Bush Administration to fight to keep meatpackers from testing all slaughtered cattle for Mad Cow disease

I found this off Daily Kos, and went to the original International Herald-Tribune source. Here is the entire article:

WASHINGTON: The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.

The Agriculture Department tests fewer than 1 percent of slaughtered cows for the disease, which can be fatal to humans who eat tainted beef. A beef producer in the western state of Kansas, Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, wants to test all of its cows.

Larger meat companies feared that move because, if Creekstone should test its meat and advertised it as safe, they might have to perform the expensive tests on their larger herds as well.

The Agriculture Department regulates the test and argued that widespread testing could lead to a false positive that would harm the meat industry.

A federal judge ruled in March that such tests must be allowed. U.S. District Judge James Robertson noted that Creekstone sought to use the same test the government relies on and said the government didn't have the authority to restrict it. - A federal judge ruled in March that such tests must be allowed. The ruling was scheduled to take effect June 1, but the Agriculture Department said Tuesday it would appeal, effectively delaying the testing until the court challenge has played out.

Mad cow disease, or bovine spongiform encephalopathy, is linked to more than 150 human deaths worldwide, mostly in Britain.

Three cases of mad cow disease have been found in the United States. The first, in December 2003 in Washington state, was in a cow that had been imported from Canada. The second, in 2005, was in a cow born in Texas. The third was confirmed last year in an Alabama cow.

Okay, so Creekstone Farms Premium Beef wants to test all of their slaughtered cows for Mad Cow disease, and show consumers how their cows are safe. And Creekstone is willing to use the same test as the Agriculture Department, and the company is willing to pay for those tests. The big meatpacking companies do not want Creekstone to test their own beef. If Creekstone's testing program results in an increase of beef sales, as consumers want beef that is considered safe from Mad Cow disease, other smaller beef companies will adopt the same testing program as Creekstone. The big meatpacking companies sales, and profits, will start to drop as consumers will demand that these companies also test all of their own beef for Mad Cow. That is the fear within the big meatpacking companies--that they will have to spend a greater share of their profits in testing their own herds.

So what do these big meatpacking companies do? They lobby the Bush administration. And the Agriculture Department comes out with this statement "that widespread testing could lead to a false positive that would harm the meat industry." This is the same Agriculture Department that can only test less than one percent of the slaughtered cows in the U.S. for Mad Cow disease. If Creekstone is willing to adopt the same testing standards the Agriculture Department uses for testing its beef, then allow Creekstone to initiate the testing program. Have the Agriculture Department monitor the Creekstone testing program. But no. Creekstone cannot perform their own testing program because it will become a threat to the big meatpacking companies' profits. The Bush administration is not fighting to protect the health of the American consumer, or even the health of the free market. The Bush administration is fighting to protect the profits of Big Meatpacking.

Rick Perlstein at .Common Sense wrote this:

Oh, all right. One small comment. First, observe the contempt for liberty. When E. coli conservatives say self-regulation is preferable to government, they're even lying about that. Second, observe the contempt for small business. When a small company want to - voluntarily! - hold its product to a higher standard, the government blocks it, in part because bigger companies have to be protected from the competition, in part because a theoretical threat to the bottom line (false positives) trumps protection against a deadly disease.

There's your conservatism, America: not extremism in defense of liberty. State socialism in defense of Mad Cow.

Government of the corporations, by the corporations, and for the corporations....