FAST FOOD FIGHTS BACK, PART DEUX

Once again turning the tables on customers who are attacking the industry with lawsuits and bad restaurant reviews, the Burger Barons have stepped up retaliation: One customer at Arby's found fresh blood all over his roast beef sandwich (a warning, perhaps?) while a couple of McDonald's customers bit into broken glass on their burgers. And a fast food chain even killed a 7-year-old boy in Argentina, apparently, with the usual suspect, E.coli. So far no word whether it was McDonald's or Burger King, so the country shut down both of 'em. Wild times, man.

I'LL JUST SWITCH TO 1/2 THE FISH

Here's one from last week that I almost missed: The World Health Organization and the Food and Agricultural Organization in Rome CUT BY HALF the recommended intake limits for expectant mothers of methylmercury, a toxic chemical found especially in predator fish such as shark and swordfish. So however much you thought you could get away with, halve it.

OHIO'S LARGEST EGG FARM ORDERED CLOSED

"The pollution and nuisance problems caused by this farm during the last decade were intolerable," Agriculture Director Fred Dailey said. "The sad legacy of mismanagement of Buckeye Egg Farm is rapidly coming to an end." The farm promises to appeal, and chickens could still die there if the company succeeds in selling the farm to someone else. However, the AP quotes industry analysts as predicting that "potential buyers are likely to lose interest in Buckeye Egg Farm if state agriculture officials succeed in forcing its closure and that losing the eggs it produces -- 4 percent of the nation's supply -- would likely drive up prices in supermarkets." Heh. Eggs-cellent!

CANADIAN MAD COW MIGHT BE FROM U.S.

This is late, only because I couldn't believe I hadn't already blogged it. As everyone probably knows by now, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency say it's a "distinct possibility" that the Mad Cow that started all the current trouble originally came from our country. Overall, the odds are against it, but as Business Week points out, the USDA hasn't done much to earn our confidence in this area, so who knows?
UPDATE 7/10: USDA urged to employ mad cow rapid test, reports UPI.

NEWS ACROSS THE WATER

Big doings, both pro-animal and con, over in the UK: A damning report revealing profound misgivings over the harvesting of animal organs for human transplants was secretly buried by government officials. Not much of a surprise there, considering the UK government's record on animal-testing reports. However, they didn't bury this one: Science has advanced so much that some drugs can be tested in tiny doses on humans rather than continuing to use monkeys for experiments, the (UK) government's official advisory body has decided. We'll see how long it takes that news to get all the way across the pond.

USDA TAKES NO PRISONERS

The Department of Agriculture just keeps getting tougher, and tougher, and tougher with meat & poultry producers. In a news release about the USDA's Increased Enforcement, we find that said enforcement equals: "a new registration form that asks registrants to provide certain information that was not requested previously, including an e-mail address, phone number and subsidiaries' hours of operations." YEAH! How do you like that, beee-yotch!?? Now you actually have to tell us your phone number!

PLEASE DON'T EAT THE ANIMALS

That's the headline of a Globe and Mail article that picks up on the points raised by a certain op-ed columnist a month ago, back when nobody knew what the word "zoonotic" meant, and makes some of the connections between animal industries and human diseases. Unfortunately, this column fails to deliver on the convictins expressed in its headline, restricting its meaning to exotic animals.

VICTORY THROUGH HEMP

This is a couple days old, but I wanted to have something positive about America - land that I love - to post on July 4: U.S. Court Rejects DEA Ban on Hemp Foods. For those who don't get the connection, there's a little fat called Omega-3... As to hemp itself, "its oil is found in lotions, soap and cosmetics and in a host of foods, including energy bars, waffles, milk-free cheese, veggie burgers and bread." Go waffles! USA! USA!

DATELINE: HOLLYWOOD!

