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Tiny Vermont Brings Food Industry To Its Knees On GMO Labels (ap.org)

Posted by BeauHD on from the overabundant-use-of-pesticides dept.

schwit1 writes: General Mills' announcement on Friday that it will start labeling products that contain genetically modified ingredients to comply with a Vermont law shows food companies might be throwing in the towel, even as they hold out hope Congress will find a national solution. Tiny Vermont is the first state to require such labeling, effective July 1. Its fellow New England states of Maine and Connecticut have passed laws that require such labeling if other nearby states put one into effect. The U.S. Senate voted 48-49 Wednesday against a bill that would have blocked such state laws. The food industry is holding out hope that Congress will prevent states from requiring such labeling. Some companies say they plan to follow Vermont's law, while others are considering pulling their products from the small state.

41 of 740 comments (clear)

  1. Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If they're happy with it, if it has advantages they can sell the consumers, then they should sell it to consumers on its advantages.

    Why would you try to conceal GMO products from the consumer? It's confirmation that the makers of GMO products have something to hide!

    1. Re:Why conceal it? by MadCat221 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      For the same reason that people find it a bad idea to self-identify as "liberal" or "socialist". Reactionary types have poisoned the word in the popular vernacular.

    2. Re:Why conceal it? by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 5, Insightful

      They aren't concealing anything. Food manufacturers already make it a point to label it non-GMO if it isn't, because they know that people who follow the food religion will prefer it, even if it means paying more. The same applies to kosher and halal labels.

      Anyways, requiring a GMO label is intended for nothing else than to stigmatize. It is every bit as asinine as the California proposal a few years back to require cell phones have a radiation output level, which is retarded because cell phones emit all of zero sieverts, but some dumb fucks think it's a wonderful idea to have to put manufacturers in the position of making phones that emit less EM energy, and for no good reason whatsoever.

      This is the same plan as those wanting GMO labeling, not to mention that fighting GMO food is dumb and even counterproductive from an environmental perspective.

    3. Re:Why conceal it? by sirsnork · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Why do you think it stigmatizes anything?

      Everyone putting food on the shelf in that state will be required to do this as far as I understand, so _everyone_ is in the same boat.

      This gives consumers the choice. If they want to buy more expensive non GMO options they will be able to make that decision.

      The fear the companies have is that there will be non GMO products available at the same price they have been selling theirs at, and everyone will buy that instead.

      If everyone is using the same base GMO ingredients, then no one has anything to worry about and everyone will keep buying exactly what they are already buying

      --

      Normal people worry me!
    4. Re:Why conceal it? by goose-incarnated · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Anyways, requiring a GMO label is intended for nothing else than to stigmatize. It is every bit as asinine as the California proposal a few years back to require cell phones have a radiation output level, which is retarded because cell phones emit all of zero sieverts, but some dumb fucks think it's a wonderful idea to have to put manufacturers in the position of making phones that emit less EM energy, and for no good reason whatsoever.

      Regardless, if you'd rather pull the product than relabel it then you know in advance that your product can't survive with an accurate label. People are stupid, but tough - that's just the way the market is.

      --
      I'm a minority race. Save your vitriol for white people.
    5. Re:Why conceal it? by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Regardless, if you'd rather pull the product than relabel it then you know in advance that your product can't survive with an accurate label. People are stupid, but tough - that's just the way the market is.

      The label isn't less accurate if it's omitted. Whether or not it's GMO is completely immaterial to the product. Another analogy is requiring mention of whether or not somebody died in a house prior to you selling it. Mentioning that fact will probably reduce its value, however if they never find out then there's no harm at all, and even if they do, there's still no harm, other than maybe it bothers the buyer's religious view, but nonetheless all 50 states in the US have laws preventing civil suits against people who don't mention this (or other immaterial facts, like whether a previous resident had AIDS.)

    6. Re:Why conceal it? by dougmc · · Score: 1, Insightful

      This cartoon tells why we shouldn't mandate labeling of them.

      *No* dangers have been found. None. And these foods (well, the GMO plants that went into them) are among the most heavily tested on the planet.

      Even the nutritional characteristics are the same -- and if they weren't, the FDA would require labeling, because then it would actually be different.

