Hold the beef, please

This Wall Street Journal article isn't making me happy.

Mad cow disease is thought to spread to cows by feeding them the remains of other mammals. This practice has been banned. Or so I thought. According to the WSJ, feeding the remains of cows, sheep, goats and deers to their living relatives has been banned. But feeding those remains to pigs, chickens, or pets is still permissible.

And then feeding those pigs and chickens back to cows is also permissible. Apparently this has been banned elsewhere, but not in the US. I guess we're not supposed to think more than one move ahead. (And no, the irony of the context of this post and the previous one is not lost on me.)

This is not making me happy. I'm going to hold off on the beef for a while. Which is a shame, because it's just so tasty.

Comments

[Jamie Gilcig]

The problem isn't just the feeding of mammals, but also their "byproducts".

Pet food also contains waste material from chickens and other creatures.

What we are feeding our pets is killing them. We would not feed this stuff to prisoners!

Also, what we feed the animals we eat is what we eat!

Finally, the hormones and antibiotics that are pumped into the animals we eat also enter our systems.

This should be labeled on any meat products we purchase.

[Doug Kenline]

Pierre,

Thank you very much for blogging for the people! I commented more on your Trust And Government Post.

Doug Kenline
Atlanta, Georgia

[John]

Try going for range fed beef, if you can find it, it is alot healthier and much more tasty. No pieces-parts of animals pumped into them. Or hormones, etc etc...

[Chad Williams]

There's probably some lobbyists who blocked tougher rules. Apparently we (the US) are way behind other first-world nations & the EU in the way animal feed is regulated.

There are plenty of these kind of situations where millions of people are adversely affected by decisions favoring fairly narrow interest groups. But what if there were some way for the unorganized majority to easily organize and fight back?

[Doug Kenline]

Pierre,

Your blog has been getting some blog press. The people are interested in the Pierre Omidyar blog.

http://www.corante.com/blogging/20030501.shtml#37163

[Doug Kenline]

From: "Kent & Phyllis"
Privacy alert regarding eBay and Paypal

I found this URL to a chilling story regarding eBay's playing loose and
fast with customer data this morning to TheNation.com. Evidently, "no due
process" is eBay's game. Their chief of Law Enforcement and Compliance,
Joseph Sullivan--a former DOJ employee--even offered to conscript eBay
employees to help with stings of customers. Travelocity and Amazon.com are
also mentioned as "...using vague language to give themselves virtually
complete discretion as to what customer information they will turn over to
law-enforcement officials."

http://thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i030707&s=engle

[Doug Kenline]

Speaking at a conference this winter on Internet crime, eBay.com's director of law enforcement and compliance, Joseph Sullivan, offered law-enforcement officials extensive access to personal customer information.

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030707&c=1&s=engle

[Doug Kenline]

eBay avoids legal trouble with its customers by giving itself carte blanche to divulge any and all personal information. Its hard-to-find privacy policy says: "Due to the existing regulatory environment, we cannot ensure that all of your private communications and other personal information will never be disclosed in ways not otherwise described in this Privacy Policy."

In liberal democracies it is assumed that criminal investigation and law enforcement are the sole domain of government. But the trend in the United States, as evidenced by eBay, among many companies, now sees huge private-sector commercial entities becoming, in effect, agents of law enforcement.

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20030707&c=2&s=engle

[Richard]

John's 'go for range-fed beef' is a good start. The best strategy I've found (without slipping into the typical overzealousness that quickly finds its way into this issue) is to treat mammal flesh as a DELICACY. Buying very expensive meat is the quickest route, to the extent that price follows quality. Certainly this isn't always true, but with a little research the best cuts from the best markets or restaurants will usually get me what I want. This necessarily limits overall intake for anyone on a budget. Avoid fast food meat. Interestingly, if you treat fast food meat as a delicacy as well, consumption will be minimal and you won't need to eliminate it from your diet.