Sunday, April 25, 2010

Monday April 26th 2010


Todays post i am going to begin by talking about a recent epiphany i had regarding what i eat and what i feed my family.I am a lifetime omnivore,but then i viewed the footage on this great documentary called "Food Inc."by Michael Pollan.This man is a blessing to the planet and he is a fantastic author and an amazing advocate for change to a broken corrupt system.I recommend all of his books as must reads,and if you possibly can watch the documentary as well.The books are"an omnivore's delemma","in defense of food" and "the botany of desire".My older sister whom is herself a brilliant scholar graciously gifted me two of these books,and i cannot thank her enough for her love and support.She has given me many of the books i recently have read and has always supported and encouraged me to write and read as much as possible.I also must say when my sister and i get a chance to talk i always learn something new and enjoy her wit and wisdom tremendously.To return to the subject currently consuming me,i cannot bring myself to eat meat anymore after seeing that movie.I want no more of this unhealthy and unnatural food to go into my or my families mouth.It was eye opening to say the least to see how executives of giant food conglomerates go directly to high ranking government positions at the FDA and make regulatory decisions over their former employers.This kind of egregious conduct was just discussed by me about the financial corporations and their executives being former federal officials and visa versa.This kind of revolving door between our government and any and all large corporations from the food industry to the energy industry to the financial industry and on and on and on.It is an unbelievably corrupted and broken system run by two political parties entangled and entwined with all of the whole of the worlds corporations.The food industry alone is going to be the example i will address now in this post,but they all need to be discussed in an open public forum on a national scale for we the people to debate and discuss a realistic way forward.No longer can we sit by and watch as money consumes any and all chance for our government to the business of the people.As they sit back and do nothing our food system is being systematically consolidated into a small but giant group of global corporate control.I could not believe how giant food conglomerates send legions of lawyers after small farmers and put them out of business if they don't use their product.Because food has been legally given a patent in the form of seed stock that stops farmers from using anything but what the company has to sell.This corruption has permeated every aspect of the whole of the food system from top to bottom,and the problem this country has related to obesity can be directly traced back to the giant food conglomerates and their desire to bring as much profit to the shareholders at the expense of the health of our nation.The companies would like us to believe that it is a crisis of personal responsability in our nation,that we are a bunch of overindulgant americans gorging ourselves on way too much unhealthy food.This is not the case at all,when most people are looking for a family meal they must try to get the best for their money,and the industry makes sure it is easier to buy sugary drinks like soda and high calorie and sugar laden snacks like chips and cookies,ect...For an average family of average income it is much easier to go to the drivethru and get a big bag of burgers and fries to feed the kids than go to the grocery store and buy fresh vegtables and fruits or unprocessed food like locally raised poultry,pork and beef.It is not hard to desire a better diet for your family,the hard part is finding out how to go about finding food that meets the criterea of low environmental footprint,low carbon emissions and locally raised and in season foods.
The more research i do the more scared i become from the overwealming chokehold these giant global food conglomerates have on our entire food system.Trying to trace your food from seed to store shelf,or from farm to table is almost impossible at this point in our history.The government agencies in charge of overseeing this billion or even trillion dollar industry,have put the profit of these corporations way up and above the safety and well being of our nation as a whole.Along with all the other different markets and industries i have mentioned besides the food industry,the unchecked growth of a capitalist marketplace has destroyed any vestiges of a once great and powerful free nation into a corrupted group of billionaires doing their best to squeeze every last recource available to enhance their own positions.The whole of the Political system of this nation is beyond repair and in my humble opinion needs to be addressed as an national emergency.Non-violent public protest on a massive scale from coast to coast must take place,people need to throw open their windows just like in the famous movie,and shout "i'm mad as hell,and i'm not going to take it anymore!!!!"We cannot sit idle and watch as the decades long practice of corporate lobbyists using corporate money to buy our elected officials off to continue any longer.We need to DEMAND that public financing be the way our elections are financed,especially due to the recent Supreme Court ruling related to corporate financing of elections being free speech and covered under the first amendment.To give a faceless corporation with the unlimited resources available to it the same rights as an individual citizen with very limited recources is just stupid in my humble opinion.This must be a priority of any citizen of this nation who believes in freedom and true democracy,because the world we leave our children is how we will be judged in the end.The poison processed food that fills the shelves of this nations grocery stores must be discarded like the useless harmful garbage that it is,and we must replace it with healthy organic unprocessed food.This noble goal is very obviously pie in the sky and not possible,but the more people who become aware of the true nature of the inner workings of some of these global conglomerates and how they have a choke hold on every bite we take the better off our children will be down the road.They put it best in the movie in my opinion,saying that we can vote on this subject three times a day at each meal.The more of us to stop supporting companies who want nothing but the highest profits possible at the lowest cost possible at the expense of our collective health,the less they will be able to harm our children.When you peel back the ugly truth of the system it doesn't matter what party affiliation you may have and what causes you may support,i am convinced no one would forego the health and well being of the people they love to benefit some executives and shareholders whom only hunger for more of our hard earned family budget.All of the suffering being endured worldwide because of this current economic crisis is being felt at the lower middle and bottom of the economic ladder,which is where most of the health related issues from unhealthy diet are suffered as well.When you are rich it is currently very chic to be "green"to buy organic and eat healthy,have a low carbon footprint and put up a facade of caring for the world and your fellow citizens,but when you struggle to meet your obligations and the daily domestic tasks of a family impose on your abilities to be "green" it becomes much more difficult to do.I believe the lack of healthy food and the challenge of finding it being everywhere from inner citys to rural countryside forces people into bad habits.If all there is to eat in your neighborhood is on the shelves of convienience stores or small market type corner stores,then the fast food option becomes an easy way to cheaply feed the family with bags of chips and soda being snackfood in between.Subsidised commodity crops like corn and soybeans create problem products like high fuctose corn syrup and other products that are horrible for your health.The longer we sit by and not collectively get up to do something about it the worse it will become and the longer it will take to fix.When you look at things from the standard of basic scientific theory,which entails hypopthosis,experiment,analasis,it becomes fairly obvious that in the analasis of the way our system has functioned over the last two or even three decades the experiment has failed.To continue on the same path expecting a different result is the exact textbook definition of insanity.Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result.I am personally going to change my and my families eating habits.I am going to do whatever is within my abilities to feed my family food that is locally grown and harvested,organic when possible,and stop buying from anywhere but farmers markets and places that sell real unprocessed food.Our family is on a tight budget and it is going to be a slow and gradual change so as not to shock the children into rebelling against it while at the same time not breaking our bank.I have a great family and i am very lucky to be able to attempt this change and my heart goes out to those who are not able to make this choice.I will end here for now,but before i go let me again thank my sister for her wonderful gift of Michael Pollens books and for imparting her knowledge and wisdom to me.I posted a another pic from the gov't mule concert i went to with my son jeromy,this is another of Warren Haynes and Jackie Brown jamming during the encore.I will continue working on eating healthy,exercising,and doing my best to battle back the pain.Without a positive attitude and a good outlook on life pain is the ultimate foe,and will take its toll quickly if left to linger unattended.The fact that laying down is most comfortable can result in isolation,so getting up and moving is key to my personal situation.I will end here,until next time thank you for reading. spacewalker

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