The weekend begins and as usual I offer up news that you may not have been exposed to during the week….
Let’s begin with ‘organic food’.
Have you noticed that your favorite food store has an abundant amount of so-called ‘organic’ food?
The good question is just how organic is it really?
Amended U.S. Department of Agriculture rules announced last month suggest the agency has high hopes for plans to crack down on fraud in the organic food sector.
“The amendments protect integrity in the organic supply chain and build consumer and industry trust in the USDA organic label by strengthening organic control systems, improving farm to market traceability, and providing robust enforcement of the USDA organic regulations,” the agency explained in a January 19 notice in the Federal Register. The new final rule, dubbed Strengthening Organic Enforcement, is set to take effect next month (with enforcement delayed until next year).
Some are hailing the USDA’s stance.
“The Organic Trade Association, which lobbied for rule, said it represents the biggest change to organic regulations since the creation of the USDA organic food program,” the Associated Press reports. “OTA officials said in a statement the regulation ‘will do much to deter and detect organic fraud and protect organic integrity throughout the supply chain.'”
Organic food is a big business in this country, and the organic label helps to fetch a premium price.
“To consumers, the symbol means an assurance that an agricultural product such as beef or celery has been produced using only naturally occurring fertilizers, pesticides, and other inputs,” I explain in my book Biting the Hands that Feed Us: How Fewer, Smarter Laws Would Make Our Food System More Sustainable. “To producers, the USDA organic seal means higher costs, but also the opportunity to charge consumers more for that beef or celery.”
The USDA Can’t Stop Organic Food Fraud
Personally I believe the ‘organic’ label is nothing more than a marketing hook….organic food suspiciously taste similar to the crap that agri-business pukes out.
Next water has been found!
Planetary scientists have a fascinating hypothesis about Saturn’s smallest moon, Mimas, which they say may be home to a “stealth” underground ocean that’s been hidden from our best observations.
In a press release out of the Southwest Research Institute, principal scientist Dr. Alyssa Rhoden said that NASA’s Cassini mission to Saturn had “identified a curious libration, or oscillation, in Mimas’ rotation, which often points to a geologically active body able to support an internal ocean.”
Translation: Mimas’ wobble seems to suggest that it could contain an ocean under its icy surface.
A specialist in the geophysics of icy satellites — say that three times fast! — Rhoden is one of the authors of a new paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters about the tantalizing hypothesis centered on Saturn’s smallest and innermost moon, which she jokingly admitted looks “much like the Death Star from Star Wars” because of Herschel, its huge impact crater.
https://futurism.com/the-byte/ocean-planet-saturn-moon
Only in Mississippi.
A white supermajority of the Mississippi House voted after an intense, four-plus hour debate to create a separate court system and an expanded police force within the city of Jackson — the Blackest city in America — that would be appointed completely by white state officials.If House Bill 1020 becomes law later this session, the white chief justice of the Mississippi Supreme Court would appoint two judges to oversee a new district within the city — one that includes all of the city’s majority-white neighborhoods, among other areas. The white state attorney general would appoint four prosecutors, a court clerk, and four public defenders for the new district. The white state public safety commissioner would oversee an expanded Capitol Police force, run currently by a white chief.
The appointments by state officials would occur in lieu of judges and prosecutors being elected by the local residents of Jackson and Hinds County — as is the case in every other municipality and county in the state.
Mississippi’s capital city is 80% Black and home to a higher percentage of Black residents than any major American city. Mississippi’s Legislature is thoroughly controlled by white Republicans, who have redrawn districts over the past 30 years to ensure they can pass any bill without a single Democratic vote. Every legislative Republican is white, and most Democrats are Black.
Mississippi proves daily that the “New South’ is not real….especially in my state of Mississippi.
That is all the usual weird ass news I have time for this Saturday.
Be well….Be safe….
I Read, I Write, You Know
“lego ergo scribo”
In Saner Thought 
You have my sympathy but then I’m from SC where our white majority proclaims, “Thank goodness for Mississippi.”
I understand….and I apologize for the repressive politics of my state. chuq
I read once that “free range eggs” means the chicken have access to a small door that leads out into a controlled area…but they are quarantined the first few weeks of life, so when put into this area, NONE doing any “free ranging” at all! But costs more! Oh my about Mississippi…I was in Jackson about 6 years ago and downtown was a decrepit ghost town.
Most of the CBD is owned by the Vatican and they get tax credit for unused buildings….chuq
That new court system sound very much like South African apartheid to me, chuq. They will have separate seats in buses and restaurants next. Back to the bad old days of Segregation seems to be on the long-term agenda.
Await the riots.
Best wishes, Pete.
GOP is very repressive….and do it overtly chuq
I know for sure that some stores just put regular stuff they buy from the wholesalers into the Organic bins and fools come along and buy it and thing they have done themselves a favor.
So true…..plus they package so inspection is limited. chuq
Hey there dude — White folks has done a good job of governing in Mississippi for a long time now … no need to break their streak now is there except to placate some racist advocates somewhere and to make more headlines in the news.
They have crapped on the people of this state for 50 years….and the idiots accept it without question….’can’t fix stupid’ chuq
The get yourself a black government and maybe things will improve.
So the white guys are so much better, right? Does Detroit ring a bell? chuq
Without the white guys there would be no United States so I could care less about Detroit.
Without slaves those white guys would starved to death. chuq
The white guys used their captive ethnic minorities to support the burgeoning cotton industry — they were perfectly capable of dealing with food issues all by themselves.
We will never know….but I think that is not accurate. chuq
The agricultural industry in the old south — and some of the newer south too was managed through the use of sharecroppers. Two thirds of the sharecroppers were white and one third were FORMER slaves. I am talking about food production here. The cotton production was another story altogether and was mostly done by slaves.
Then we are talking apples and oranges chuq
We are talking reality –Two thirds of any number is far more significant than a lesser percentage .. the dominant number wins the classification… More whites equals the dominant factor in food production…. less blacks equals less importance in food production…for illustration and comparison’s sake, try to imagine a huge number of white slaves picking cotton — it cannot be done because the very argument is irrelevant.
John my original point was pre-Civil War…..you are talking about the years after and the poverty it created. and most of that production was for individual consumption….white slaves were after the War…it is called indentured servitude….but that is the conversation for another day. chuq
The White Farmer
Many white small farmers turned to cotton production during Reconstruction as a way of obtaining needed cash. As cotton prices declined, many lost their land. By 1880, one third of the white farmers in the cotton states were tenants rather than landowners, and the South as a whole had become even more dependent on cotton than it had been before the war.
Before the Civil War, the majority of the South’s white population owned no slaves. Few of these farmers grew much cotton; they preferred to concentrate on food crops for their own families, marketing only a small surplus, and making most of the tools, clothing, and other items they needed at home.
The widespread destruction of the war plunged many small farmers into debt and poverty, and led many to turn to cotton growing. The increased availability of commercial fertilizer and the spread of railroads into upcountry white areas, hastened the spread of commercial farming.
By the mid-1870s, the South’s cotton output reached prewar levels. But now, nearly forty percent was raised by white farmers. Like black sharecroppers, those who wished to borrow money were forced to pledge the year’s cotton crop as collateral. Some found economic salvation in cotton farming, but many others fell further and further into debt.
Thanx for the Southern history…..chuq
I love Mississippi because when I was there at Biloxy for a few months, everybody was so nice and kind to me ..much different from the stiff necked self-absorbed up North where I come from.
Those days are long gone John…..the only appreciative ones now are those in the tourist industry…..you have money then they love you….the rest of us suffer because of that. chuq