The US embassy in Paris advised Washington to start a military-style trade war against any European Union country which opposed genetically modified (GM) crops, newly released WikiLeaks cables show.
In response to moves by France to ban a Monsanto GM corn variety in late 2007, the ambassador, Craig Stapleton, a friend and business partner of former US president George Bush, asked Washington to penalise the EU and particularly countries which did not support the use of GM crops.
(Read more from emptywheel.firedoglake.com)
I should say a word about why I’m posting this, as it can be interpreted that the US was simply trying to remove harmful government regulation. GMOs have widespread government support from getting a pass from the FDA, to various laws forbidding GMO competitors from labeling their food GMO free, to government violence against farmers whose crops were infected in GMO pollen — against their wishes, no less.
I’m all for consumer choice, but so long as food approval remains a national government monopoly, we have to pay attention to how the choices of that monopoly are made. This heavy handed support of the US government is evidence of the political strength of GMO companies.
If I still have any socialist readers they probably sympathize with my criticism, but propose a powerful, chaste bureaucrat or politician to lead us to paradise.
Here are my proposals:
* Eliminate all government authority over food certification. Let private standards emerge.
* Consider GMO contamination to be pollution, and just a system of justice to punish the polluter.
* Let people label their food however they want, so long as they don’t commit fraud. Fraud is also a crime for the justice system.