Diet for a Dead Planet

I haven’t read Cook’s book — and I probably don’t need to. As someone who used to work for one of the biggest food companies on the planet, I can tell you just from your review that what you are saying is true.

I used to be one of the lucky “Account Managers” that had to go into meetings with the big grocery chains and get raked over the coals to pay those “slotting fees”. Another thing, and I don’t know if this is covered in Cook’s book, is “deductions”. The grocery chains are the only companies I know of that can deduct from a company what they think you owe them BEFORE any type of performance has happened. Other companies, judges, lawyers, and normal people call it by another name — stealing. But they get away with all the time, often billing for things they never follow through on. It is worse than the heinous slotting fees they charge!

The other bad thing they do is that if you give a big chain $1.20 per case on a 12 pack item (.10 per unit) in order to get your price lowered to the customer for a certain amount of time…many, many chains will keep around $.07 per item and pass along a measly $.03 to the customer.

Matt

A Gathering Swarm

Here’s what I think about the “election”.

The Democrats, as usual take the high ground, like Al Gore did in 2000. And it doesn’t work.

Gore let this country down by not challenging Bush then and there, so as to aviod “unpleasantness”. Now, we’ve got an America moving rather briskly toward facism, as Bush and Co. pursue their “no holds barred’ fight againest the American public.

This “election” was stolen also, albeit on a national scale. They learn quickly, these demogogues. The Democrats need a little more backbone (or a lot more) in dealing with these cheaters, liars and murderers. It’s time to take off the gloves. The people of this country need champions, not tea-drinkers with their collective pinkies in the air.

And Bush’s Social Security rape! Don’t get me started. This guy has ruined the entire economy and now people are actually considering letting him mess around with the ONLY program left for the people?

And why aren’t the Dems rolling up their collective sleeves and helping the Greens and Liberterians with the recount, especially in Ohio where the fraud was so blatant as to be almost comical? I’ll tell you something about your soft dreams of a revitalized Democratic Party. It’s not going to survive, period, unless people see some damned strong action for their sakes coming from these pampered slobs. And Liebovitz standing on the podium with Bush! I thought I’d puke! Bush is taking down the entire country and everyone in Washington wants to protect their own backsides. Bunch of losers! We may not have an America in another four years unless somebody gets a move on.

Regards,

LS in NM

Life of the Party

It seems to me that the real problem with the Democratic Party is that it has been taken over by a bunch of political hacks who would rather preserve their positions than work for the American people. The plain fact is that the Beltway crowd did everything they could to keep a genuine candidate from getting the nomination. Kerry was about as exciting as a fence post and about as effective. Why is it that the Democrats in Washington are afraid to take a position on anything of value? Am I bitter? You bet! I am a progressive liberal and am not afraid to say it; I sure as hell am not an ersatz republican, posing as a Democrat.

Paul Paine