In the new Charlies Angels sequel, reviewers keep remarking that Demi Moore looks as hot as, or hotter than, her younger co-stars. One outlet sez that Demi "owes her sizzling new look to Hollywood's hottest new chef, who refuses to cook his culinary delights. ... Juliano's raw treats feature no meat or dairy products." Hmmm.

In terms of plotlines, animal rights and vegetarianism seem to be turning up with more frequency. Rather than quirky supporting characters, vegetarians are moving into lead roles. Last year's My Big Fat Greek Wedding had a vegetarian romantic lead (though the argument could be made that John Corbett still played only a supporting character), and Hollywood Homocide boasts a vegan as one of the mismatched cops in this buddy movie.

In Legally Blonde 2, animal rights becomes a main plot point, the cause for which Elle fights and wins. And in a rare move, this "message" carried over into the real-life shoewear - Reese Witherspoon wore 63 pairs, no leather on any of 'em. Unfortunately, like all the other movies mentioned, this one seems to kind of suck. For a movie that uses vegetarianism/AR in a surprisingly effective way, and which doesn't suck, check out Scotland, PA, an update of MacBeth, in which "McDuff is convinced there's foul play at the new center of the fast food universe."

FRIVOLITY MARCHES ON

The news sites have made a big deal about it, but I don't have much to say about the big Kraft-to-make-cheese-less-like-complete-junk story... except to note that it's a clear outcome of those "frivolous" fast-food lawsuits. This USA Today story, which includes some others in the trend, spells it out with a subhead: "Looking to stay out of court."

SCIENTISTS: GOV'T SHOULD WARN CITIZENS AWAY FROM MEAT

"The government should encourage people to eat less fat and meat," is how Reuters summarizes the NIH panel's report on cancer-causing dioxins in animal fats. The administration is too cheap (or too scared?) to actually test the levels of dioxins in these foods, so warnings have to be vague and theoretical. But the scientists stress that "The government should teach women and girls to eat less of the fats found in meat, poultry, fatty fish and whole milk years before they become pregnant to protect their offspring from harmful dioxins." In other words, we're screwed already by our poisoned environment, but maybe we can give our kids a fighting chance with a more vegan diet.

OUTFOXED

You have to wonder if the recent revelation that "far from trying to keep numbers down, [joint hunt masters in England] were trying to encourage foxes to breed in order to have sufficient numbers to hunt" had anything to do with it. Either way, though, "a majority of lawmakers in the House of Commons voted Monday for an outright ban on fox hunting with hounds, rejecting a government proposal for strict controls." The legislation is still not definitive, and it wouldn't take effect until 2005, and it's just fox hunting with hounds, but still... this is a watershed moment. Consciousness is growing, and it ain't going away.

HOW'S THAT OTHER WAR GOING?

You know the one I mean - the War on E.Coli! Oh, it's going swimmingly - but don't swim in Georgia's Lake Lanier, where a tanker truck spilled its contents - chicken blood - resulting in a spike in E.Coli there. And don't drink the water in Cook, Minnesota, because it's chock full of E.Coli.

But these are just teasers - the real issue, of course, is how the USDA is clamping down on meatpackers to stop people from getting sick and dying from feces-smeared beef. Well, gee: Stampede Meats (an unfortunate enough moniker, though when the story broke on Friday (*cough*), it was only tied to a distributor called "Farmer's Pride" - sound familiar?) has just recalled 739,000 Pounds (370 tons) of Beef, not just for suspicion of E.Coli, but because four people have already been sickened by the company's steaks. "Steaks are not usually considered a high-risk source of E. coli, but the government said the Stampede products had been injected with tenderizers and other solutions, and the injections increased the risk of contamination." Again, sound familiar?

And in a further tie to the previous post, Kirk Smith, supervisor of MDH's foodborne illness investigation team, said it is not known how widely the products were distributed. Boy, how convenient for the meatpackers, who with the help of their friends in the GOP just scuttled a law that would vastly improve tracking and tracing of meat.
UPDATE 7/9: The E. Coli that sickened people has been connected to the Stampede meat recall, says the AP, with MSNBC pointing out that this now means everyone should be wary of steaks. Well, yeah.

