Scrapin' Up the Bits... Repeat After Me: Corporations Are Always Right

Lots to discuss, read, ingest (intellectually, that is). And I'll start with the title to this digest (and remind my tens of readers of the "comments are my own" dislcaimer).

Business rules. Corporations, big banks. They count. The rest of the lot (that being the vast majority of this country), not so much. To wit, USDA secretary Tom Vilsack has acquiesced on the co-existence idea of genetically modified crops and organics.

But in recent weeks, the administration has announced a trio of decisions that have clouded the future of organics and boosted the position of genetically engineered (GE) crops. Vilsack approved genetically modified alfalfa and a modified corn to be made into ethanol, and he gave limited approval to GE sugar beets.

The announcements were applauded by GE industry executives, who describe their genetically modified organisms as the farming of the future. But organics supporters were furious, saying their hopes that the Obama administration would protect their interests were dashed.

“It was boom, boom boom,” said Walter Robb, co-chief executive of Whole Foods Markets, a major player in organics. “These were deeply disappointing. They were such one-sided decisions.”

So, yes, corporations are always right, at the expense of everyone else. Need more proof?

The House Agriculture Committee endorsed a letter this week to Budget Chairman Paul Ryan arguing that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which helps low-income Americans purchase food, would make a better target for cuts than automatic subsidies to farms.

The move comes as food prices are rising -- the Department of Agriculture expects overall food prices to rise 3 percent to 4 percent this year -- making it harder for the beneficiaries of SNAP to stretch their existing benefits, even as farmers profit from the tightening market.

UPDATE: Even more on this latter subject.

Next? No photos, please... or we'll send you to jail. Seriously.

Angered by repeated releases of secretly filmed videos claiming to show the mistreatment of farm animals, Iowa’s agriculture industry is pushing legislation that would make it illegal for animal rights activists to produce and distribute such images.

Agriculture committees in the Iowa House and Senate have approved a bill that would prohibit such recordings and punish people who take agriculture jobs only to gain access to animals to record their treatment. Proposed penalties include fines of up to $7,500 and up to five years in prison. Votes by the full House and Senate have not yet been set.

Baby carrots. Ubiquitous. Kid friendly. Cute. Also a very big business. Read the whole thing.

Unlike me, Mark Bittman can find a few good food/agriculture-related issues to blog about.

I have this strange thing. I write for a living. I enjoy reading, although I don't get to as much as I would like. And I really like wine.

But I don't like reading about wine. And that's because the writing (and writers, who are often deeply entrenched in the wine culture and world) is too often insular, snooty, over-the-top, self-concerned... In other words, it makes me wish I didn't like wine so much. Just thought I'd get that out there.

Finally, the Post-Gazette's food critic has nice things to say about a restaurant with particularly high culinary ambitions that, inexplicably, opened in the city's northern suburbs -- not a place known for such restaurants (or, for that matter, people who are interested in such restaurants).