100 Percent Testing of Mad Cow Now Officially Illegal

September 1, 2008

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(From Matt). There are so many stories of the federal government selling out the public interest, and animal welfare, in order to protect the big meat companies. But if I had to pick the most blatantly scuzzy story of all, it would probably be this one, blogged about within the past hour by Kevin Drum of Mother Jones:

Four years ago I first reported about the travails of Creekstone Farms, a Kansas beef producer that wanted to initiate 100% testing of its cattle for mad cow disease so that it could sell into the Japanese market. It was the free market at work: a plucky little company taking advantage of emerging technology to maintain its share in a foreign market and help improve our trade deficit. Just the kind of thing George Bush talks about all the time.

Except that George Bush wouldn’t let them do it. Might upset the big producers, you see, who were afraid consumer pressure might force them to eventually perform 100% testing too. Today, via Dean Baker, I see that the DC Circuit Court has finally ruled in the Bush administration’s favor. America’s meat processing industry — which, coincidentally I’m sure, favors the GOP in its campaign contributions by more than 3:1 over Democrats — can breathe a sigh of relief.

I’ve known about the Creekstone case for years, and still can’t believe something like this could end up in court. Should Obama get elected, it’ll be interesting to see whether, and how quickly, travesties like this are addressed.

On another matter, it’s thanks to the rise of blogs that this story will get adequately publicized. The New York Times saw fit to bury its reporting of this court ruling in a one paragraph article on page C2 of Saturday’s paper.

Posted in Blog