      This labeling makes even *less* sense than the Prop 65 warnings in California -- at least there, the chemicals in question really have been found to cause cancer (though in things bearing that ubiquitous warning label usually have the chemicals in question in utterly minuscule amounts that are many orders of magnitude lower than what's been found to cause even the smallest problems, or they're in things that aren't consumed by humans at all. (You wouldn't eat a Disneyland, would you? (Note that I didn't say "eat at Disneyland", but instead "eat Disneyland itself".)

    7. Re:Why conceal it? by ChromeAeonium · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Regardless, if you'd rather pull the product than relabel it then you know in advance that your product can't survive with an accurate label.

      How do you think it would affect sales if organic products had to 'accurately' say that they were grown in 400-700 nm radiation?

    8. Re:Why conceal it? by imidan · · Score: 5, Insightful

      I'm conflicted over this. I agree that the label is intended to stigmatize. But I can't quite see that we shouldn't have them. The people who want the label to be there want it because it's scary sounding and they hope it will dissuade people from buying food that contains GMOs. And those people want to undermine the GMO food industry for a lot of stupid, superstitious, bullshit reasons.

      But I do have objections to GMO food. My objections revolve mainly around two things: intellectual property rights and monocultures. I don't think it's a good strategy for our species for corporations to "own" and "license" the right to plant certain seeds. Also, agricultural monocultures can open us up to harm when some plant pest, pathogen, or disease latches on to the monoculture and potentially causes crop failure because our crops are all genetically identical. (The latter problem is possible without GMOs, but is enhanced by GMOs.)

      The labels are factual, but when people are dissuaded from buying GMO foods because of the label, they're just buying in to a superstition that GMOs are bad. The people advocating for labels are doing it for the wrong reasons, but I do think we need to put some real thought into how we incorporate GMO foods into our food supply. I'd just rather we did it for the right reasons, because the way we're going now, we're having the wrong conversations about the dangers of GMOs.

    9. Re:Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You might be surprised to learn that "socialism" is not a dirty word in most of the first world. There are many political parties across the globe that use terms like "social" and "liberal" in their names with no shame... including Germany, the very nation depicted in your picture. I think it's entirely fair to say that American media bears at least some responsibility for that particular stigma's continued existence at home.

    10. Re:Why conceal it? by execthis · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Your argument boils down to: People don't think/believe/do what you want, therefore they should be denied their right to know.

      I think it is you who is sick.

      Too bad you can't handle freedom.

    11. Re:Why conceal it? by cowdung · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I don't believe the dangers of GMOs are from a health standpoint.

      The main danger of GMOs is the social effect on small farmers being forced out of the business by companies like Monsanto. This is a real problem that affects farmers in many many countries where IP law is being used to bully the small guy into paying the big multi-national or go out of business.

      But again its not so much the technologies, but the legal framework around it that is causing this problem.

    12. Re:Why conceal it? by SvnLyrBrto · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I agree actually that the anti-GMO arguments are pretty stupid. But people have the right to eat what they want to eat, be it non-GMO, organic, fair trade, kosher, vegan, ovo/lacto vegetarian, gluten free, paleo, soylent, or whatever the next diet fad that comes down the pipeline will be. And it's a dick move to try to talk, trick, or coerce people into eating something they don't want to eat. Yeah, some of proselytism by people about their diets can be obnoxious. But that's no reason to withhold information about their food in order to trick them into breaking said diet. And if you think the GMO-free ones are the worst, I suspect you've not encountered many vegans or paleos.

      --
      Imagine all the people...
    13. Re:Why conceal it? by Aighearach · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Where have you been for the past two decades? Have you really missed the controversy, fearmongering, lies, and generally unscientific bollocks that lead up to this?

      Except that intelligent people also accuse the food industry of these things.

      This push for labeling is not coming from plant & agricultural scientists, and for good reason.

      Yeah, the good reason is that scientists are not politicians or legislators. Lots of people who are scientists support food labeling, of whatever things people want to know about the product. Why do you just assert that scientists are anti-information, anti-choice? That is insane.

    14. Re: Why conceal it? by slashping · · Score: 3, Insightful

      And they can't do that when the conditions they care about are hidden from them

      Most of the conditions of the food is hidden from them. Why single out GMO as one of the required pieces of information ? Why not mandate accurate display of all pesticides and herbicides, or why not the additives that were added to the blend of rubber of the tires of the harvester ?

