For Schmidt, Schlangen, Hershberger, It’s Pick Your Legal Poison Time, and We're Not Talking About Raw Milk
When you follow the tedium of the legal justice system, you begin to understand why some defendants, even though they are innocent, decide to cop pleas rather than follow the process through to completion. It can be a maddening process that is often difficult for the non-jurist to make sense of, and it doesn’t necessarily matter what country you are in.
Three cases involving food rights activists are cases in point:
*In Canada, raw milk dairy farmer Michael Schmidt was in court Thursday, placed in the awkward position of seeking an Ontario judge’s permission to travel next week to British Columbia so he could stand trial on separate contempt-of-court charges. You see, Schmidt is barred from traveling because he is facing conspiracy charges in Ontario in connection with his supposed involvement in the disappearance of a herd of Shropshire sheep last year in Ontario. The sheep were targeted by public health authorities for slaughter because they were thought to be diseased. As part of Schmidt’s bail terms, he’s had his passport confiscated, and he’s not permitted even to leave Ontario without permission. Hence, his court appearance so he could be granted the privilege of going on trial in another province—the British Columbia charges grow out of his takeover of a herdshare, so that members there would continue to receive their raw milk. Canada’s national health system, Health Canada, had approved use of raw milk as a cosmetic, yet British Columbia public health authorities refused to recognize the designation, and insisted on prosecuting Schmidt, along with an associate. Gordon Watson. It’s generally understood in Canada that Schmidt is in “lockdown” as a way to muffle his powerful voice on behalf of food rights during travels around North America. Schmidt has expressed his views of the motives of the Canadian bureaucrats pressing to punish him, in this article on The Bovine blog.
*In Minnesota, farmer Alvin Schlangen had appealed to a judge in his home Stearns County to drop three of six misdemeanor charges, arguing they were nearly identical to charges he had been acquitted of last September in Hennepin County, mostly involving raw milk distribution. The follow-on charges constituted “serial prosecution,” argued Schlangen’s lawyer, Nathan Hansen. Nothing doing, said the judge, in an opinion issued Thursday. “The crimes charged in Stearns County are separate and apart from any crimes that were charged in Hennepin County. Although the offenses are similar in type, they are not the same crimes and do not constitute a single behavioral incident. A defendant charged, and either convicted or acquitted of a sale crime, cannot thereby immunize himself against being prosecuted for all future sale crimes on different dates in different locations.” It looks as if Schlangen will indeed face a second trial with a second jury…and a very aggressive prosecutor.
*In Wisconsin, raw milk farmer Vernon Hershberger has filed a brief arguing that his religious beliefs prevented him from challenging the state’s Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) when his farm store was raided and shuttered in 2010. The state has argued that his failure to challenge the shutdown, which was premised partly on the supposed dangers of raw milk, now prevent him from calling a witness at his trial to testify about the benefits of raw milk. Hershberger in an affidavit accompanying the brief, explained why his religious beliefs prevented him from taking legal action against the state:
"Scripture contains the following admonition in Matthew 5:38-41: '… And if any man will sue thee at the law, and take away thy coat, let him have thy cloke also. And whosoever shall compel thee to go a mile, go with him twain.' The Bible teaches that we should not be aggressors in court actions by suing people or filing counter claims (“cross bills”, below), even though it is possible by course of law to force off the coat from a man's back. We are not to marvel at the matter, but, in such a case, rather than go to the law by way of revenge, rather than exhibit a cross bill, or stand out to the utmost, in defense of that which is our undoubted right; rather we are to let him even take our cloak also. If the matter be small, which we may lose without a considerable damage to our families, it is good to submit to it for the sake of peace. It will not cost us so much to buy another cloak, as it will cost us by course of law to recover that; and therefore unless we canst get it again by fair means, it is better to let him take it.
“Thus, Scripture requires me to avoid initiating conflict. I cannot be the aggressor in a lawsuit. I could not request the hearing provided by the administrative rules and referenced on the State’s holding order even though the findings of fact in the order were incorrect, because it would have been tantamount to suing the State and would have violated this Scriptural prohibition on initiating conflict. “
It’s definitely a different take on the American way of handling legalities than most of our increasingly litigious society is inclined towards. It makes a lot of sense, but the judges hearing these food rights cases seem long on legalities, and short on sense. Remember, what this is all about is whether Hershberger can call a particular witness. Who knows what other technicalities the state will raise in an ongoing effort to delay the actual trial, currently scheduled for May.
If nothing else, these legal maneuverings are great opportunities for all concerned to practice patience, and learn more about the intricacies of our legal systems. Our legal systems represent opportunities to delay and intimidate by the authorities, but they also represent opportunities to educate people about the issues at hand. Michael Schmidt, Alvin Schlangen, and Vernon Hershberger are performing huge services by standing in for all of us to force the authorities to explain themselves, and allow the public to evaluate the substance of their arguments.
This site's mission is to provide news and analysis about food rights and raw milk. Increasingly, our access to privately available food is under attack by government and industry forces that seek to impose their choices on us. The Complete Patient seeks to provide up-to-date information and encourage the development of community to maintain traditional food acquisition options.
The "authorities" don't ever feel the need to have to explain anything they do. And as for public education, one can hardly get a bit of information across to the average "Joe/Sally" unless it hits their purse strings.
Those who are interested enough to do even a modicum of research on any food/farm related issue can be overwhelmed by what they find. Sometimes I end up just "standing by" these farmers, because of what little information I can gleen from what I read, and that I believe in their causes, and can 'see' the persecution that they endure at the hands of governments/taxpayer dollars!
Also, I'd like to ask anyone here what their take is on the following: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23375414. Here is another example of "information" "educating" the public. I literally need a "Paul Harvey" to tell me "the rest of the story!" David G., David M., miguel, Sylvia???...can you comment? I apologize if this has been already covered here...I don't think it has...but I may have missed it if it was.
mfpellicano,
This article doesn't say just how "small" of a study it was, also it doesn't state where the bones came from nor what the animals were fed, all of which are very important factors. For myself, I would not want any animal products from the feed lots or chicken houses et al. They all are contaminated to me. We all know, the definition of "Organic" can be very obscure. So called "organic" chickens/beef can come from the feed lots/chicken houses, not what I would want, nor recommend for healthy eating.
Hopefully the doctors/nutritionists will correctly recommend products from healthy environments/fed natural healthy foods. The article itself, would lead me to believe that all bone broth may contain high levels of lead....very misleading. I would bet the majority of people don't look further into the study or ask the above questions about environment/animal feeds, etc.
I make my own broths, if I am out of chicken or beef broth, I then use my vegetable broth. Too many chemical in store bought broth and I have no idea what they fed their animals or the environment they were raised.
Learning about our foods and health can be very overwhelming. I used to tell my diabetic patients to make very small changes at a time. Let your body and mind get comfortable with each change before moving on. For them or probably anyone, a drastic change in diet leads to failure.
