Hi,

I’m writing an article about car sharing for the Columbia News Service, distributed by the New York Times news wire, and I would love to hear your opinions on car sharing! I look forward to hearing from you.

Thanks,
Sydney

wow, I always thought they were walking time bombs trying to kill jews (sarcasm)… funny how easily we are manipulated by the media.

when you say OPEC, do you mean the bush administration?

Dude the RIAA is such a fucked up organization.. they care nothing about music, only making money. I’d say 90% of the corporations in the US are like that and it sucks ass. What happened to the good ol’ mom and pop shops that actually take pride in what they do, and care about making their customers happy.

Justifying the existence of humongoid, money hungry corporations by the need to feed 7 billion people is lame dude. There is more than enough food to feed everyone in the world. The problem is that the hungry people can’t afford to buy the food they need. Plus, smaller farms that are run by farmers that take pride in their work to produce for a community are much more efficient than larger corporate farms. Smaller farms can even produce a multitude of crops and animals on their land rather than just one.

As for integrating them corps, that’s pretty much happening naturally since this system seems to encourage monopolistic practices, at least in order to maximize profit. Just look at the car companies or fast food companies, pretty soon there’s gonna be like 1 or 2 that own all auto production or own all fast food chains. One major problem with that is exactly what you mentioned, how do you make them more responsible to their constituency? Right now all they really care about is making a buck and not in their products, services, customers, or innovation.

basically to sum that up, I agree with you your second post;)

It was not an anonymous coward…. just a forgetful Yamin… Yes the truth is out….

It was I ahahahaha… But here is my reasoning for mega corps in food production:

Imagine a grain belt like you have here in the US and Canada. How do you distribute all of your surplus wheat around the world without a distribution network and some sort of global scale for your distribution model? I’m not sure everyone here knows this so I’ll say it; The US provides a significant amount of grain to other nations.

http://www.vegrains.org/documents/veg_chapter4.pdf

I would also implore you to consider the government’s ability to monitor and restrict the quality and process by which food is handled, stored, and distributed. When there are thousands and thousands of small growers, collectors, storehouses, distributors, and outlets the cost can become astronomical.

I unfortunately do not have time to make a further case but I think that large corporate models are the future for food growth and distribution.

I also feel that corporations in their current state are irresponsible selfish children. Many of them often take too much and give as little as possible. Some poison the towns that their workers live in and a decade later close the plant, leaving a cancer stricken population without health care (read GE, Dupont).

I would point out that this is not how it has to be. Large corporation does not equal evil. That is simply how we are doing things. We vote with every purchase and we accept all to often a lifestyle, which in practice, embraces these corporate practices rather than shuns them.

I’m no angel on this topic. Everyone one of us using or owning a computer has endorsed pollution on a scale that is hard to comprehend. I would suggest having conversations about making corporations better rather than simply condemning them.

Dude, that’s disgusting.

I would just like to state my position on the beef industry before going into this- I wish it didn’t exist.

Now for my thoughts on this article. I couldn’t actually read the NYTimes article because it is past the free period, but I did read a bit elsewhere on this issue.

My first thought as to why the fed gov was resistent to 100% testing was that possibly the screening test for mad cow produces false positives (as is the case with many diagnostic tests). This would create public confusion over the safety of beef. Well, I didn’t find anything to confirm this, but there are unresolved questions on some of the tests. Let’s assume this denial of 100% testing is entirely motivated by finances; setting a precedent to test 100% would increase costs (which would be reflected in beef prices). I can understand this position that it is unnecessary to spend the cash to test all cattle. Here is a fuller explanation of the truncated quote that is throughout many media articles: U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ann Veneman responded, “There is no scientifically valid reason for 100% testing.'’ She said that is particularly true for cattle younger than 30 months because they are not vulnerable to the disease.

The important fact here is that cattle younger than 30 months are not vulnerable to the disease (this isn’t stated very well, because they can be infected but do not develop the disease until later). The incubation period for this prion disease is several years in cattle- so young cattle being slaughtered for beef will not reach the age where many of the tests (possibly all of them) would show a positive result. I need to read more about recently developed tests, but the commonly used tests would not detect the prion until there is a lot of it in the cow ( would have to be older than 30 months).

As far as I can tell, in the U.S. mad cow testing is only done by the government. There isn’t any testing done privately. I’m not sure of the reason for this and whether or not this is the case in other countries as well. I think that’s one reason the USDA took that stance. I understand the point about the government making the decision for this company that wants to sell it’s beef to Japan- I agree that there should be some means for that company to be able to supply that market (and if Japan requires 100% testing, then the company needs to comply). Really, everyone should just stop eating beef since cow’s are so cute and sweet- that would solve the problem

V

Happy Borthday Eric! The similarity is in the nose…. defenitely the nose…

haha Thanks guys!

This makes speechless with surprise. Never knew that.
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