ramblins of buddy don: cuple thangs

aint gut much time, but i half to menchun a cuple articulls i almost missed.

furst, did ye ketch thisn? tiz a story bout a meat packin cumpny that deecided it wood test everone of its cattle befor servin to innybidy, the hope bein that folks wood be more cumfterbull eatin meat that wuz tested to make shore it dont have no mad cow disease. seems lack a grate use of the free market principills that them publicans claims they bleeve (mayhap thems the same publicans that bleeves in small gummint n balanced budgets, witch seems lack they dun gone eggstink.)

innywho, here tiz, a sine that our gummint will do innythang to perteck ... well, not usns, but thar clients, the big corporayshuns that dont wonta half to deal with too much competishun – Mad cow madness: USDA stands in the way of broader testing:

If a hospital wanted to advertise that it upholds sanitary standards higher than any required by the government, no one would object. A used-car dealer who decided to offer only vehicles with the best crash-test scores would be free to do so. But after a meatpacker announced plans to establish the strictest program around to protect consumers from mad cow disease, the U.S. Department of Agriculture replied: fat chance.

Eating meat from animals afflicted with the illness can cause irreversible, fatal damage to the brain. Last month, a cow in Alabama was found to be infected, the third confirmed case in this country. Canada, which has similar regulations to prevent the disease, has had five.

You would think those cases would indicate the need for more testing of cattle to keep contaminated beef off our tables. In fact, the USDA, which now tests only 1 percent of all slaughtered cows, is planning to cut back on that effort. Crazier yet, it also intends to keep anyone else from conducting more tests.

One company wants to do exactly that. Creekstone Farms, a premium meatpacker based in Kansas, knows bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE, can be deadly for business. After the first American case was discovered in 2003, some 58 countries banned shipments of American beef, costing Creekstone about $100 million in sales.

Those countries were dissatisfied with the safety measures in effect here. So Chief Executive Officer John Stewart decided to address health concerns in places such as Japan and South Korea by going beyond what the U.S. government requires of packers. He pledged to test all his cattle for mad cow in an effort to reassure nervous foreign consumers.

What he didn't account for was that his own government would bar him from doing what his customers want him to do. Creekstone's plan, it said, would undermine federal attempts to "maintain domestic and international confidence in U.S. cattle and beef products." To let the company adopt a more stringent regime would imply the USDA rules were inadequate.

The National Cattlemen's Beef Association agreed, complaining that "if you let one company step out and do that, other companies would have to follow." So last month, Creekstone filed a lawsuit requesting the right to cater to its customers.

fack is, they dont wonta test so much n druther test even less! ye kin read bout it here – Government: Only 4 to 7 Cows Have Mad Cow:

There are probably a few undetected cases of mad cow disease in the United States, but the total - estimated at four to seven - is "extraordinarily low," Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns says.

The calculation comes from new testing data released Friday. Testing is likely to be scaled back after a panel of independent scientists reviews the figures, Johanns said.

"The data shows the prevalence of BSE in the United States is extraordinarily low," Johanns told reporters on a conference call. "In other words, we have an extremely healthy herd of cattle in our country."

The brain-wasting disorder infected more than 180,000 cows and was blamed for more than 150 human deaths during a European outbreak that peaked in 1993.

The first American animal case appeared a decade later, prompting the United States to increase its testing for mad cow disease, which is medically known as bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. So far, the U.S. has found three cows infected with the disease.

But the first case, a Canadian cow found in Washington state, is not included in the testing analysis. Including that animal would have revised the estimate of infected cows upward to five to 11 nationwide.

The scientific peer review should be finished by the end of May, Johanns said.
Johanns said there is little justification for keeping up the higher testing levels, which rose to about 1,000 samples daily, from about 55 samples daily, after mad cow turned up in the U.S. The current level is around 1 percent of the 35 million cattle slaughtered last year in the U.S.

corse, tiz hard to serve them corporutt masters, witch live by corporutt greed, die by it:

Senate Republicans on Monday hurriedly abandoned a broad tax proposal opposed by the oil industry and business leaders, another sign of their struggle to come up with an acceptable political and legislative answer to high gasoline prices.

Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, the majority leader, said he had decided to jettison the provision, which would have generated billions of dollars by changing the way businesses treat inventories for tax purposes. Instead, he said the Senate Finance Committee would hold hearings on the plan "later this year, so the pluses and minuses of the provision can become well known."

The retreat came after a torrent of objections from business leaders and their advocates, who typically view Republicans in Congress as allies. They said they had been blindsided by the inclusion of the proposal as a central element of the Republican leadership's energy package late last week.

tiz gittin sos ye caint even buy yer votes when ye need em most, in a eleckshun year:

The public derision of Republicans' idea for a $100 gasoline rebate has focused on the desperate political pandering embodied in the proposal. But there's another view that makes it seem even worse. Consider the China angle.

With the nation already deeply in debt — and with Congress angling this week to cut taxes for affluent investors by more than $20 billion — lawmakers would need to borrow $10 billion to make the rebates happen. Since more than 80 percent of the immense borrowing of the Bush years has been from foreigners, it's safe to assume that most of the rebates would be courtesy of foreign lenders, of which China has been one of the most willing.

It’s the circle of crude: China's competition for the world's oil is pushing up prices. Congress piles on more debt to calm angry consumers with a rebate. The increased debt is a prescription for a weaker dollar, which in turn would make imports, including oil, even more expensive.

the good news is how at lease them publicans is happy with a gummint lack 1984.

or is it that they dun brung back the king to take the place of this messy democrussy thang we used to have?

but the rilly good news is how on sundy thays a'gone be a music n arts festivull in hoboken, new jersey, witch they gut em a band playin named after one of my favert bloggers, red molly.

so it should be a good weekend. we kin eat, drank n be merry n let the devil wurry bout the gummint.