Silvia, thank you for your reply. I am very aware of CAFO's, so I haven't bought meat of any kind from supermarkets, or other unknown sources in years. I am also aware of the fact that livestock are also what they are fed. This article was so obtuse however, and it's claim so maddening that I just had to research it more today and found the following: http://chriskresser.com/bone-broth-and-lead-toxicity-should-you-be-conce.... I knew I'd find more about this if I just kept looking. And you're right about the word "organic," as it means different things depending on who uses it.
Yes, good info, Sylvia. I would just add that increasing numbers of people want to avoid the meats, even those labeled organic, sold in supermarkets. There is no guarantee of safety, but the closest we seem to be able to come is food from farmers like Michael Schmidt, Alvin Schlangen, and Vernon Hershberger. That's why their cases are so important--not just for them, but for the many farmers who are emulating them and their means of distributing food. I'd add that, as distasteful as the legal cases against these farmers are, the education component comes as much from monitoring what the authorities reveal in these cases. In court, the regulators are forced to defend their positions, cite data, and it's when they make such attempts that we are able to hear and see the inconsistencies and, often, the emptiness of their arguments.
exactly ... one of the maxims of war is ; "sometimes the best recognizance you can get is 'getting shot at' one tiny example here in BC being: when Fraser Health slapped a Violation Notice on one of our depots, I immediately challenged it. The pricks then managed to have it "stayed" because they realized I'd use the Disclosure protocol in Provincial Court, to open them up like a can of sardines. Afterwards, when I spoke to the agency in charge of prosecuting such Notices, asking for documentation as to who, and why, stayed it, I was told that the Crown Counsel had begged-off, on the ground that 'the signatures on the tickets were indiscernable'. Yeah, well, through FoI I already had their internal documents showing that excuse to be an utter lie.
these Quangoes* are dinosaurs operating on peabrains. They do well as long as citizens just suffer in silence. But when someone gathers-up righteous indignation and focusses it properly, the miscreants are revealed as the little "Wizards of Oz' which they are all along
We the People are only now finding out how powerful this new technology is = the Internet = to put the bureaucrats back in their proper place = as civil servants, rather than our masters
*Quasi-governmental agencies
A hilarious spoof on the Dodge Ram "God Made a Farmer" superbowl commercial:
http://www.funnyordie.com/videos/e1abab3c2b/god-made-a-factory-farmer
Also, a more serious analysis of the implicit racism in Dodge's ad:
http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/02/the-whitewashing-of-...
Uh should there have been an equal amount from each race? Then again, many don't believe in God. Perhaps those people were offended to?
I thought it brought to light the things a farmer does and their importance. Racism didn't enter my mind. But then for some, racism is foremost in their minds.
"And on the eighth day, God looked down on his planned paradise and said, "I need a caretaker." So God made a farmer.
God said, "I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, milk cows, work all day in the field, milk cows again, eat supper, then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board." So God made a farmer.
God said, "I need somebody willing to sit up all night with a newborn colt and watch it die, then dry his eyes and say,'Maybe next year,' I need somebody who can shape an ax handle from an ash tree, shoe a horse with hunk of car tire, who can make a harness out hay wire, feed sacks and shoe scraps. Who, during planting time and harvest season will finish his 40-hour week by Tuesday noon and then, paining from tractor back, put in another 72 hours." So God made the farmer.
God said, "I need somebody strong enough to clear trees and heave bales, yet gentle enough to yean lambs and wean pigs and tend the pink-comb pullets, who will stop his mower for an hour to splint the leg of a meadowlark."
It had to be somebody who'd plow deep and straight and not cut corners. Somebody to seed, weed, feed, breed, and brake, and disk, and plow, and plant, and tie the fleece and strain the milk, . Somebody who'd bale a family together with the soft, strong bonds of sharing, who would laugh, and then sigh and then reply with smiling eyes when his son says that he wants to spend his life doing what Dad does. "So God made a farmer."
Sylvia,
Did you watch the spoof "God made a Factory Farmer"? Its pretty funny, and highlights the problems with our industrial agricultural system.
I am an athiest, but the "god" part didn't offend me so much. I would be OK with people invoking "god" if they did it for the right reasons... for example, to call for an end to militarism, poverty, enviromental destruction, and social injustice of all kinds. However, Dodge Ram invoked "god" for all the wrong reasons. More than anything, the Dodge Ram commercial highlighted how shamelessly Corporate America is willing to exploit imagery of hard working American Heartland farmers for its own greedy ends. And how they ignore the immigrant (primarily Mexican) laborers who do the majority of US farm work today.
I also just saw this Tim Wightman commentary on the "God made a farmer" commercial. Another good criticism of Dodge's shameless self-promotion.
http://www.thehealthyhomeeconomist.com/sustainable-farmers-response-to-g...
Dodge has done nothing different than other entities that exploit Christmas, Easter or any other religious day. Much of the world is corporate. For the majority of Americans, and I noticed some of the Germans in the 70s-80s; It was a shopping holiday, not so much a religious thing.
Just imagine if the "laborers" got paid a living wage there'd be no room for the illegals. And if the farmers made money they then would be able to pay living wages, but alas it hasn't been that way in decades.
From a friend in Az:
"on the Arizona border the whole notion that these farmworkers are paid slave wages is a lie they foster on the public to gain political advantage.
Produce workers are hired by growers (which, by the way, requires a worker to have a social security card, and you know how illegals obtain those--illegally of course).
They work in teams called crews. Depending on the grower and the product they are paid a basic wage of somewhere between $10 and $12 per hour. Not minimum wage, but not enough to support a family. From this wage are deducted federal and state taxes.
These are the facts that liberal apologists love to cite. That they are merely hard-working, tax-paying people who simply want a better life for themselves and their families.
However:
Much like the garment industry, there are cash bonuses for a crew that harvests more than the standard allotment. Depending upon the crop and the demand, these cash bonuses can be significant: equalling or exceeding the standard pay. And, because it is paid in cash, no taxes are deducted.
It is not at all unusual for a good crew to make the equivilent of $30 - $40 per hour. In truth they work from before sunup to after sundown, and the work is long and tedious, but not especially difficult. (stoop--cut--stand--repeat) for 8-10 hours a day, 6-7 days a week.
Because the wages are significant, spots on crews are coveted. Unlike these apologists suggest, if you went down and applied for a job, you would not be hired. These spots typically are reserved for friends and relatives.
Even if you were to be hired as a publicity stunt, you would be shunned. First, because you don't speak Spanish, second because you are new to the job, and would hold an experienced crew back (and don't expect anyone to show you the ropes either--you are unwanted there), and lastly because you are an outsider, and taking a job which is more or less expected to go to friends or family.
Not all farm labor jobs go to illegals, but a significant number do (those are the family members or friends coming up from Mexico)
At the end of the harvest season, some workers (maybe 25-30%) move to another state and another crop. But most are not migrant farm workers any longer. They are laid off by the growers at the end of the season in mid April, and collect unemployment benefits for 6 months until planting starts in mid October.
