In just the past week, the anti-consumer No on 37 campaign has been accused of misleading voters by Stanford University (twice), the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics and by three major newspapers. Today it was announced that the $36 million No on 37 campaign, bankrolled by $20 million from the world's six largest pesticide companies,
has been caught in yet another lie, this one's a doozy. The No on 37 campaign affixed the FDA's seal to one of the campaign's mailers, a clear violation of Section 506 of the U.S. Criminal Code, and alongside the seal attached a totally 'fabricated' quote according to the FDA.
The well healed No campaign is following the advice of Goebbels, who said, "...a lie told a hundred times will become the truth." It's fairly easy to see that when
one side can buy all the propaganda spin space they want, the
opponents are spending a million dollars per day this week, that the free press isn't really free anymore, it's become just another tool of the corporations that own them. Freedom of the press has become a sticky wicket in these time of
'truthiness'.
The fact is that a victory for the YES campaign, for the people who believe they have a 'right to know' what's in their foods, is also
a defeat for Monsanto and their ilk who's only goal in all things is the maximizing of profits for their shareholders. Corporate law dictates that all corporations are only allowed to serve their shareholders and any public service they offer is only a means to that end.
Michael Pollan
says, "Proposition 37 is the litmus test for whether there is actually a food movement in this country.. It may also be the litmus test for whether there is democracy left in this country." This vote in California is a BIG DEAL not just for Californians, not just for the rest of the US who'll undoubtedly begin to see their labeling laws change to but for people everywhere because these battles are ongoing in every country, on every continent, that doesn't already make GMO labeling mandatory [67 countries including China and all of the EU do]. Up here in BC farmers and consumers are fighting the good fight against
Arctic Apples, another 'better living through chemistry' illusion. At the UBCM Convention a couple weeks ago a resolution to ban the GMO fruits and GMO trees was carried almost unanimously. There's little a person can do these dark days to fight the global corporate colossus, but Californians will get a chance to give them a kick in the ass for us all on Nov. 6th, billions of people will be watching...and hoping.
