and a logical conclusion can not be drawn,
you know all of the facts are not on the
table.”
FreonPete
To connect the dots of a complicated set of issues, at first appears to be a difficult task. When it comes to the dots which connect the players in the drama that I have discussed in the previous three parts of this article, it proved to be much easier than I ever thought it would be.
I have known for years that there exist a sort of revolving door which opens on one end into the halls of political power and on the other into the richly decorated offices of the well paid executives of huge corporations.
I realized that most people are completely oblivious to who inhabits these corridors of power. Much less how their policies find their way onto your dinner plate. So with out delay, lets play connect the dots.
During George W. Bush's 8 years in the White House he seemed to appointed directly from major corporations. Most appointees were placed in the government agencies that regulated their former employers. Often the appointees would later leave their government jobs and go back to work for the corporations they had been regulating.
I smell conflict of interest, do you?
We all know about Dick Cheney and his Halliburton conflict of interest. What was good for the VP was good for all. It was a time of lowered ethical standards, for the benefit of the corporations that made the donations and provided post public service employment.Clinton's administration was not much better.
Here is what that looked like.
Linda J. Fisher worked as the Assistant Administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency's Office of Pollution Prevention, Pesticides, and Toxic Substances for 10 years.
She left her government post and became an employee of Monsanto. She was the Vice President of Government Public Affairs, a lobbying wing of Monsanto in Washington. She also sat on the board of Covanta Holding Corporation, an energy company with projects in Canada and Westbury New York.
In 2001 George W. Bush appointed her as Deputy Director of The United States Environmental Protection Agency. Then in 2004 she took a position with DuPont as Vice President of Safety, Health & Environment and chief sustainability officer.
Revolving door?
Here is a highly accomplished woman that has been in the employ of companies involved in the Chemical, Agriculture and Energy industries and between her various positions she was the second in charge with the government agency which regulates all of those industries. Conflict of interest is apparently not a problem when it comes to these industries. In fact, it looks as thought it is a prerequisite to advancement and appointment.
Donald Rumsfeld, a man it is reported, that Henery Kissinger once called “the most ruthless man I ever met”, has had so many positions of power I will only be able to scratch the surface of his affiliations.
March 8, 1978 Rumsfeld became the CEO of G.D Serle, the Pharmaceutical giant owned by Monsanto. He was at the helm in 1981 when Searle was able to get FDA approval for Aspartame, their synthetic sweetener. Searle had been trying since the mid 70's to get approval for the sweetener, with no success.
Perhaps it was the study which showed that aspartic acid, one of the chemicals in Aspertame, had caused brain lesions on lab mice that was holding the process up. World renowned scientist Dr. John Olney conducted that study and his findings are still accepted by most medical and scientific professionals as accurate and valid. But that didn't stop the newly appointed CEO from seeing it through the process of FDA approval.
In 1977 the US Justice Department began a prosecution of Searle for submitting fraudulent tests results on NutraSweet in their attempt to get approval by the FDA.Then in the following year that case seemed to vanish as if it hadn't ever happened.
Why ? The two justice department lawyers assigned to the task, Sam Skinner and William Conlon left their Justice Department positions and joined the Searle defense team. Soon after , the statue of limitations ran out on that infraction and the case was dropped.
Claims that Rumsfeld used his contacts in Washington to expedite the approval of Aspartame without the proper research are everywhere. I don't know if he did or not. But others make clear their claims that he pushed through a product that both he and Searle knew was dangerous to humans and lab animals.
Betty Martini, the director of Mission Possible, a consumer advocacy group stated that the reason Rumsfeld was hired by Searle is “He was willing to get a deadly chemical poison, aspartame, approved for human consumption”.
The Aspartame debate continues today to the dismay of the scientist that have declared it harmful to humans. Mean while we consume it in hundreds of products. The Corporate Giant influences the Government Agency for the purpose of increased profits without regard for the people's safety. Is this starting to sound familiar?
Here are some more Industry/Government officials.
Michael A. Friedman, M.D former acting commissioner of the FDA and Health & human services became the Sr. VP for Clinical Affairs at G.D Searle Pharmaceuticals.
L. Val Giddings .Was biotechnology regulator and (bio safety) negotiator at the United States Department of Agriculture. Then he became Vice President for Food & Agriculture of the Biotechnology Industry Organization
In 1997 Marcia Hale was the assistant to the President of the United States and director for intergovernmental affairs. Later she became Director of International Government Affairs for Monsanto Corporation.
Michael (Mickey) Kantor , was Secretary of the United States Department of Commerce and former Trade Representative of the United States. Then he became a member of the board of Directors of Monsanto Corporation.
Josh King , was director of production for White House events. He then became director of global communication in the Washington, D.C. office of Monsanto Corporation.