They make more money than the public assumes, they only pay a portion of their taxes, they collect unemployment for half the year, and they act as a conduit for illegal family and friends coming up from Mexico."
Does your friend have any hard evidence to back up these claims, or is it, as usual, just an attempt to rationalize racism against immigrants and to divide the working class?
(I am not a liberal, btw. I have been VERY emphatic in my rejection of liberalism, in case you haven't caught that yet. American-style "Libertarianism" is a subset of the broader liberal ideology.)
Back in the 60s, I picked strawberries and tomatoes. I worked alongside of mostly white, asian and black field workers, with very few mexicans. This was within 200 miles of Sacramento. There was a lot of us "children" (under 14) working in the fields. People who use the race card show their true colors. (pun intended)
Bill, in the future, I will ignore you, unless you are talking about cheese.
Way to play the smug card, Sylvia.
For the record, I am white and from the middle class. But unlike most of these right-wing "libertarians" and mushy petit bourgeois liberals around here, I am not blinded to the privilege which I enjoy as a white-middle class male.
Back in the 1960's, Sylvia, they didn't have NAFTA and other neoliberal "free trade" agreements. The US wasn't flooding Mexican corn markets with cheap subsidized GMO corn, driving their subsistance peasant farmers off the land.
Its not the 1960's anymore. But given what you have just said here, I can only imagine that back then you would have been one of the people opposed to Cesar Chavez when he went on hunger strike. Unfortunate.
Go ahead and ignore me. Show how smug and self-rightous you are. PLEASE Sylvia. "The race card"??? UGH!!
I don't know how we got started down this road but only a white person would call this a card game Sylvia. I think we can all see how difficult it is for white consumers to get fresh food, what chance does a minority have in this country? "It is not at all unusual for a good crew(How many American workers fit that description?) to make the equivalent of $30 - $40 per hour(electricians scale). In truth they work from before sun up to after sundown(14hrs.), and the work is long and tedious, but not especially difficult(Not especially difficult?). (stoop--cut--stand--repeat) for 8-10 hours a day, 6-7 days a week(Mandatory, at straight pay.)." Look up living wage. How can Europeans call indigenous people illegal aliens. You guys brought it up, I'm just sayn. Our bosses are the ones that bring them in so don't blame the workers. If we allow them to pay illegals less, there is no reason for them to hire us.
Thanks Mike. I totally agree. By keeping immigrants "illegal", they can repress their wages using fear tactics, which represses wages for all workers.
@ rawmilkmike: WE don't allow them to pay illegals less. They get by with paying less because the gubment is picking up the tab for everything else for illegals. Unlike slavery, where the slave owner was obligated (with his ownership) to feed, clothe, educate and provide medical care, with illegal immigration the burden of expenses is carried by the entire nation. So instead of individual slave owners having to endure the expenses of supposedly cheap labor, it is a burden now carried by taxpaying Americans.
But you're right. There IS no reason for them to hire "us".
All labour is subsidised in this country especially minimum wage jobs. The living wage starts around $24 an hour and can easily be twice that. The wealthy drive up the cost of living in this country. Union busting, overtime, and increasing the the retirement age drive down wages. Selling subsidised corn in Mexico lowers wages there as well. My lack of big words shows I never went to college but these thing are obvious even to me. I guess you can tell the subject gets me a little emotional.
Regarding this: “The living wage starts around $24 an hour and can easily be twice that.”
Low wages are not the problem Mike, but the very prevalence of “wages” themselves. It behooves us all to take a good step back and carefully inspect the current paradigm that nearly everyone should earn their daily bread from government or corporate wages. If we look honestly at it, I think we will conclude that it is an absolutely deadly idea.
A man cannot be psychologically or spiritually healthy unless his work is in clear and understandable symbiosis with his neighbors. Most old-fashioned livelihoods---butcher, baker, candlestick maker---were clearly aimed at the immediate needs of local communities. As such, labor's fruits were obvious---good or bad. Modern “workers” on the other hand, often have no idea whom they serve, and worse, no idea if their work is truly beneficial. (That is why natural farming for one's local community is so satisfying---there is little better one can do for his brother than both feed him and care properly for the planet that sustains him.)
To our great detriment we have been lead away from the livelihoods that were so neatly tied to the needs of our neighbors, and drawn into factories, bureaucracies, and myriad corporate systems that create, above all, space between people. Captured by lurid promises of physical ease and high living standards (as if cheap goods in abundance can replace human relationships) we have abandoned the very thing that makes life worth living: brotherly love, given and received. By now, generations into the world of corporate and government wages for all, we have so imbibed the notion that happiness equates with copious consumer goods and the least possible physical exertion that we feel justified in fighting system injustices with the invention of even more systems (unions and regulatory bureaucracies come quickly to mind). We are attempting to wield the problem as a solution; in so doing we have become what we hated.
The humane solution is to redefine happiness as joy, not money. Then maybe we will see fit to untangle our webs, and decentralize. (Producing nutritious food for one's local economy is an excellent place to start.)
"taxpaying Americans" use to be only the rich. Now the only ones paying taxes are the poor.
Rawmilkmike,
"taxpaying Americans" use to be only the rich. Now the only ones paying taxes are the poor.
This just isn't accurate at all.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/jul/10/cbo-rich-pay-outsized-sh...
CBO looked at 2007 through 2009 and found the bottom 20 percent of American earners paid just three-tenths of a percent of the total tax burden, while the richest 20 percent paid 67.9 percent of taxes.
The 10% of households with the highest incomes pay more than half of all federal taxes. They pay more than 70% of federal income taxes, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
From http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/money/perfi/taxes/story/2011-09-20/buffet...
The poor (lets say the bottom 20%, and obviously, by poor Americans, I merely mean poor by American standards... which is a whole different matter) pay very little in taxes, especially in comparison to what they are given back in exchange. Many of this 20% have a negative tax rate, meaning they get BACK money that they did not pay in through various credits and other programs.
Thanks for the the numbers John. I'm definitely going to use them the next time a republican tells me raising taxes on the rich won't get us off the fiscal cliff.
rawmilkmike. Are you implying I am white?
Well, you don't seem to be native American and most blacks seldom fell the need to play the race card game. I guess the answer would be yes.
rawmilkmike,
I am a card carrying Native American, I have a band card, been on the reservation numerous times, stood in line with my Grandma (in the 60s) to collect commodities the govt was so "generous" to provide. My ancestry consists of a vast mixture, dad called us 'Heinz 57s'. As the other poster tried to twist my words to his own agenda, as if I was a racist: I would then have to be a racist against part of myself. I was taught that the color of ones skin isn't what's important, it's what they say and do that is important. In my posts, I was alluding that another poster was using the race card, not I.
I get the feeling that this blog's regular readers and posters get to a point that they feel they know someone personally and intimately based on the brief comments we make here. That perspective may have some validity, but...
