GMO allowed by FDA

Wait, Did the USDA Just Deregulate All New Genetically Modified Crops?

It's a hoary bureaucratic trick, making a controversial announcement on the Friday afternoon before a long weekend, when most people are daydreaming about what beer to buy on the way home from work, or are checking movie times online. But that's precisely what the US Department of Agriculture pulled last Friday.


In an innocuous-sounding press release titled "USDA Responds to Regulation Requests Regarding Kentucky Bluegrass," agency officials announced their decision not to regulate a "Roundup Ready" strain of Kentucky bluegrass—that is, a strain genetically engineered to withstand glyphosate, Monsanto's widely used herbicide, which we know as Roundup. The maker of the novel grass seed, Scotts Miracle Gro, is now free to sell it far and wide. So you'll no doubt be seeing Roundup Ready bluegrass blanketing lawns and golf courses near you—and watching anal neighbors and groundskeepers literally dousing the grass in weed killer without fear of harming a single precious blade.


Which is worrisome enough. But even more worrisome is the way this particular product was approved. According to Doug Gurian-Sherman, senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists' Food and Environment Program, the documents released by the USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) along with the announcement portend a major change in how the feds will deal with genetically modified crops.


Notably, given the already-lax regulatory regime governing GMOs (genetically modified organisms, click here for a primer), APHIS seems to be ramping down oversight to the point where it is essentially meaningless. The new regime corresponding with the bluegrass announcement would "drastically weaken USDA’s regulation," Gurian-Sherman told me. "This is perhaps the most serious change in US regs for [genetically modified] crops for many years."

First it was soybeans.  Now Kentucky Bluegrass.  Next?  Every single seed/crop known to man.

Dietary laws in the Bible

FDA says you have no right to real food unless they give you permission first

In a response to a lawsuit filed by the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF), the FDA has articulated its belief that there is no such thing as a right to health or to purchase or consume any given food.
The FTCLDF has sued the FDA for banning the interstate shipment or sale of raw milk products, alleging that the policy deprives consumers and a food buying group owner “of their fundamental and inalienable rights of (a) traveling across State lines with raw dairy products legally obtained and possessed; (b) providing for the care and well being of themselves and their families, including their children; and (c) producing, obtaining and consuming the foods of choice for themselves and their families, including their children.”
In a legal response, the FDA countered that “there is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to food of all kinds.” As evidence for this position, the agency cites “the dietary laws of biblical times.”
The FDA goes further, stating that “there is no absolute right to consume or feed children any particular kind of food [because] comprehensive federal regulation of the food supply has been in effect at least since Congress enacted the Pure Food and Drugs Act of 1906. … Thus, plaintiffs’ claim to a fundamental privacy interest in obtaining ‘foods of their own choice’ for themselves and their families is without merit.”
In other words, the agency has stated that because Congress has given FDA the authority to regulate food, there is no such thing as a right to acquire any given food.

Great, the FDA turns to the Bible. Manna from the heavens?