Terry Medley was the administrator of the Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) of the United States Department of Agriculture as well as United States Department of Agriculture Biotechnology Council. Former member of U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) food advisory committee. She later became Director of Regulatory and External Affairs of Dupont Corporation's Agricultural Enterprise.
William D. Ruckelshaus was the chief administrator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA) later he became a member of the board of directors of Monsanto Corporation for over a decade .
Justice Clarence Thomas, Supreme Court Justice ruled in favor of Monsanto on a case before the Supreme Court of the United States of America. Justice Thomas once worked as in house counsel for Monsanto. It was the case that dealt with the patenting of GM seed.
The list goes on and on and on and on. I'll spare you, the redundant documentation and take the liberty of assuming that it is clear to you how the multi-national corporations in the Oil, Chemical, Pharmaceutical and Agricultural industries achieve their political goals. They hire the government.
Mussolini had a term for this arrangement, Fascism. He once said Corporatism would be a more accurate description. I think he was right.
Association does not confirm complicity. It could be, and the aforementioned people themselves will and have made the claim that, these connections are purely coincidental, and shed no bad light on them or their employers. There are some of us that will accept that explanation and then there are others that might interpret these connections in other less trusting ways.
Thus far we have looked at the genetically modified seed business, the former 4th largest company in the world in 1938, IG Farben and how they interacted with the Nazis. Then there was the Eugenics movement.
We have covered the connections between the government agencies that police and regulate these mega corporations and how they achieve their objectives. Now lets look at the other connections.
IG Farben, can stand as an example of an ultra-rich corporate power and to what ends they have gone in the past to realize their full profit potential. The corporations of today are similar in many ways to IG Farben. Consolidation of power by way of mergers and purchases is a standard practice. With each sale/purchase and merger the resulting new improved corporation is stronger and more influential then the pre purchase/merger companies were.
The connection between IG Farben and Codex Alimentarius can been seen in the names of the companies and executives credited with founding Codex.
According to the Health Freedom Alliance of Australia “Just fifteen years after they were convicted in the Nuremberg War Crimes Tribunal, Bayer, BASF and Hoechst were again the architects of the next major human rights offenses. In 1962, they established the Codex Alimentarius Commission “
In his book “IBM and the Holocaust”, Edwin Black documented the business relationships between American corporations and German Industrial giants, even during the war years when such relationships were illegal.
It is chilling to think that the numbers tattooed on the wrist of the human beings that were murdered in Aushwitz and other death camps were generated by an IBM computer.
But that's not all.
Precott Bush and Avril Harriman both had some explaining to do when the US Senate inquired about their business with Fritz Theissen the German industrialist as well as their involvement with Union Banking Corporation, which was declared by the Senate committee as a “Nazi front bank”.
The Harriman fortune came from his fathers railroads and later went into investment banking. Harrimans' wife was a key financier of Margret Sangers Planed Parenthood. Their involvement in the Eugenics movement as well as Nazi Germany can be deciphered as making clear their agreement in principal with the application of eugenic in Germany during the Nazi years.
Corporations like a fascist state, it allows them to be themselves, without moral restraint.
That brings us to Eugenics.
The Eugenics movement infected the rich and powerful families of America and Europe. The Rockefellers were supporters as were the Harrimans and the Carnegie's and many other ultra-wealthy families. The Bush family, with all of it's political power, has a history of close involvement with the eugenics movement dating back to 1921 when George Walker and Prescott Bush provided transport to the attendees of the Second International Eugenic Conference in New York. Would they support a science they didn't agree with? Doubtful . Would they teach their children what they believed? Everybody does, why would the Bush family not teach their children what they believed? Eugenics and thereby white supremacy.
The Titians of commerce were both students and financial supporters of Eugenics. The application of Eugenics was manifest in Nazi Germany as well as in the US sterilization laws. IG Farben can also be an example of how corporate power attaches to the political power structure of the day and pursues it's goals of ever increasing profits by essentially infiltrating the government.
The other place these corporate and eugenics interest found power was through research councils, advisory boards and other industry supported bodies that advise governments and often times set policy objectives. The Cold Springs Harbor Research facilities were the driving force behind pushing Eugenic based legislation through the political bodies across the US and those bodies enacted them.
Similarly, Codex Alimentarius is an advisory council which is pushing through the standards of safety of food on a world wide basis. Codex is the way the Multi-Nationals are guiding policy in the areas of food safety and international trade. There is no secret that Codex is supported by the Pharmaceutical and Chemical industries of the world and it is fair to assume that their interest are being looked after. What are their interest? Profit.
So what does that mean for the safety of our food? According to many experts genetically modified food can present so many potential pitfalls and dangers that it's too dangerous to allow. They point to the potential of cross pollination. The possibility of the suicide gene being released into the environment and causing the extinction of wild plants as well as heirloom and non-GM strains of food crops. What then?
Check in tomorrow for Part 4b. (Part four is too long for one posting, trust me.)
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