This is the internet and anyone can present themselves as they want to be perceived. Real names, accountability and honesty are not a requirement unless David decides to enforce it.
It's part of daily life just like meeting strangers on the street, so we should not make assumptions or impose our expectations. Repression, racism and sexism are just words until it happens to you.
As brother Bob said: "If you get down and you quarrel everyday, you're saying prayers to the devils, I say. Why not help one another on the way? Make it much easier (just a little bit easier.")
what a wonderful, up-beat missive!! ... so utterly out-of-touch with the present reality, and the raison d'etre of this website. Do you think I'd be devoting about 20 hours a week of my life to wrangling with the idiots if they'd simply leave me alone to produce food for myself / my kinsmen? I wish I had the talent to portray to you the malice in the smirk on the face of Insp. Rod Asplin, the minute after he received a phone call, directing him NOT to give my property back to me - as we'd arranged the day before - but, instead, to seize it. The next day Fraser Health Authority poured hundreds of gallons of perfectly good REAL MILK down the drain. A couple of years later, their spokes-thingy's mealy-mouth admission to a reporter was : 'we never claimed that there was a connection of e. coli to the raw milk from the dairy'
the little aparatchik Asplin was overjoyed for authorization from on -high, to send me away emptyhanded, for the sheer, perverse glee of exercising power for its own sake
any day you want to start laying that PollyAnna stuff around - "you catch more flies with honey than with vinegar" - start with the obscenely obese parasites & predators on the public payroll. ... then get back to me when you have a real, practical answer how to deal with diabolical race traitors in high places who = LITERALLY = glory in stealing the food out of the mouths of our children. The Declaration of Independence is a good primer to get children up to speed as to where Ham-merica is, tonight, contrasted with Mister Rogers' Neighbourhood
When you accuse someone of playing the race card you are suggesting the racism is a game and that this person has somehow won. You are also implying that racial stereotyping is not a problem.
Sylvia, If you are at least 1/4 Indian I would expect you to have a little more compassion for our brothers from across the border. My only argument is that I don't believe strict emigration policies really help American workers because they're not really designed to slow the importation of cheap labour. I believe they are only designed to waste tax dollars and to criminalise the Mexicans and their American family members.
An exposé on the importance of immigrant labor to Wisconsin's dairy industry:
http://www.thedailypage.com/isthmus/article.php?article=29421
Immigrants are legal. When the 3rd word is "undocumented" it means illegal.
Raw milk is illegal in most contexts.
Are we ever going to have a consistent hit-upward-only principle? Not at this site, evidently.
Sylvia,
What you just said is incredibly racist, coming from someone whose European ancestors settled in this country ILLEGALLY, violating every treaty that the US government ever signed with a soveriegn Native American nation.
New Mexico and Arizona, in particular, were STOLEN ILEGALLY by the United States from Mexico in the Mexican-American war, in which the US initiated aggressions.
In addition, I find it morally repulsive that you would characterize a person as "illegal."
Your blindness to your middle-class white privilege is glaring right now, Sylvia. I guess I should not be surprised that this kind of racist nonsense is coming from the raw milk movement.
What part of "illegal" do you not understand? If you come to America, come legally, law breakers are not wanted. Very simple. As for you finding anything morally repulsive...I could care less.
You are very presumptuous. My ancestors... Would they be the ones who greeted the ones from across the pond? Would they be the ones who came to this land long before it was known as America? Would that be the native ancestor who was taken captive by the other native ancestor? Do tell which ancestor of mine came to this land illegally. And be sure and point out the law that was broken... You have no clue what you're blathering about.
Middle class white? Again you are presumptuous. You don't have a clue as to what my ancestral make-up is, nor my financial standing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Guadalupe_Hidalgo Gee, I wasn't alive in the 1800s and am not responsible for what occurred then.
Most raw milk sellers and drinkers are law breakers. The duly constituted federal and state governments you're suddenly fetishizing here say so.
Russ, are you referring to American citizens? Or people who are in this country illegally? If you are a citizen of this country, you have every right to get laws changed that you believe are unjust.
Using Sylvia's logic, slaves had no right to run away in the South, because they were "law breakers", and not US citizens to boot. If the govt ever attacks me for drinking raw milk "illegally", I sure hope I don't get someone like Sylvia on the jury. "law breakers are not wanted..."
"If the govt ever attacks me for drinking raw milk "illegally", I sure hope I don't get someone like Sylvia on the jury. "
That's too bad Tomm, with all I've posted on this blog alone, you should have gotten the impression that I am for people consuming whatever they want and that I also feel the govt has no place in making raw dairy illegal.
Not sure where your logic is at putting runaway slaves in the same category as consuming foods. Totally different issues. To me, there is a big difference in sneaking across the boarder illegally and consuming foods that you believe are healthy and needed. From your post you the issues are one and the same.
On a jury, I would be a known factor in exonerating you of any wrong doing in the event you stated; "for drinking raw milk "illegally".
"...To me, there is a big difference in sneaking across the border illegally and consuming foods..."
Sylvia, whether an action is "legal" or "illegal", according to the rules of your club (the US Govt), does not determine whether the action is right or wrong. And for the record, the issue of your club stealing the Native peoples' lands is not an ancient issue, it's ongoing. For example, I know Natives in the Everglades, and they sure don't want to be in your evil club, but you guys are claiming 100% of the land. Your club is not a live and let live club. You guys have no right to claim all the land, you didn't create the Earth. And why don't you read your own Constitution, it's not very long. And it says the supreme law of the land, according to your laws, is the Constitution AND treaties made by your government. You guys are currently in violation of all kinds of treaties you made with the Natives, ie even under your own laws your actions TODAY are illegal.
Your club has no right to make laws for me, or tell me I can't eat real food. My advice to people with your philosophy (not that you're asking), is to learn the real history and present of your evil club, and then leave it. Operate alone, operate with good groups, but stop supporting evil groups, like your govt.
@ tomm: I agree with you about the Native Americans. Totally. That's the message being carried by Russell Means, and a few others, but now that Means is gone I don't hear much. I saw a headline last year, but once and only once, about the gubment paying the SD/ND Indian Tribal Nations for some land here in the Black Hills region. Never have seen or heard another word about it so I have no idea if that happened or if it hit the skids. My guess would be for the Reservation inhabitants NOT to hold their breath on that score.
Not support "evil groups like our govt"? What island do you suppose they'd exile us to if we didn't pay our taxes as required? Please give suggestions on how you would go about NOT supporting the current evil group. And don't say move to another country because one's as bad as the other anymore.
"Please give suggestions on how you would go about NOT supporting the current evil group..."
Yes D, "other countries" are actually all controlled by the same basic thing, and simply arms of one global prison. Believe it or not, 20+ years ago, after spending a couple years in Brazil, I returned with a plan, which I tried to circulate, the idea was to purchase an amount of land from a small third world country ... peacefully. in perpetuity, to form a new sovereign state... I had friends who were "idealists" like me. Anyway after spending over $1200 I learned no one was even interested in talking about the idea..."the follies of youth". (The process did help me to learn "third world countries" are actually controlled by the same thing that controls the US)
So I've since adopted the approach used by some traditional Natives, "The elders told us if we join any tribal governments that will be newly formed, we will be defeated..."