    15. Re:Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Manufacturers are already required to display all sorts of things they would rather not, including caloric content, nutritional value if any, and actual ingredients used to assemble the product, some of which may resemble food. This is a step in the right direction and manufacturers who don't want the public to know what they're consuming can stand next to tobacco manufacturers who didn't want the public to know that tobacco products were lethal and lied to the public when questioned. In fact, the food manufacturers can probably thank the tobacco industry for this label now.

      Captcha: Impostor. I'm not the real AC, I'm an impostor.

    16. Re:Why conceal it? by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nice illustration how word poisoning works. For you, "socialist" is a nasty word. For me, here in Europe, we have had a socialist party in our government for the better parts of the latter 20 century, and we have reached a prosperity level that most of the world, and I dare say including the US, envy us for. So someone calling himself "socialist" isn't that big a deal here.

      I needn't hit books to see that. I need to open my window.

      He would, by the way, be the absolute polar opposite of a "liberal" for the average European. Also due to our political history, where the liberals are usually found at the right edge of the political spectrum.

      A "conservative" here is more a centrist than a right wing nutjob. If you're looking for poisoned words in the political arena here, I guess you have to reach for "nationalist". That well has been utterly poisoned for good, I think. But I guess that's what starting the bloodiest war in the history of mankind would do.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    17. Re:Why conceal it? by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Are you high?

      Do you REALLY need an explanation why it might not be in the consumer's interest, if not outright dangerous, if the manufacturer gets to state what he wants to say about the product and what he does not?

      If so, just think back a few years and what we learned since about cheap Chinese child toys.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    18. Re:Why conceal it? by Smidge204 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      ...so it's okay if manufacturers lie just a little bit?

      I understand that you're taking this position from the perspective that GMOs are harmless. It's not like labeling foods that contain or may contain traces of peanuts, where a small population are demonstrably, deathly allergic to peanuts. Let me say that I agree that GMOs (at least so far) do not pose any health threats.

      However, there are reasons beyond health and safety that people might choose one product over another... even irrational reasons. For a "free market" to work, consumers need to be informed. Therefore manufacturers lying consumers *in any capacity* then that is, in my opinion, an injustice to the general population: how are the people who do not want GMOs in their foods supposed to have their voices heard in the "free market" if they can't tell what foods contain GMOs?

      Enough people care if their foods contain GMOs that they got laws passed to require labeling. In a properly democratic society, that means food should require labeling regardless of if it makes sense or not. And since there are no higher or existing laws that overrule or prevent this requirement, guess what? I think manufacturers should label their products.
      =Smidge=

    19. Re:Why conceal it? by sonamchauhan · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, we can't - its a balance. Giving consumers the ability to choose what they eat outweighs the 'freedom' the manufacturer has to display what they want.

    20. Re:Why conceal it? by cbraescu1 · · Score: 1, Insightful

      Your whole text reinforces the disdain of Central and Eastern Europeans against selfish Western Europeans.

      "For you, "socialist" is a nasty word. For me, here in Europe, we have had a socialist party in our government for the better parts of the latter 20 century, and we have reached a prosperity level that most of the world, and I dare say including the US, envy us for. So someone calling himself "socialist" isn't that big a deal here."

      In Central and Eastern European members of the EU the reality is that "Socialist" is being seen as a more tricky version of "Communist" (which in itself is seen as nothing different than "Nazi"). Yes, the Socialists themselves tend to believe being a Socialist is oh-so-different than being a Communist (with a minority being actually hardcore Communists who realize their only way to influence is by using the Socialist umbrella). But since most Socialist parties are in reality former Communist ones (you know, those who enslaved their own nations post WW2), their situation is very similar to those who are sorry for being caught, not sorry for doing something bad. For the majority of the population Socialism has negative connotations (for obvious reasons).

      "He would, by the way, be the absolute polar opposite of a "liberal" for the average European."

      True. A liberal in Europe still follows the classical liberalism stance of freedom.

      "Also due to our political history, where the liberals are usually found at the right edge of the political spectrum."

