Unspinning the Web of Spider-Goat

By Dr. Mae-Wan Ho
Institute of Science in Society

Breeding transgenic goats for spider silk is unethical, and passing surplus goats onto the public food chain unsafe; the project has never been subject to regulatory risk assessment and there is not a single report characterizing the transgenic sequences in the spider-goats’ genome. [Image]

Sitting in Starbucks, eating GMOs

By Robert McCollough

Across the country rage is growing about GMOs and their being unleashed one after another on the country.  While Europe, despite immense pressure from the Clinton administration, initially banned them, the FDA hid 40,000 documents indicating their extreme toxicity, to get them introduced in the US.

Ten years after Monsanto’s Bt corn was first planted in 1996, diabetes had increased 90% with the highest incidence among Hispanics for whom corn is a sacred and central part if their diet.

Those GMOs are being kept unlabeled.  A Monsanto official once said to label them would be like putting a skull and cross bones on them.

Boulder CO bans GM crops on county-owned land

By Dr Mercola

In November 2011, about 250 Boulder County residents attended a public meeting to discuss the planting of GM (genetically modified) crops on county-owned land. Their turnout, together with an anti-GMO (genetically modified organism) recommendation from the county’s Food and Agriculture Policy Council, led county officials to vote for a phase out of genetically engineered crops on open space.

This is a powerful testimony to the influence residents can have on their local regulations when they stand together for a cause; you, too, can work toward enacting such a phase out in your area as well.

Jungle fungus eats plastic, beats cancer

Pestalotiopsis microspora image by Yale University

By Rady Ananda
Activist Post

Researchers have found the first endophytic fungus that eats plastic, and can use it as its sole food source even in an oxygen-free environment. [1] 

Pestalotiopsis microspora presents a massive bioremediation opportunity for landfills, where buried and surface plastics can be degraded naturally.

Monsanto illegally plants GM corn in India

By Coalition for a GM Free India

New Delhi/Bengaluru, 6 Feb. 2012: Ahead of a regulators’ meeting on February 8th 2012, and reacting to the confirmed reports of Monsanto’s illegal planting of Herbicide Tolerant (HT) maize in its GM maize trial, the Coalition for a GM-Free India demanded that Monsanto be blacklisted immediately.

The violation was revealed in a response of the Genetic Engineering Appraisal Committee to an RTI application.

World Peas Expo in Toronto Feb. 11

By Occupy Gardens Toronto

The WoRld PeAs ExPo is a celebration of peace, food, love, art, and soilidarity!

The purpose of this gathering is to build community, to share and learn with one another, and to begin plotting for the mass seeding of the city.

Through this event we wish to emphasize and celebrate the connection between peace and food; and the incredible power of food to bring people together, bridge differences, reduce conflict and promote peace!

Occupy Farm in the Sky

By Seismologik

Organizers of Occupy Wall Street Sustainability Working group in
concert with Eco Station NY are creating a 16,000 sq foot Roof Top Farm in Bushwick Brooklyn, and we need your help.

Bushwick, Brooklyn, is home to a population of 130,000 people, many of
whom reside in neighborhoods that have been designated as food
deserts.

We assert that access to natural, nutrient dense, real food is a basic
human right.

This Food Blasts Your Body With up to 180 Times the Fluoride in Drinking Water

By Dr Mercola

One of the primary sources of fluoride exposure is not fluoridated drinking water but non-organic foods, due to the high amounts of fluoride-based pesticide residues on these foods. Non-organic foods may account for as much as one-third of the average person’s fluoride exposure.

Monsanto-funded legislators suppress WA’s GMO-label bills, lie about funding

By Rady Ananda

If Washington State’s GMO-label bills, HB 2637 and SB 6298 don’t get voted out of committee by Friday at 5 pm, they’re dead, which is exactly what Monsanto-funded legislators on both the House and Senate Ag committees want.

The Senate’s Agriculture and Water & Rural Economic Development committee chair, Democratic Sen. Brian Hatfield, and two Republicans, Sens. Jim Honeyford and Mark Schoesler, have all taken money from Monsanto, reports the Organic Consumers Assn.

Targeting Monsanto’s Man in DC

By MetroFarm.com

In 2009, President Barack Obama selected Monsanto executive Michael Taylor to be the nation’s first food safety czar.

In 2012, citizen Frederick Ravid collected 186,000 signatures on a petition at signon.org to force Taylor’s removal.  All those signatures lead us to ask…

Should Monsanto be in charge of America’s food safety?

This Saturday at 9am Pacific, the Food Chain Radio show with Michael Olson hosts citizen Frederick Ravid for a conversation about the relationship between the federal government and the Monsanto Corporation.

