Author: R J Adams

Twenty years ago it would only have been used for dog-food. Since the 1990s it’s been in 70% of all processed beef products on the store shelf. ‘Pink Slime’ is the one that leaped off the production belt of secrecy and out into the limelight of public knowledge, thanks in no small part to TV chef, Jamie Oliver, who ‘outed’ ‘Pink Slime’ on a 2011 TV show.

What disgusted consumers the most was Oliver sloshing household bleach all over the stuff.

They’d probably be even more horrified if they realized ammonia is used extensively in the meat industry. How do they think those ‘oven-ready’ chickens remain un-putrified until they finally reach the supermarket shelves?

The answer is they’re stored in huge caverns filled with ammonia gas. Back in the mid-seventies, while training with the British RSPCA, I visited a poultry processing and storage plant. It was one of the largest in the country. I won’t mention the company’s name, but can assure you the processing was definitely not as ‘bootiful’ as the owner described his product on television. British readers will, no doubt, remember the relevant advertisement.

‘Pink slime’ is supposedly safe. It meets federal food safety standards. It’s only fault is it’s bloody disgusting.

Desperate to save their profits, the meat industry is fighting back with a new slogan: “Dude – it’s beef”. Wow! They’ve also called on failed Republican presidential nominee, Rick Perry, for assistance. He happily sampled the product and appeared to enjoy it.

Pink Slime: it takes one to know one.

The meat marketing companies knew it was disgusting, so they came up with the name, ‘Lean Finely Textured Beef’. That makes it sound quite appealing, and while it isn’t a lie, there can be no doubt of the obvious deception to the consumer.

It may be perfectly acceptable to describe a tin of ‘Lassie’ as ‘lean, meaty, chunks in a rich, taste-laden, gravy’ when the reality is a load of offal processed into lumps of gristle, but dogs aren’t too bothered what they eat so long as it tastes okay.

To treat human consumers as though they are no better than animals is an extreme insult, and a certain marketing disaster once the ‘pink slime’ hits the fan.

It’s sad that 850 employees have to lose their jobs because yet another food marketing scandal has come to light. Some folk appear to blame Jamie Oliver, or the media, but it’s not their fault.

No, the blame lies fairly and squarely on the shoulders of the meat processing industry. Deception will out, eventually.

We’re not their pets, we’re their customers, and it’s time they remembered that.

Two weeks ago, a seventeen year old black youth, Shawn Tyson, was sent to prison for life, with no possibility of parole, for the brutal, cold-blooded, murder of two young men from the UK, James Cooper and James Kouzaris. Both men were in their mid-twenties.^[1]

^{The killer, Tyson, is on the left in this image}

The two men were on vacation in Florida and strayed into the rundown Newtown area of Sarasota late one night while looking for an all-night cafe. Tyson, released from prison only that day after a conviction for shooting at cars, gunned them down as they stood in the road, defenseless, pleading with him to spare their lives.

Just about the time Shawn Tyson was learning he’d spend the rest of his life behind bars, Florida neighborhood watch man, George Zimmerman, gunned down black teenager, Trayvon Martin, in an incident that sent the US media into a frenzy and provoked marches and protests throughout the state.^[2]

^{The killer, Zimmerman, is on the left in this image}

On March 6th this year, not long after the Trayvon Martin killing, a disgruntled ex-teacher at the Episcopal School of Jacksonville, in Florida, walked back into the school carrying an AK47 assault rifle and shot the head teacher, Dale Regan. Ms Regan had been at the school thirty-four years. The man, Shane Schumerth, a Spanish teacher at the school had been fired earlier that day. After shooting the principle, he killed himself.^[3]

James Cooper, James Kouzaris, Trayvon Martin and Dale Regan, were all in front of the bullet. They are dead. Shane Schumerth killed himself with his own gun. Shawn Tyson, George Zimmerman, may as well be dead. Their lives are over, destroyed by the same weapons used to inflict their deadly violence.