      Not true. And it shows that you're a socialist / social-democrat / leftist yourself (not that there were much remaining doubts by now). European liberals are on the CENTRE-RIGHT of the political spectrum. On the RIGHT-EDGE are, well, right-wing / nationalist / populist movements and parties. But as usual European leftists believe they are the center, so of course a liberal would be so far to the right...

      "A "conservative" here is more a centrist than a right wing nutjob."

      I fail to see where on this discussion (which is focusing exclusively on either USA or the European Union) conservatives are *EVER* believed to be "right wing nutjobs". The only place would be some Communist propaganda outlets... So now we know even better your position, comrade "Opportunist"!

      "If you're looking for poisoned words in the political arena here, I guess you have to reach for "nationalist". That well has been utterly poisoned for good, I think. But I guess that's what starting the bloodiest war in the history of mankind would do."

      Funny thing is that WW2 was started by National-SOCIALIST Germany and COMMUNIST Russia attacking and sharing Poland. So let's tone down the obvious lies that the bloodiest war in history was not the direct effect of left wing nutjobs bringing socialist / communist revolution to the unprepared world.

      --
      Catalin Braescu
      Ofaly.com
    21. Re:Why conceal it? by skam240 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Yeah, the left wing media did us all a massive disservice demonizing a war that amounted to sending non-voluntary soldiers to a war meant to suppress a government that our government knew would most definitely win a democratic election (the reason that both the French and then US wouldn't allow elections in the country). In fact, we have a good sized record of disrupting legitimately elected governments because they we inconvenient for us. "Socialist" governments are most definitely not the only form of governance that has served to oppress people.

      --
      I ignore Anonymous Coward posts. If you want to discuss something, that's awesome. Log in.
    22. Re:Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Liar. Cross-breeding is NOT the same thing as GMO.

      There is no way in hell any amount of cross-breeding a potato can make it pick up genes from a fucking fish to make it more cold-resistant.

      Your deliberate misuse of "cross-breeding" labels you as a fraudster, a liar, a shill and human vermin. FUCK OFF poo-eater!

    23. Re:Why conceal it? by InterGuru · · Score: 3, Insightful

      The lefi wing nutjobs are on campus, the right wing nutjobs are in Congress, governors chairs and state legislatures.

    24. Re:Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

      Talking about the "free market" and about legislation at the same time is (oxy)moronic. If people care about GMO, they can petition companies to label their products, or they can stick to those who already label of their own volition.

      If there is ever a health risk associated with GMO, we can worry about labelling.

      What good does petition do if no company labels its products ? None at all. It isn't like you can stop buying food eh ? So regulation is necessary.

    25. Re: Why conceal it? by Dog-Cow · · Score: 1, Insightful

      That has never happened. The one case involved a farmer who went out of his way to gather the seeds from his neighbor's crops and use them in preference to other seeds. At no time has Monsanto gone after a farmer for accidental use of Monsanto seeds.

    26. Re:Why conceal it? by slashping · · Score: 4, Insightful

      ...so it's okay if manufacturers lie just a little bit?

      No.

      how are the people who do not want GMOs in their foods supposed to have their voices heard in the "free market" if they can't tell what foods contain GMOs?

      That's quite obvious. Any producer is free to include a label that says "GMO free", and sell his products for a premium.

    27. Re:Why conceal it? by Opportunist · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Quite the opposite.

      A free market according to its model requires one thing that does not exist in our reality: A consumer with total information available to him. And while this is impossible, we can still try our best to get to it as close as we possibly can. Because that's what the market model demands.

      Only an informed consumer who knows every aspect of the product could possibly choose the "best" product. Only then could he even come close to having the function that the free market requires from him: Determine the product that fits his needs best, choose this product, reward the producer making it and punishing those who fail to do so.

      This would be what a FREE MARKET requires and demands! Without this, there is no free market. Unfortunately, whenever someone start blaring "free market", the very last thing he has in mind is such a model market. What he has in mind is a dumb customer who will buy whatever shit you feed him. Either you then get to hear that a customer "could try to get that information on his own if he really wants to" or even the completely bogus shit that there is no need to inform that customer or that he has no right to any kind of information altogether.

      That is bullshit. Because then he CANNOT perform his function in the free market system. The consumer does not only have the right to be informed, he MUST be informed, whether he likes it or not, to perform his elementary function in the system! And that's independent of any health hazards or whatever else you could think of. The question the free market asks is not whether it is good for someone, the question is whether he wants it.