Harvard Food Law Society to Host Raw Milk Debate Feb. 16

By Kimberly Hartke
Weston A. Price Foundation

At one time, everyone drank raw milk. But with the invention of pasteurization and its alleged safety benefits, consumption of raw milk in this country almost completely disappeared. In fact, in some states it is illegal to sell raw milk. But a growing segment of the population is clamoring for increased access to raw milk, citing its nutritional benefits and recently discovered inbuilt safety mechanisms. Opponents are skeptical of such nutritional claims and believe the safety risks of unpasteurized milk are simply too high.

Join the Food Law Society as we present a debate covering the legal, health, and nutritional merits of raw milk. The participants are:

Dean Foods, Biotech, USDA Conspiring to Pollute Organics

By Cornucopia

Largest Corporate Dairy, Biotech Firm and USDA Accused of
Conspiring to Corrupt Rulemaking and Pollute Organics

Watchdog Requests Federal Investigation, Files Ethics Charges

WASHINGTON, DC: The Cornucopia Institute, an organic industry research and watchdog organization, announced it has formally requested the USDA’s Office of Inspector General (OIG) to investigate corruption at its National Organic Program resulting in the use of illegal synthetics in organic food and then allowing powerful corporations to “game the system” for approval “after the fact.”

The controversy surrounds products developed by Martek Biosciences Corporation. Martek, part of a $12 billion Dutch-based conglomerate, recently petitioned for approval of its genetically modified soil fungus and algae as nutritional supplements in organic food.

Kentucky food freedom takes on Big Ag in S.B. 47

Why is Big Ag so afraid of freedom of food choice? Kentuckians battle for basic right to choose food.

By John Moody

Kentucky finds itself at the center of the emerging battle over who decides what the average person can choose to eat – the government/regulatory apparatus, little more than a front man for Big Ag and the establishment at this point, or the people.

It is a question of paramount importance – whoever controls the food supply controls the people. Whoever controls what people eat controls a large portion of a nation’s wealth and health.

Senate Bill 47 (www.kysb47.info) would protect Kentuckians’ right to privately contract and invest in all types of livestock and poultry to acquire the food of their choice from the farmer of their choice, raised in the manner of their choice.

CDC calls Morgellons’ nanoworms a delusion, protects DARPA

By Rady Ananda
Activist Post

Imagine having the mental prowess to be able to create living filaments heretofore unknown, that can reproduce themselves, some of which come with identifying letters embossed on them, and then to make them extrude from beneath your skin, all against your conscious will. [Image]

Sound like science fiction?  It’s not, says the US Centers for Disease Control.

Despite having spent four years and $600,000, and using the world’s largest forensic database, the premier health agency reports it is unable to identify the source of the fibers emanating from those suffering with Morgellons. [1]

Occupy Monsanto with Farmers: Jan. 31, Foley Square (NYC)

On January 31st, family farmers from across the county will take part in the first phase of the OSGATA et al. v. Monsanto court case filed to protect farmers from genetic trespass by Monsanto’s genetically modified (GMO) seed, which can contaminate organic and non-GMO farmers’ crops and open them up to abusive lawsuits.

Meet at Foley Square in Manhattan at 9 am on Tuesday, Jan. 31, 2012. [Image]

New Study: GMO’s Bt protein toxic to human cells

By Frédérique Baudouin
CRIIGEN

Insecticidal Bt toxins such as those produced in genetically engineered plants can be detrimental to human cells. This is a result of recent research led by researchers at the University of Caen (France).

Their experiments showed that toxins produced in, for example, the genetically engineered maize MON810, can significantly impact the viability of human cells. The effects were observed with relatively high concentrations of the toxins, nevertheless there is cause for concern.

Doctor cures her multiple sclerosis with hunter-gatherer diet

Dr. Terry Wahls learned how to properly fuel her body. Using the lessons she learned at the subcellular level, she used diet to cure her MS and get out of her wheelchair.

Confessions of a Lukewarmist

By Rady Ananda

Today, the Wall Street Journal published a letter from 16 distinguished scientists addressed to political candidates entitled, No Need to Panic About Global Warming.

“Perhaps the most inconvenient fact is the lack of global warming for well over 10 years now,” they write, a fact that “is known to the warming establishment…”

The piece directly attacks the notion that carbon dioxide emissions are warming the globe, concluding with:

Why You Absolutely Must Personally Treat Your Own Water

Mike Barrett
Activist Post

Why do we need to worry about the water we are consuming each and every day?

When referring to a group of people or someone acting different, the phrase “it must be in the water” is often used as a response. While this phrase is always used comically, you need to know that many of your health problems may indeed be result of what is in the water you are consuming every day.

Disease genomics a false paradigm per new Harvard study

Mystery of Missing Heritability Solved?

By Dr. Mae-Wan Ho
Institute of Science in Society

EXCERPTS: Genome-wide scans for genes that determine susceptibility to common diseases have yielded little because most of those genes do not exist; disease genomics is a science fantasy that wastes time and money while the health of the nation deteriorates.