SHUT THAT VEGETARIAN UP!

A certain vegetarian protester is getting a lot of press for standing up to the Bush administration in a stark free-speech dispute. Brett Bursey was arrested for "trespassing" at the Columbia Metropolitan Airport in October during Bush's visit because he was protesting the president's warmongering, while pro-GOP demonstrators in the same space were not "trespassing." The original charge was dropped and replaced with a more convoluted one, resulting in a legal technicality that's just delayed Bursey's trial. This will be one to watch.

COW-KILLERS BEG FOR BUSINESS

As the Canadian livestock industry continues to reel from the effect of "one sick cow," patriotic Canadians are being urged to bail them out: "Consumers should beef up their barbecues with roasting cuts instead of regular steaks for Canada Day celebrations to help beleaguered cattle producers survive the mad cow scare, says a campaign by the industry." This comes as a report of Mad Sheep (where BSE originally came from, supposedly) in Canada makes everybody jumpy, and a report slamming the industry for lax safety procedures makes them all defensive.

And meanwhile, back in the USA, Tom Harkin calls for a full BSE report from the USDA, which apparently knows something that Botswana doesn't - or is it the other way around? Somehow the latter got it into their heads that it's not safe to feed cattle the manure of chickens who have eaten cattle. What could possibly go wrong?

HIGH-CARB DIET PROLONGS LIFE

"People who closely follow a Mediterranean diet - rich in vegetables, grains and olive oil - live longer than those who don't," says new research involving 22,000 people. "Working with a 10-point scale that gauged adherence to the diet, researchers found that an increase of two points on the scale led to a 25 percent reduction in overall death rates. It also led to a 33 percent reduction in deaths from coronary heart disease, and a 24 percent reduction in deaths from cancer." Those are huge percentages, folks. I know, there's fish in it, but you can replace those Omega-3s with flax and not get the radiation (see below) or mercury.

I'LL JUST SWITCH TO SHRIMP

The prawn industry ... has become a case study in how to destroy the environment and undermine social harmony," sez the Japan Times. But if you're thinking of switching back to the bigger fish, note that Greenpeace research found traces of radioactive waste in salmon on sale in major supermarkets in the UK (via Vegan Porn), and canned tuna turns out to have from twice to four times as much mercury as anyone should be eating, depending on the variety.

BULLFIGHT FIGHT

"A clash between the operator of the Plaza Mexico bullring and lawmakers over the rules governing public events in Mexico City has halted amateur bullfighting this season, which is a training ground for future stars," reports the Houston Chronicle. "Unless the issue is resolved soon, it threatens the regular bullfighting season, scheduled to begin in early November." Oh, nooooooo!!!!
UPDATE 6/30: In another blow to this venerable bloodsport, children under 14 are now banned from attending bullfights in Catalonia, making the "Supporters said they hoped the ban would diminish children's exposure to violence." Ya think?

NOT MILK - AND NOT COHEN

Hey, Robert Cohen's no saint, but it's interesting that this article entitled Not Milk: The Unwholesome Collusion of the USDA, Monsanto, and the U.S. Dairy Industry contains absolutely no mention of the "notmilkman" himself, who has pretty much "owned" this particular story for at least five years. Meanwhile across the pond, Millions of British adults are suffering from serious illness because their bodies are unable to safely digest milk, a husband and wife team of biochemists have claimed. And even if these two scientists are, as charged, somehow confusing lactose intolerance with milk allergies - which is pretty hard to believe - it's interesting that two people who drink milk are suggesting the problem is at least twice as big as previously reported.

A TALE OF TWO PETAS

I've said it before, but I'll set it down here again: PETA should spend more of its valuable time, energy and reputation on this sort of thing - procuring footage of abuse and publicizing it - and less - wayyyyyyy less - on this sort.