      So no, free market and labeling legislation are not contradicting. They're pretty much a requirement.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    28. Re:Why conceal it? by Teun · · Score: 1, Insightful

      You're full of it, and in the pocket of Monsanto as well.
      Cross breeding is extending the natural process by the same natural means, GMO is laboratory chemistry typically to achieve what nature wouldn't allow.

      --
      "The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
    29. Re:Why conceal it? by St.Creed · · Score: 2, Insightful

      According to the NSDAP it was a bit before that: the "stab-in-the-back" legend is pretty infamous and basically claimed the same thing: the first world war was actually going pretty well for Germany, apart from minor setbacks, and if only the left hadn't risen up in revolt against the emperor and the papers hadn't claimed defeat, they still could have managed to salvage the whole thing.

      This legend works best on people who have no idea about the historical situation at the time.

      It's also quite funny how army leaderships always keep telling the rest of the world it wasn't their fault they lost the war. I'm pretty sure the Carthago Press Corps had the same problems in the Punic wars.

      --
      Therefore, by the (faulty) logic you're using, you're just a cow with a keyboard - osu-neko (2604)
    30. Re:Why conceal it? by slashping · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Manufacturers are already required to display all sorts of things they would rather not, including caloric content, nutritional value if any, and actual ingredients used to assemble the product

      And as soon as you can show that GMO food affects consumer health, like the caloric content does, then we should have a warning for GMO as well.

    31. Re:Why conceal it? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Seed patents date back to the 1930s. Biological patents (yeast was the first) date back to the nineteenth century. Agricultural "intellectual property" has nothing at all to do with genetic engineering, a technology that wasn't commercialized until the 1980s.

    32. Re:Why conceal it? by AthanasiusKircher · · Score: 3, Insightful

      I don't disagree; what I'm saying is that they have no right to legally mandate their personal dietary preferences.

      If you were talking about an individual, sure I agree. But luckily we live in something still resembling a representative democracy, where individuals get to make all those arguments to their representatives, and those representatives get to vote on such things.

      I don't see how asking a company to provide some information about ingredients is some sort of violation of any "fundamental right."

      Notice how things like non-Kosher and Haram labels are not required by law. If, say, a Muslim demanded that non-Halal products had a Haram label on them because they were too lazy to learn about their own belief system, would you feel any sympathy for that person's 'right to know?'

      If a single Muslim demanded that our food labeling system be changed, I probably wouldn't pay much attention. If a significant segment of the population cared and convinced a state legislature that such labeling would be helpful to many people, though, I wouldn't have a problem with such labeling on consumer goods.

      This isn't about a "right to know." It's a question about whether states have ability to pass minor regulatory laws. They pass them all them, requiring all sorts of random crap. Yes, some of those regulations are probably unnecessary or even an abuse of power. I sincerely doubt that GMO labeling laws would come close to even the top 1000 of most egregious acts that state governments have mandated through regulation in the past year.

      Yet for some reason this particular one causes everyone to get up in arms.

      I certainty wouldn't knowingly do something like give such a person teriyaki chicken cooked with mirin and not tell them the food was cooked with alcohol, but still, they don't get to dictate regulations and mandate labels for something they could easily look up.

      Again, you're talking about individuals. TFA is talking about the actions and decisions of a representative governmental body. Last time I checked, local and state governments can pass pretty much whatever laws they want to regulating whatever, as long as they don't violate any fundamental rights and aren't fundamentally abusive, arbitrary, or discriminatory. If you don't like such policies, lobby your representative or move to another state.

    33. Re:Why conceal it? by ChromeAeonium · · Score: 1, Insightful

      That's a pretty poor case you're making. If someone is knowingly, intentionally, violating patent law or breaking a contract they signed, that's their fault. I suppose you could complain about the very concept of plant patents if you care to explain how crop breeders getting paid a fair price for their work, selling something that no one is forced to buy or use but is still desirable enough to command a premium seed price, is somehow wrong.

    34. Re:Why conceal it? by BenBoy · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Well put. For those of us (here in the US) who have forgotten the difference between capitalism and plutocracy (I know, so technical, right?), a couple of citations:
      Information Asymetry.
      Why you (and your 401K) care.
      In short, voting with your dollars for a product whose contents you're forbidden to know is like voting in an election for a candidate behind door number three or taking what's behind the curtain. Kinda like now. But I digress.