So I don't try to run the US govt or any of its branch offices. I don't work for it, or cheerlead for it, or call it "my govt". When the subject comes up I point out it's a terrorist group...
I wouldn't work for it's scam school system, that imprisons people to go to it, I wouldn't work for its scam media, or scam corporations, I work alone and with good groups. I found David's blog thru the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund site, a group defending people legally, from the bad guys. You're right about taxes, they are extortion, and if we don't fork it over they will send guys with guns... It's a coerced action. BUT, we have all kinds of choices in other areas of our lives. And everyone's got their unique path and contribution to make... (btw I dont' vote in their "elections", because I don't want to hook in with their evil group, it's not my job to help run terrorist groups, and by voting I'd be encouraging people to keep joining it, "hey I got more votes maybe I should run again next election". Good people should just leave that evil group known as "the government". It's an illusion to think they are all powerful.)
"according to the rules of your club (the US Govt)"
Another presumptuous person. Tsk tsk Oh I see, you are one of those people who believe it's all or nothing is beliefs (of any issue). Now I understand where you are coming from.
I'm not presuming anything. Reread your own statements here. You're saying immigration is wrong if it's illegal, by ok if it's legal. But legal or illegal here is simply based on US Govt made rules.
"If you come to America, come legally." If that's not saying "America" aka the US Govt, is your club, then what is? You're clearly showing you support the US Govt and its laws, and violators of its laws are not welcome by you.
Tomm is right, Sylvia. Your logic that a human being is "illegal" is no different than the logic of the southern slave-catchers pre-civil-war. Runaways slaves were also "illegal."
Sylvia, what's a "border"? I know what a watershed is, and a foodshed. But I don't know what it's supposed to mean when people talk about borders as defined by governments. It sounds mystical, and I'm not part of that cult. Therefore, the rather vile talk about human beings as "legal" and "illegal" makes no rational or logical sense either.
(The Rio Grande watershed, for example, is split between two of these fraudulent state constructs. Well, Stalin used to intentionally draw provincial borders to split natural, logical communities into two or more parts. It certainly makes sense from the statist point of view.)
Thanks for the 5th grade Good Civics lesson. I'm sure you gave the government cadres who monitor this blog a good laugh.
Meanwhile I hope people who are serious about Food Freedom will confront the fact that there's no such thing as "law", just a gangster shooting gallery.
When you want to "get the law changed", what do you do, vote Democrat or something? Join MoveOn's petition to have Michael Taylor fired, or what? Or let me guess - get a GMO Labeling initiative on a state ballot! Yes, "getting the law changed" works so well!
Russ,
I was listening to NPR this morning, and (in its usually entertaining and self-contradictory way), it was discussing Ob's current policy of murdering American citizens without due process.
In many states, the state constitution makes it clear that you cannot pass laws that are contradictory to the state constitution. Some are clearer than others, obviously. But one does not become a law breaker when you violate a law that is itself invalid because it violates the Constitution.
Hi John,
I apologize for interjecting here, but I think this is an excellent illustration of how pointless it is to base one's political philosophy on a literal reading of the constitution. The American ruling class has never respected the bill of rights, going back to the earliest years of the Republic. For example, the Alien and Sedition Acts, which were used as tools to silence political opponents of the Federalists. In more modern memory, the internment of Japanese Americans in the 1940's comes to mind.
I think George Carlin had a rather astute analysis of people who go on about "rights" all the time. This is hilarious. Prepare to be offended!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gaa9iw85tW8
John, my point is that there's obviously no "rule of law" in this system, so it's idiotic to deny the legitimacy of "the law" in one instance but fetishize it in the next. This movement will go absolutely nowhere (like it is so far) so long as it has zero philosophical coherency.
That's American-style "libertarianism" for you, Russ. I think Chomsky had a good explanation for the problem with it:
http://www.distantocean.com/2008/04/chomsky-on-libe.html
Not really Russ.
You and I have been through this legalism business several times already. It's too bad that you refuse to understand it, or even the very simple point I'm making.
Russ I wasn't really disagreeing with your basic argument. I was only suggesting it may require a little tweaking, because in Wisconsin raw milk is not illegal to buy, posses, or consume. When it comes to selling it yes the state says it's illegal but they have no law to back that up. That may be why they never charge anyone with selling raw milk, at least not that I know of.
As far as the immigration issue itself, it's the same simple answer as with literally every other issue - the enemy of us all, on every front, is Big Ag. Fight Big Ag (in both its corporate and government forms), 100%, and don't be distracted in any other direction.
Mexican farmers want to farm in Mexico. They were economically destroyed by Big Ag's land grabs and dumping. Today the government there is on the verge of legalizing Monsanto's GM corn. Abolish Big Ag, restore the economic basis of smallholder Mexican farming, and there won't be any forced migration northward.
That's just one example.
Thanks for the referral to Tim Wightman commentary.
I have no practical experience of life on the farm before subsidies and cheap credit came on the seen. Mind you there was certainly no shortage of work. During the summer months my brother and I, the hired hand and my dad would work 16-18 hour days bringing in over 30,000 bales of hay among other things. If we were lucky and the weather cooperated so that the work could get done quickly we had a couple of weeks to spare to go fishing or visit relatives. Mind you we rarely did this as a whole family since someone would have to stay back to do the daily farm chore such as milking the cows.
My knowledge of pioneer farm life came from a variety of sources, however the most memorable of them came from stories told to me by my grandmother.
Pioneer folk were both rugged and individual (they had to be) and although they expressed those qualities in various ways there is one thing most of them understood more then anything else, and that was the value of hard work. If there was one thing they relied on more then anything else in dealing with adversity, it was their faith in God.
When my grand parents were children there was only a railroad and a wagon trail from Toronto to North Bay, which was three hundred mile trip. Today there is a four-lane highway and twice a day air transit and although the railway is still there they have just recently discontinued passenger service. I suppose some would consider that progress.
Ken
The effect of regulatory pressure on dairy farmers is to encourage farmers to adopt strategies to minimize the risk involved in providing the local community with the food they seek. This pressure can be seen as a positive influence when you see the long range direction that we are moving in. Regulatory pressure says to the farmer--- stay small scale, very local and be diversified, don't risk more than you can afford to lose . Avoid visibility to those regulators. When confronted by regulators stop the activity that they object to and put your energy into another aspect of your farm . Rather than grow your dairy production, help start other small scale diversified farms to provide for the growing demand. To those who want to legalize the sale of raw milk I would say ,be patient. Millions of small scale diversified farms will pressure the regulators to make the sale of raw milk legal so that they can attempt to regain some level of control. This whole process is dynamic balance in action. We are always moving away from central control towards local control and then returning back to central control in a never ending cycle. Rather than spend a lot of energy fighting against the direction things are moving,if we see the big picture ,we can adjust rather than resist. I think legalization is one stage in the cycle leading back to central control , just like local control is a stage leading to legalization. It is not a war between good and evil, no matter the appearance. It is all following a natural pattern of succession the way an abandoned field will go through stages resulting eventually in mature forest (in some climates) ,then mature trees die and create clearings again.
miguel
Miguel, I agree with much you say, and have advocated similar ideas for years: people returning to the Earth, producing their own food and energy... with communities if possible, focusing on energizing the good vision as opposed to a career of reacting to the bad. However, I do think you go off the rails with your statement: "It is not a war between good and evil, no matter the appearance. It is all following a natural pattern of succession..."
