Milk Madness

I heard in the news the other day that the government of Pennsylvania decided to ban hormone- and antibiotic-free labels on dairy products. The article Don't Cry Over Labeled Milk explains that agriculture officials banned this label because, according to them, it creates the false impression in the minds of the public that there is "good" and "bad" milk in terms of health and safety. I take exception to this ruling.
Injecting cows with antibiotics when they are not sick, and hormones is unnecessary and indeed kind of scary to think about. Anyone who has taken antibiotics could see from the warning labels that if a nursing mother takes antibiotics, they will be secreted in her milk. The same is true of cows. Quite frankly, I don't relish the idea of drinking milk that has antibiotics in it.
I also do not trust growth hormones. Canada and the EU have not approved them for use because of concerns about animal and public health.

I wonder how much of a hand Monsanto, the corporation that makes bovine growth hormones, had in this ruling? There are plenty of goods that are marketed to make one product seem better in some way than the same product produced by other companies. You don't see the government limiting how bottled water producers use the words "clean" and "fresh." Although, I believe that there are rules surrounding whether bottled water they can be described as "spring" or "drinking" or "mineral." But, you don't see the government saying "Labeling one bottle as spring instead of drinking makes it seem that one is good and one is bad." and then outlawing the use of that form of descriptive labeling.
This whole thing seems corrupt to me, like the agriculture officials were doing a favor for Monsanto at the public's expense.

Well, enough ranting for now.
I head an awesome quote from Thomas Merton, a Kentuckian Monk from the early part of the 20th century. He said, "In the end, it is the power of personal relationships that saves everything." There is so much wisdom in that. He was addressing social activists and peacemakers, cautioning against becoming too success oriented and losing sight of the value and truth behind their work. Sounds alot like an appeal for Christian "do not resist evil" and Buddhist "desireless action."
I have thought a great deal about the word resist in that quote from the Bible. I believe it has a different meaning than the way we use "resist" now. The way it was used in that quote would imply the application of anger and/or violence to confront evil. I do not believe it refers to non-cooperation or firm, non-violent, and good-natured confrontation of evil.

Internet's Down

The internet went down at my brother's place, where i have been staying the past couple weeks. So I had the pleasure to walk for half an hour down a hill to get to this lovely internet cafe in Berkeley. It really was a nice walk, even if it was a little rough on my knees. I have thought about taking the bus back up the hill, but I decided that I have the time to walk and the exercise would be good for me. I don't want to get into the habit of spending small amounts of money to make my life slightly easier.

Lately I have been wondering why giving to strangers has become so taboo in American society. I was sitting on the subway the other day, and there was an old man standing at the other end of the car. He was not fragile, he looked like he was in good health. His lady friend had managed to snag a seat next to a late 30s person. But, even though he was surrounded by younger people, no one offered him their seat. I wonder why no one near her thought to give up their seat for him. I would like to think that had I been on that side of the car I would have given him my seat. But I suppose I won't know until I get the opportunity. It is often hard to publically give when no one else is doing so.
Americans also seem reluctant to accept help. They say they don't want to be a bother, or they don't want to cause another hardship, which are good intentions. But I do not see helping someone else as a burden, I see it more as a lucky opportunity. Helping people is very rewarding for the person giving as well as the person receiving. Everyone ends up feeling better about their interaction. And I refuse to feel like others are indebted to me when I help them. I would rather they waited until they had the opportunity to help me, or someone else instead of endeavoring to "repay their debt." I don't even like framing it as a debt. Debt implies that you own someone something. Helping others should be done with no strings attached, and assuming that you owe something to someone who helps you is, in fact, doubting their generosity.

Also, everyone should check out my article "What is a Christian? Part One: Values are Practical"

Starting out

So, I figured I would give Blogging a try. We will see how it goes. I am going to try to post atleast once a week.

I watched the Democratic Debate on CNN tonight and I was struck by the difference between this years crop of candidates vs. 2004's candidates. These people are farther to the left and they are talking about important issues like health care, education, the war, corporate-power, and poverty. I like Kucinich best, he takes bold, principled stands on the issues, and I agree with most of his policies. If only the media was giving him more attention.
Obama comes in a close second. His policies aren't as good as Kucinich's, but he is smart and has not lived a sheltered life. I would vote for either with a pretty clear conscience.
Edwards has some good policies with poverty and unions, which is pretty good, but I don't trust him as much as I would trust Kucinich or Obama. And I am not a fan of Hilary. I think her policies won't be particularly effective. She is too much of an establishment candidate too. The others talk about corporate power, but I haven't heard that rhetoric from her.

I do think that whoever gets elected in 2008 will be a democrat, I don't think the republicans have a chance if they pick anyone other than Ron Paul. I do not think a pro-war candidate is viable. So, I think there is going to be a period of change after the 2008 election. I do think that we will have healthcare reform, environmental reform, energy policy reform, and education reform. But I think it probably won't be enough. A step in the right direction, sure, but not enough. Which is why we need to try to push the public discourse in this country toward better solutions and push the government toward these solutions too.

I have found it particularly interesting to see how each candidate tailor their statements to appeal to certain groups of people. They use terms that are popular on the left, like movement, progress, and social justice. Edwards has been using the corporate power rhetoric and Obama has been using rhetoric of change.

In other news... My move to San Francisco has been going pretty well. I have a second round interview with the PIRGs for an organizing job. I have found alot of good apartments on craigslist, so now I just have to start contacting the posters and deciding where it would be best to live. Unfortunately, this depends on how often I have to go into San Francisco. If I have to go every day than transportation costs would make it cheaper to live in the city. If I need to move around the Bay Area more often than transportation costs would make it cheaper to stay in the east bay. So much planning to do.