    35. Re:Why conceal it? by drunken_boxer777 · · Score: 5, Insightful

      You clearly don't work in medicine, healthcare, the pharma industry, or even understand how drugs work. I also suspect that you've had very basic instruction in biology. I get tired of hearing "pharma companies only make drugs that address symptoms so they can keep selling you drugs." I think you are conflating "disease treatment" and "cure". Most drugs are disease treatments, since permanent cures are not possible (at this time) for the vast majority of diseases. But, e.g., there were recent market approvals of 3 actual cures for hepatitis C.

      Drugs are developed to have a mechanism of action that directly addresses underlying disease. When it costs in excess of $1 billion and 10 years to bring a drug to market, you don't waste time on something that you have no idea how it works. Never mind that FDA and every other health regulatory agency in the world frowns upon pharma companies saying "we have no idea how it works, but it does, so just approve it." You make sure you are targeting the molecular and cellular causes of the disease. The drugs drastically reduce the severity of the disease. This manifests in a reduction in symptoms. The average person sees it as "the drugs only treat symptoms, I still have the disease", but what is actually happening is the drug is treating the disease and reducing its severity and a reduction or disappearance of symptoms is really just a side effect of treating the disease.

      TL;DR: "Treatment" and "cure" are not the same, and "cure" is often not possible at this time. So should pharma companies not bother?

  2. Re:truly free markets require full information by Jiro · · Score: 4, Insightful

    It's funny how nobody who ever says that then supports the idea of labelling foods "This food picked by Mexican immigrants", even though that's information that some people would certainly like to use in their purchase decisions.

    No packaging can disclose every bit of information about the product, and the government picking and choosing what information the company is forced to provide, for political reasons, is not free market. (And make no mistake, "some pressure groups hate GMOs and want the government to force companies to label them" is "political reasons".)

  3. Re:Corn and other grains by My+Name+Is+Neo · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Selective breeding is a lot more predictable than directly twiddling genes. There are a lot of unforeseen side-effects.

    [citation needed]

    Bill Nye would disagree with you. Specifically, here is a quote from when he changed his mind about GMO's:

    "The thing is, genetically modified food has no effect on us. That is to say, there is no difference between it and organically raised food. This is scientifically provable. It’s certainly provable to my satisfaction, and that’s the most straightforward thing about it, to see if it’s still nutritious and see if it has any allergic effect, and it absolutely does not. In fact, in general, all of these foods are more nutritious."

    Source: http://ecowatch.com/2015/07/14...

    There's further details in his recent book Undeniable about why there aren't "unforeseen side-effects" from GMO foods. I think anyone with doubts or curiosity about the subject (and evolution in general) should read it.

    --
    Snarf This.
  4. Smart companies will call it "Intelligent Design" by FrodoOfTheShire · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Just add the label "GMO Created by Intelligent Design" and the whole Heart Land will buy the products like gene spliced hot cakes.

  5. Re:Anti science by Dog-Cow · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Of course it's anti-science. Science is about formulating a hypothesis and conducting experiments to prove or disprove it. An anti-GMO stance is about forming a hypothesis and forcing everyone else in the world to validate it by fiat. No experimentation in sight.

  6. "To Its Knees" is right... by Cornwallis · · Score: 4, Insightful

    As A Vermonter I love to see these stories. VT is increasingly a playground for the rich and those subsumed with WLG* to support the cause du jour.

    Hate fracking? Vermont BANNED it in a very public legislative effort. (Even though Vermont will never have fracking due to geologic conditions in the state.) But of course the Illuminati who run the state strongly support a new, natural gas pipeline that will transport fracked NG to the most "sustainable" of towns.

    Hate litter? We are all becoming professional garbage managers due to legislatively micro-managed trash laws. (Meanwhile, Keurig/Green Mountain Coffee STILL dumps millions of plastic, unrecyclable single-use K-cups into the environment.

    The local "food co-op" broadcasts BUY LOCAL then sells grossly overpriced Yuppie-chow imported from California.

    I can go on but you get the point. Do as I say - not as I do.

    *White Liberal Guilt