The "central power" you refer to is not central in terms of the Universe as a whole, rather, it is fundamentally at odds with the purpose of the Universe. Somebody running a factory farm, abusing animals, creating an environment for disease, totally out of synch with the natural order, is not following a natural pattern.
Sorry to keep referring to Native Americans, as there are Native peoples around the globe, but since I've spent most of my life in North America, these are the guys I have most experience with, and to quote from memory one Native healer, "I understand what some modern people are trying to say, that there is no good or evil, but they don't understand it, there's good and there's evil, and you better know the difference."
The fact of the matter is, humanity is being farmed. The ones truly behind the "central power" here are turning Mother Earth into a factory, with humans as a trained slave labor force. That's why at the universities there is all this focus on certain areas of science, and blackouts or slandering of other areas, such as human potential. The ones that control plantation earth to not want us developing our potential, because a slave that gets too strong, that they cannot control, would be of no use to them, and in fact would be a threat.
For a long stretch of time in human terms, but just a blink of an eye in cosmic terms, they have been using humans to build the infrastructure for their slave factory here. That's why seekers know that there is much more advanced technology in this universe than what is being produced by current human factories. The slaves are being advanced step by step, learning ever new skill sets, ... with the goal of ultimately producing the types of technology the slave masters desire for themselves. And they have got most of the slaves loving Big Brother. They have indeed built a better mousetrap.
The good news is, humans are not meant to be slaves, and I fully intend to free myself from this prison and take my rightful place in this Universe. As I've pointed out in other posts, as advanced as you might think their technology is, there is superior technology, that comes from within. Accessing our true abilities is the key to it all. And that's where eating good food, doing good deeds, living in synch with the natural order, ... comes in.
The glue that holds together the current "paradigm" is a type of hypnosis, delivered energetically, in various ways. You can't understand "the human condition" if you don't understand hypnosis. This is how they get grown men and women to routinely act as if they are mentally retarded. If ever you have a chance to see a stage hypnotist, don't miss it. I dont' advocate using hypnosis, other than to show people that intelligent humans can be caused to think they are baboons, and they will believe it, and act accordingly... and post hypnotic suggestions can operate on the human mind for long stretches of time.
I realize most people will laugh at what I just wrote here, and that's called a fools laugh, and it is precisely because your minds have been tampered with that you laugh. I'm not going to dwell on this subject, but if any of you were curious about the bigger picture, there you have it. And it should explain a lot of riddles to you, like, why is it they are wiping out all the natural areas and other life forms on the planet, trees, tigers, cheetah, whales, orangutans, redwood trees...? Because all these beings and technologies of Nature help all of us, help the true Central Power, the true Purpose, and so the bad guys are destroying this all deliberetly to weaken us and the Earth, because their program is fundamentally at odds with the True Program. Humans are becoming their "monoculture" crop on the Earth. But it doesn't have to be this way, if people would start waking up.
Hope my post there wasn't off topic, but some people need to grasp the bigger picture, as to who really it is that has made our milk illegal. Here's Dr Edgar Mitchell, 6th man to walk of the Moon, admitting on a british radio show that we are not alone in this Universe. The interviewer kind of blew a fuse, learning that what we are taught in school is not truthful. Who knew? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhNdxdveK7c
Mitchell makes some naive comments toward the end, not realizing the implications of what he knows, but still, he's giving out priceless info for those that want to know.
Astronaut Gordon Cooper blowing the whistle: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvPR8T1o3Dc
If you're not interested in Gordon, at least check out that interviewer (she is hottt).
tomm,
"But it doesn't have to be this way, if people would start waking up."
What makes people wake up? Maybe pain. Disease. And then looking for good quality food and water without being able to find it. We are free to pursue happiness.That implies that it is a moving target. Sometimes we need to pursue it through times of thirst , hunger and pain to learn to appreciate the simple things that bring happiness. If I am involved in a war, it is not with anyone outside of myself. It is between my consciousness and my conditioned responses to events. We have learned a lot from all of the court cases involving people trying to help us gain access to good food. This is fine, but at some point we need to start putting what we have learned into practice. More people need to get involved in actually producing food in a resilient and sustainable way. We can be aware of what is going on with the court cases but our energy should be going into developing and creating a way to produce food that does not destroy the earth. From my point of view the regulators are telling us that this alternative food system should not have the appearance or substance of the commercial food system. I agree with that. Many ,many people need to be personally involved in food production.There are great benefits to doing the work yourself as well as eating good food. It changes your view of the world.It will teach us to slow down and really appreciate what we have.
miguel
Miguel, your points about encouraging more people to become involved in producing their food are well taken. I'm not sure, though, that you interpret the regulators correctly. ("From my point of view the regulators are telling us that this alternative food system should not have the appearance or substance of the commercial food system.") The regulators are telling us that all food potentially comes under their authority, no matter how different it might be from the commercial system. The farmers in trouble are far from the commercial food system, but the regulators won't hear about the differences. In Maine, they are challenging the authority of towns that tell regulators to stay out of the private exchange of food between farmers and citizens. But as more people learn about the regulatory challenges, they invariably agree that the regulators are going too far. So more towns are signing up for food sovereignty. More people are seeking to obtain their food privately. More people are growing their own food. My sense is that one way or another, these efforts will snowball and create a new reality the regulators will find increasingly difficult to control. There is no magic bullet here, though, and no guarantees.
http://www.williams-sonoma.com/shop/agrarian-garden/?cm_type=gnav
You're right David, people are seeking out healthier foods and slowly, more and more are attempting to grow their own foods. When high end stores start selling items that promote healthier methods, etc , shows that the movement is growing. Indeed, just how will the regulators snap to it when their masters put pressure on them to squash these common folk?
http://health.yahoo.net/experts/menshealth/12-scariest-things-your-food
If it just leads one person towards a healthier lifestyle/foods/environment then it will bring others along as time goes by.
I'm sure this isn't news to the people who post here, but it is still mind boggling that "regulation" can have such different meanings, and be applied in such disproportionate doses much as we cringe and try to support the little guys doing the right thing. Imagine if raw milk was making 1/3 of our population obese and sick... if small farms had one iota of financial and political clout - it would be a much different food horizon. Good food doesn't necessarily mean expensive food and bad food doesn't have to/shouldn't be cheap, but that's what America corporate culture has chosen to implement on our own people.