It may seem that Florida is especially gun-violent. It isn’t. Similar stories abound all over the United States. In every state similar incidents occur on an almost daily basis.

I received this document recently in the mail, together with an unsolicited membership form.

^{Click to enlarge}

It came from the National Rifle Association, based in Florida. I sent it back, unsigned.

^{Click to enlarge}

Guns kill – that’s all they do.

^{[1] “Shawn Tyson gets life sentence for murdering British tourists in Florida” Guardian, March 12th 2012}

^{[2] George Zimmerman Innocent Of Racist Hate Crime” Sparrow Chat, March 20th 2012}

^{[3] “Two dead in shooting at Florida high school” March 6th 2012}

The latest revelation to spew forth from the Supreme Court of the United States is further evidence of how much this once august and independent establishment has become affiliated to corporate influence.

The question under debate is whether the federal government has the power to make medical insurance mandatory on every individual. Is it ‘unconstitutional’; does it attack those sacred principles: the rights and freedoms of the individual?

What the Supreme Court is totally ignoring is the very essence of government. Governments are appointed by the people specifically to regulate their affairs within the confines of the society in which they live. In a democracy, that means governing for the greater good of all – not just those at the higher echelons of society.

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, disaffectionately labeled ‘Obamacare’ by its opponents, was an attempt by the US government to provide a framework of support for those people presently unable to afford medical insurance. ‘Healthcare for all’ was one of the platforms Barack Obama campaigned on, and the fact it helped him win the White House in 2008 is proof that a majority of Americans supported it.

Despite huge resistance from House Republicans, who forced substantial amendments to the bill and seriously weakened it, it managed to become law. There is little doubt, if Obama is elected to a second term, he will make every effort to strengthen those weaknesses imposed by his adversaries.

Unless, of course, the Republicans and their corporate masters bend sufficient Supreme Court judges to their will and force a legal ruling against the Act.

What began, only a few days ago, solely as a discussion on the legality of mandatory insurance, has now resulted in a proposition, by certain of the more ‘conservative’ (read: right-wing) judges to throw out the Act in its entirety.

If the US government is acting on behalf of the majority of the people in this matter, it seems that the Supreme Court most certainly is not. Which begs the question: on whose behalf are they acting?

The argument against mandatory insurance appears to hinge on a lack of precedent. Apparently, only once before has any US government tried to impose such a mandatory imposition. It was nearly two hundred years ago and only lasted a few months before being overturned.

Yet, it’s perfectly fine for any of the fifty states to do it, though they can be a little tardy. Take motor insurance, for example. Despite the advent of the Model T in 1908, Massachusetts was the only state requiring compulsory auto insurance until 1956. Most of the others followed suit in the 1960s and 70s, though Illinois allowed its citizens to drive around without insurance until 1990. God alone knows how many people died, or were maimed, from road accidents between 1908 and 1990!

Was Illinois merely protecting the ‘rights and freedoms’ of its citizens? Surely, not those who were mowed down by uninsured drivers?

The only US state still so irresponsible as to not demand mandatory auto insurance is New Hampshire. There, a penniless bum can swan around in any old pick-up truck and kill or maim whoever he chooses. If he has no money, they’ll likely get no recompense whatsoever.

Which begs a somewhat ironic scenario. Imagine for a moment, you lose your job, and with it, your family’s medical coverage. Bereft, you spend your last few hundred dollars on a vacation in New Hampshire. Whilst there, a drunken hobo from a tumbledown shack in the backwoods smashes his pick-up into you and your family. You spend weeks in hospital, only to discover on your discharge that the hospital’s taken your house and all your possessions as part payment for those huge medical bills.

You have no money, nowhere to live, and your only recourse is to move you and your family into the tumbledown shack with the drunken hobo who almost killed you all.

Maybe ‘Obamacare’ might seem a little more attractive from your new perspective.

What price your rights and freedoms, then?