- ‹ previous
- 3623 of 8830
- next ›
Time To Ban Beef From School Lunch
Yesterday, news broke that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) was recalling a record-breaking 143 million pounds of beef from a California meat packer. The Humane Society had caught employees at the Hallmark/Westland Meat company last month on video using a forklift to prop up sick "downer" cows long enough to pass inspection, in violation of a host of federal regs. The USDA hasn't exactly snapped into action on this one. Eating meat from sick cows can spread mad cow disease, yet most of the beef suspected of being contaminated had already been consumed by the time USDA announced the recall. And you know who ate it? Little kids.
A big chunk of the nation's poorest quality beef is routinely dumped on federally subsidized school lunch programs. Not surprisingly, beef in school lunch has caused a fair amount of food poisoning. No one knows how the mad cow problem will play out, since it takes years for the disease to show up in humans. But one thing is certain: As the Humane Society's video reaffirmed, USDA seems largely incapable of guaranteeing the safety of beef in this country. (The USDA tests fewer than 1 percent of all slaughtered cows for mad cow disease, and Bush administration, in fact, went to court to prevent one beef producer from voluntarily testing all his cattle for mad cow disease because it would make all the other companies look bad.)
Given that little kids are far more vulnerable to the effects of food poisoning than adults are, it seems to me that it's time to simply ban beef from the school lunch program. It's not like kids will suffer much. Most of them spend plenty of time at McDonalds. In fact, in light of the current obesity epidemic, there's a strong argument for banning beef solely based on its fat content. But putting school children at risk of illness and death from dangerous beef to subsidize ranchers and shoddy meat companies is criminal. Let the kids eat garbanzo beans and force the meat companies to find somewhere else to peddle their sick cows.
I don't think we need to ban it entirely; as lunch programs like the one highlighted in Super Size Me have shown, you can serve good meat as part of organic, freshly-prepared meals for not much more than the huge institutional programs, and achieve health and behavior benefits. I think we need to ban industrial beef in school lunches.
Absolutely. In fact, isn't this reason enough for all of us to ban beef from our diet. I have decided to. I have known about abuses for a long time, we all have. Honestly, these videos were sickening, but we did know. We just blocked our consciousness to be able to eat beef. And now I no longer want to disregard what I know and participate in this slaughter.
We stopped eating beef years ago because of mad cow in the UK.
These kids are our future - the future of the country.
No more beef - period. We won't even know if they have been poisoned for many years.
UGH!
["The USDA hasn't exactly snapped into action on this one.
...
USDA seems largely incapable of guaranteeing the safety of beef in this country" (or fruits & vegetables for that matter. D.S.)]
Yeah, so let's get the government to fix it(self).
How 'bout we follow the Underwriters Lab model?
(one that's WORKED to insure we have safe appliances for over 100 years) rather than continuing to speed faster and faster down a path that isn't getting us where we want to go?
NO sense of security is a safer thing to have than a FALSE one.
You folks want to trust the people who run the war on drugs to decide what you're going to eat?
I'll pass on that dish.
Many types of food have caused disease, including onions, lettuce, chicken, and many other things too numerous to list. This country consumes a LOT of beef, and to suggest it is a "dangerous" food is just as ridiculous as suggesting we should all eat canned vegetables becaue sometimes fresh vegetables harbor bacteria.
I'm a small rancher (45 cows) who sends good quality beef to the packer. I get NO government subsidies to do it. None. I feed my family with my earnings, and my cows are well tended. SO PLEASE, THINK BEFORE YOU TYPE THIS NONSENSE.
Let them eat cake, right?
Darren, at least for me, it's not so much the "beef is dangerous" idea (though I am a vegetarian) but the disgusting and despicable practices that slaughterhouses engage in. While small farmers like yourself may offer more humane care, you are not the majority - and the thought of what these poor animals are going through just sickens me. Seeing and reading things like this really makes me feel the truth of Gandhi's quote about judging the greatness and moral progress of a nation based on how its animals are treated.
Ah.. while there's nothing funny about abusing animals, I can't help getting a kick of watching people's reaction when exposed to the reality that makes their daily life possible. It helps to have been vegetarian for 13 years, with no beef for 15 and no pork for 20. Bans? Enforcements? Why not depend solely on making people face reality. Can you imagine that world? No more hiding beyond corporate, government, financial, religious and cultural facades. Open the curtains. See how we've let this place go...
Yes, by all means, ban the beef. Go Vegetarian. Beef cows fart and make CO2, along with fat Americans.
The school lunch program is just another bad subsidy to the factory farms and factory meat outfits. And Democrats and Republicans all continued the same old school lunch program in the 'new' farm bill.
That said, this video was startling in that the sleeping 'Humane' Society is finally taking up the fight PETA and others have been on for years. Did they finally freakin' wake up and realize 'humane' doesn't just refer to cats and dogs?
143 million pounds of beef has been recalled, the largest in U.S. history. "We do not feel this product presents a health risk of any significance," said Dick Raymond, the undersecretary of agriculture for food safety. When informed that most of the meat has probably already been eaten, Raymond observed, "Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!"
Tony Peyser (Buzzflash)
Obviously not everything is the same (e.g. where IE6 crashes, the HTML5 spec requires something else) but by and large it is already as close to IE6 as possible. So not only would we consider doing what you describe, to a large extent, we've done it. In practice browser vendors have to do that anyway, whether it's specced or not, due to the volumes of content on the Web depending on it. It's better to have a spec than require reverse engineering (especially when your EULA might forbit the latter!).
You know,everyone is talking about how the inspectors aren't doing their jobs,but when you have shortages of inspectors and the USDA agency is trying to let the companies take on more "responsibility" for "how they process" their products,who is responsible?The companies who try to keep every little bit or the Agency for not making sure the inspectors ARE doing the job they are getting paid for(not sleeping on the line)???You complain about beef plants,anyone every checked out a poultry processing plant?? so much has changed in the last five to ten years.
The USDA Agency doesn't want the floor inspectors in the areas unless the is a sample test to be done...they have to MONITER the plants operations via computer files of the plants tests.And we all know how well a company can always have correct/good paperwork.
["And we all know how well a company can always have correct/good paperwork."]
All they have to do is model their system on the Federal government's, and we can all sleep better at night, knowing we're adequately protected.
Yeah,when the usda is trying to implament their HACCP plan to put inpspectors at the END of the lines and just do "spot" checks instead of on the lines checking every(poultry)carcass.'course when inspectors are asleep or not paying attention to the carcasses,who's to blame then...supervisors too busy on the computer,floor inspectors who are checking the plants paperwork,even plants attitude is they will get it at the end of the line!!!go figure.