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2013/02/11-8
"Food companies are in the business to make money." Shocking, eh? But why can't they make just as much money making good food instead of crap that sickens and fattens people? They have the financial power to redirect the government support and subsidies, yet continue to take easy street and perpetuate bad health policies.
I remain befuddled.
@ Ora Moose: " . . . why can't they make just as much money making good food instead of crap that sickens and fattens people?"
Because bigAg has totally and completely overproduced GMO corn and soy and they hafta figger out what to do with the junk. Sooooo, they feed it to our animals (who should be eating grass as much as possible) and they also stuff it into every boxed food imaginable on a grocery store shelf. Still too much corn? Ok, then we'll make it into something reeeally sinister - HFCS - and put THAT into everything, even stuff that doesn't need to be sweetened. Put that combo (soy and corn and their oils) together with borderline fat/sick people and you've got a winner for bigMed. A permanent customer for all kinds of drugs, unless they can find a way to help themselves. Even then people have to be careful not to tell anyone (like the guy who blogged about his success in changing his diet and losing weight plus getting rid of diabetes) or risk arrest. Is this not just insane?
Ora
“But why can't they make just as much money making good food instead of crap that sickens and fattens people?”
I think the answer to your question rest with this statement by Marcus Tullius Cicero, “The function of wisdom is to discriminate between good and evil”.
However you may also wish to consider this comment by Martin Luther King, “Communism forgets that life is individual. Capitalism forgets that life is social, and the kingdom of brotherhood is found neither in the thesis of communism nor the antithesis of capitalism but in a higher synthesis. It is found in a higher synthesis that combines the truths of both.”
Unfortunately societies have gravitated towards the lower synthesis that combines the untruths of both. Greed and self-righteousness have rendered us indifferent to those very “truths” for as King correctly pointed out, “Our scientific power has outrun our spiritual power. We have guided missiles and misguided men”.
Ken
"They ... continue to ... perpetuate bad health policies. I remain befuddled."
Don't remain befuddled Ora, reread my posts. I posted the astronomical amounts of revenue the pharmaceutical cartel generates by having a sickly, calcium starved population. Forced pasteurization to wreck the milk is a key part of their program.
And if you can handle it, listen to those astronauts I've posted, if you want to understand the bigger picture. Money is only what oils the plantation. Their real goal is advanced technology produced by human slaves, and so having a sickly population serves as another excuse for more r&d, medical technology, biotechnology, etc etc in the direction the have preplanned.
In other words, it's not a situation where we have been "visited", it's a situation where we have been enslaved.
David,
I agree that "The regulators are telling us that all food potentially comes under their authority, no matter how different it might be from the commercial system." " Potentially" . There is a line there at which even they become uncomfortable crossing.It is true they will try to get our agreement that they have more power than they actually do. But even the people who get their food from people like Schmidt, Schlangen and Hershberger often see the relationship as a commercial relationship. The "normal" way most people acquire their food is from one of those big box grocery stores. Getting it directly from the farm is different but still very close to the "normal" experience. Not as convenient but still a lot more convenient than milking your own cow. Food is not only necessary for our physical existence it is also necessary for our spiritual existence. "Give a man a fish -- feed him for a day,teach him to fish -- feed him for a life time". Bringing food to people in the city feeds their bodies, helping them learn to produce their own food feeds their bodies and their spirit. When it becomes common for people in the city to organize an expedition to the countryside to visit friends, bringing with them supplies and helping out with bills and labor , it won't be seen as a commercial relationship between farmers and consumers. It won't be convenient. It will be a chance to take off your shoes and maybe get a little cow manure between your toes. A vacation from the noise and rush of the city. Going home with food for the body and the spirit.
miguel
Miguel,
I've seen a growing number of community gardens; some were families had sectioned/fenced off small plots of land and they worked it themselves, some were a large plot of land where the whole group worked each area of whatever was growing. I think both ways are great as they bring the people back to the soil and they also communicate with each other. I hope that it expands.
"When it becomes common for people in the city to organize an expedition to the countryside..."
Miguel, that basic idea. of bridging the city and the country, was the basis of my community idea. One foot in each world. A community of about 25 people out in the country, and a presense in town too. You could work part time in town if needed, and have your country retreat too, your own food supply and natural setting, five acres per person gives you almost a half mile by half mile square of land. I like bicycles, but as I mentioned in an earlier post, you could always go farther out, and revamp an old school bus to burn wood, and use fallen trees and branches from the nature presere to fuel a commute twice a week into town and back...
Maybe someday people will be ready for simple, common sense ideas like this.
Miguel,
Never forget the declaration of WI Judge Patrick Fiedler, that we have no "fundamental right" to own a cow, or even to drink the milk from our own cow. That manure between your toes may only come with government permit or other authorization in the not-too-distant future.
David
David,
The judge is speaking about the very specific context of commercial "law". Every ruling he makes has to do with contracts of a commercial nature.When you appear in front of him you have already agreed that you have some sort of contract or should have some sort of contract of a commercial nature that he has to make a judgement about. Of course in commerce everything you do is subject to the rules of commerce. Within the game of commerce you don't have any right to anything unless it is stated in the rules that you have that right.If you want to have rights don't play the game. And if you don't want to be hassled make very sure that no one can possibly make the assumption that you are part of the game. Yes, you will still be assumed to be part of the game,but in that case the argument is about "what have I done that made them assume I am playing a game ?", not about the rules of the game. At any rate if you start out by identifying your self with a legal name ( some people refer to it as your "real" name),then you have admitted that you are playing the game. Good bye rights! We all have rights but they will not be recognized without a struggle. The judge simply has no jurisdiction unless we give it to him. If he wants to claim that I am a legal entity ,then he has to attach a legal name to me. I am the only one who can do that. To say otherwise is to say that I am his property. I will fight that at any cost.
miguel
"...The judge simply has not jurisdiction unless we give it to him..."
Tell that to the colonized Irish, Native Americans, South Americans, Africans, Indians, Australians, Middle Eastern peoples, Chinese, Hawaiians, etc etc etc.
Former Wisconsin Judge Patrick J. Fiedler in 2011, sad in defence of his ruling against the Wisconsin consumer, that citizens do not have a fundamental right to produce and consume the foods of their choice. The Judge was not saying that citizens do not have a fundamental right to consume the foods of their choice; only that we don't have the right to produce them if no one wants them.
I agree David. And you know I don't think any of us mind a little regulation but I feel there's a deference between regulating and banning.
“...the regulators are telling us that this alternative food system should not have the appearance or substance of the commercial food system.”
Yes, but these days regulators are fueled less by legal standards and more by their own momentum. The line between personal and commercial is being pushed along a continuum; at this point in history virtually any exchange is being defined by the controlling class as commerce, and thereby subject to government intervention.
Ultimately the answer is indeed an America in which many, many people grow real food properly, and perhaps more important, an America in which individuals have strong personal and community relationships. Millions of tiny, diverse, devoted cells is a potent force.
Consequently I promote (and participate in) a food economy that is personal, responsible, and as much as possible outside the money economy. But until the tipping point is reached, until a man can freely barter, sell, and buy unadulterated food without harassment from government, we benefit from action on all reasonable fronts, including the legal one.
That is, by the way, why it's important to support individuals and organizations working within the commercial system, like the Farm To Consumer Legal Defense Fund. The FTCLDF is admittedly not enjoying successful outcomes in each of the cases they defend, but that is almost beside the point. It is, by working within the legal universe, by using language and behaviors that the legal universe understands, speaking loudly to powerful people who would not otherwise even care that we are here, and would roll us over without even knowing they are doing it. The FTCLDF (along with farmers and consumers banging their heads against the commercial regulatory systems) are making clear the critical message that not all the citizenry is satisfied with government creep, and that injustice will not pass without a fight. Their work is necessary to keep the idea alive that space between the personal and the commercial must exist.
Since we seem unable to learn much without falling and failing, undoubtedly there will be more pain before the tide turns.
Thank You, Dave!
You've mentioned an essential point for the possibility of a much needed re-education!:
"... virtually any exchange is being defined by the controlling class as commerce, and thereby subject to government intervention."
The legislative power in the United States of America is a proprietary power. Although the Constitution of September 17, 1787 does state "The Congress shall have Power To ... regulate Commerce ... among the several States," it also needs to be understood that the very delegated legislative power itself is limited to land and/ or property that is owned by the United States of America. In the case of Vernon Hershberger this requirement for the state's jurisdiction is totally absent, however that particular requirement has never been challenged and so the jurisdiction of the court is presumed and will continue unless it is challenged.
"The Constitution of September 17, 1787 is not what it seems. It is true that the first article appears to create a legislature, the second article appears to create in executive and the third article appears to create a judiciary. However, those three purported branches of government apply only to the territory owned by the United States of America. How can this be proven? The proof is in the organic laws of the United States of America." (See: http://www.edrivera.com/)
Miguel
That's a really amazing perspective. Rather than butt heads with regulators, agree that you will stop or greatly curtail (i.e. family consumption only) the "illegal" practice and then go help others to provide for their families in the same way. The small scale aspect is intriguing, because it means your life isn't devoted to just one thing. Off-farm employment is a possible option among many other possibilities. Keep your options open.
Sylvia,
I think your AZ friend is probably correct in how the migrant harvester situation works there. It is in all human nature to help one's family succeed. I can only point out that even $30-$40/hr isn't really a whole lot of money, and that I, personally, would not be able to perform that kind of repetitive work.
Yes, How many vegetable CSA's in your area could benefit from having a cow or goat or chickens added to the farm? It would make the vegetables better because the soil would be improved from the composted manure. If the people in the cities that want raw milk would get to know each other and pool their resources they could quickly expand the number of sources of milk with less risk than the farmers are taking now. There is enough work to producing food without butting heads in court ( their territory) with the regulators.
miguel
kturner, I think the same situation is in many areas in California too.
@ kturner: "$30-$40/hr isn't really a whole lot of money . . ." You must be kidding. To a migrant worker that's a whole lot of money, in fact, in the work I do now it's a helluva lotta money per hour. Do you know any young parents who would pay me that kind of money to watch their infants? I wish. Believe me, I earn it but I don't make it. You'd keel over if you knew what I get paid per hour to watch people's most precious possessions.
Thought I would share a few paragraphs from Joe Mitchell's famous story, “Old Mr. Flood”, written in 1944. It concerns bread Mr. Flood buys from Mrs. Palumbo's “hole-in-the-wall” bakery in New York:
“Whatever to hell it's called,” he said, “it's good. Mrs. Palumbo knows what she's doing. She don't take ads in the papers to tell big black lies about her vitamins, she don't have a radio program rooting and tooting about her enriched bread, she don't wrap in cellophane, she don't even have a telephone. She just goes ahead and bakes the way her great-great-grandaddy baked. Consequently, by God, lo and behold, her bread is fit to eat. I'm not against vitamins, whatever to hell they are, but God took care of that matter away back there in the hitherto---God and nature, and not some big scientist or other. Years back, bread was the stuff of life. It looked good, it smelled good, it tasted good, and it had all the vitamins in it a man could stand. Then the bakers fiddled and fooled and improved their methods and got things down to such a fine point that a loaf of bread didn't have any more nourishment in it than a brickbat. Now their putting the vitamins back in by scientific means---the way God did it don't suit them; it ain't complicated enough---and they've got the brass to get on the radio and brag about it; they should hide their heads in shame.”
Mr. Maggiani hadn't been paying much attention to Mr. Flood's remarks; he only half listens to him. Now he pursed his lips and nodded his head a couple of times. “Science is a great thing,” he said piously. “It's wonderful what they can do.” Mr. Flood stared at him for a moment, and then let the matter drop.
@ Dave Milano: That is a very interesting tale. Exchange the words 'raw milk' for the word bread and you've got another story to tell. Mr. Flood had a pretty good grasp of the obvious, didn't he? Mr. Maggiani continued to keep his head buried in *scientific progress*. Science isn't always a sign of progress, as many of us here well know.
As I posted somewhere else earlier this week, that Dodge Ram Superbowl commercial wasn't a salute to farming, it was an insult to SMALL farmers, IMPHO. I guess I'm not the only one who found some fault with it. Apparently Baylen Linnekin did too, as well as taking a bit of the gilding off Paul Harvey!
http://reason.com/archives/2013/02/09/the-rest-of-the-story-of-god-made-...
All of those plowed up fields (in the commercial) made my stomach turn. Those should be grass covered hills/fields with cattle grazing on them. Heck of a lot more in keeping with nature than bigagri plowed fields planted with gMo (OMG!) crops and then sprayed like the dickens with poisonous chemicals that penetrate the soil and ruin it, then into the ground water, also into the air we breathe - not to mention into the seeds themselves and then into whoever eats the junk made from it, including our animals. How can that be good? I'll admit - a field of standing wheat is a beautiful sight, but I'd much rather see a gorgeous sight - a green pasture.
Here is another take on the Dodge Ram commercial.
http://www.kcet.org/socal/food/the-nosh/god-made-a-factory-farmer-parody...
@ Ron Klein: Heh heh! Good one.
This would be an excellent *opener* for an even bigger look at the corruption in agrifarming today. Small farmers should actually be called small "growers" because mixing them into the same bin with the farmers of today is certainly not an accurate accounting.
Also, I should have mentioned in my other post that most people (especially the citified class) have no concept of the fact that a rancher and a farmer are not the same thing. And then there's the dairy farmer which is another subset because he has to DO something with his animals - twice every day. City dwellers oftentimes don't have a clue. Sorta like the writers for that commercial. ;-)
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