Texas Congressman Ron Paul, running for the Republican nomination for President on a strange platform of weirdness, wants to strike a blow for us imperiled citizens. On his website he says:
I oppose legislation that increases the FDA‘s legal powers. FDA has consistently failed to protect the public from dangerous drugs, genetically modified foods, dangerous pesticides and other chemicals in the food supply. Meanwhile they waste public funds attacking safe, healthy foods and dietary supplements
I’m thinking Mr. Paul hasn’t had his dog killed by Chinese-y dog food, nor his relatives imperiled by Chinese foodstuffs, nor his descendants poisoned by Chinese toys covered in lead paint. Oh, well, never mind that.
The real problem with the FDA, which Mr. Paul seems not to address or be willing to address, is that under the Republicans, one of whom Mr. Paul is rumored to be, the drug companies and the food companies pretty much have come to regulate the FDA. Remember also the MediCare drug act? Yeah, the drug lobbyists wrote that bill and the Republicans swallowed it whole and foisted it on us. But since they view it as a poison pill designed to get rid of MediCare once and for all, they think that’s okay.
Mr. Paul also notes his operating principle in the matter:
Americans are justifiably concerned over the government’s escalating intervention into their freedom to choose what they eat and how they take care of their health.
Well, no, dude. We’re pissed that the government, under Republican rule, has chosen to exercise less and less control over what we eat and could give a damn about whether we are able to take care of our health.
What we need, Mr. Paul, is for the FDA to have more regulatory power and control over our food supply and our medicines. What we need, you sneaky little Republican, is for your party to provide more funding to the FDA, and other regulatory agencies, so that they can do their job. What we need, Mr. Paul, is for you Republicans to get your hands out of the corporate till and stop sucking up to industries that want a free hand to poison us, to kill us, to sicken us, so they can reap huge profits from doing so. And you Republicans have been all too willing to allow them to do that.
So for Mr. Paul to criticize the FDA is a lot like the pot calling the drug and food lobbyists black. Mr. Paul seems to think that Americans can only be free when corporations run roughshod over the citizenry and need not be held accountable for their actions. Good to see he practices good old Republican values, especially the basic one – Money is the root of all Republican values.
Perhaps Mr. Paul would like to try some donepezil HCL. It might help restore the logic centers of his mind.
Postscript:
For all those free marketers and conservatives out there who want to get rid of government regulation and oversight, perhaps you’d like to get your food and drugs and other things directly from China, you know, where they don’t bother to oversee the companies that produce the stuff people eat and the medicines they need and … oh, hell, you’ve all been Pauled, haven’t you? Critical faculties shot to hell? Ears stuffed? Eyes plucked out? Nothing left but babbling mouths. Just what the country needs – to be Bushier and stupider.
Maybe you might try something factual instead of ideological, like this piece at Daily Debate.
Grumpy Lion 
Could where you live cost you more for medicare? Looks like it. Medicare fraud falls into the lowest of low, but it’s even more prominant in certain areas.
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Perhaps he made a mistake and forgot to take that off of his website when the whole tainted food story broke. Or he’s an idiot. Either way.
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FDA PROTECTS US FROM BAD FOODS AS WELL AS THE CIA DOES FROM DRUGS BY DOING MUCH OF THE SMUGGLING.
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not to mention bragging dea agents shooting themselves in the foot during demonstrations of their firearms INcompetence.
regulate-it gets worse
declare war on it or subsidize it, it only increases.
government bureaucracy – the ultimate in incompetency.
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Why should the government be responsible for checking your health and what you eat? That is precisely the argument of real conservatives like Ron Paul. Seriously, you trust a giant bureaucracy for that? And, speaking in name of the “pissed”, you say the FDA needs even *more* regulatory power?
Think about it this way: you don’t need coercion to enforce product quality, that can be solved at the private market level. And no, I don’t believe the free market is perfect, but it’s damn well a lot more efficient and gives you a lot more choices than a bureaucratic monopoly.
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You’re comparing apples and oranges, Gustavo. More choices does not equate to safe food and medicines. The private market has shown over and over that it will get away with whatever it can to maximize profit. And yes, I would expect a rational, non-partisan, non-ideological government bureaucracy of professionals to see to the safety of the food supply and medicine.
Under Republicans we have an administration that seeks to create irrational, partisan, ideological bureaucracies. Which means we cannot trust either the government or private business with safety or security matters, nor are we in a position individually to see to the safety of our food and drugs.
Christ, I’m wasting my pixel breath talking to you people. Go eat food in China, dude.
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The problem is inherent in all regulatory agencies, or any time government officials have power over a section of the marketplace. This power gives businesses (such as big pharma) something to buy. They can buy certification for their products, and prohibition for their competitors. Or they can buy regulations which keep smaller competitors from being able to afford to compete (which is more common, hence the reason there are few “small” pharma companies). If this power does not exist, the corporations loose the ability to influence the marketplace through political action. So they stop lobbying congress, because there is literally nothing for them to buy there. Prior to FDR’s changing of the constitution through his New Deal justices, the USA was closer to this (though business still had an undue amount of influence where it could, with railroads and the like).
The mistake you make in your comments is assuming that without the FDA, there would be no certification agencies. That is not quite correct. The FDA is a coercive monopoly, and as such is not at all accountable to its “customers”. It is mildly accountable to politicians, who are mildly accountable to voters, but thats it.
Dr. Paul’s stance on how to deal with government-enforced monopolies (such as the post office before UPS, FedEx, etc) is to allow competition with them. In other words the FDA would still exist, but loose its ability to prohibit products from entering the marketplace. Other certification agencies would spring up, lending their approval to products they deem safe (just as they do in other industries). In this manner, if one certification agency was bought by big business interests, consumers would loose trust in that agency and switch to another. This competition would breed a better certification agency in the same manner that competition breeds improvement in other areas.
Without consumer choice, there is nothing to prevent business interests from corrupting the marketplace, because only the consumer has his own best interests at heart. Indeed, only the consumer can even know what his or her interests are.
A simple example of this is what happens when a group of people get food poisoning at a restaurant. The restaurant almost inevitably goes out of business, and sometimes even the restaurants which take its real estate have problems. Because consumers do not have perfect knowledge of the products they buy, they must lend trust to brand names and the like. Trust in those names takes a long time to establish and much less time to tear down. Businesses do everything possible to ensure they remain trusted. For example, Firestone’s blowout problem with their tires caused a tiny number of deaths compared to the overall number of traffic fatalities every year, but cost the company incredible amounts of money.
In addition, people often make the mistake of assuming that because X number of people died from product Y, coercive regulation is needed. This does not take into account the number of people who will die because regulation will prevent helpful products from entering the marketplace. Because regulatory agencies always catch more criticism for approving products which may be harmful than not approving products which may be helpful, they will err on the side of caution (for their own jobs) and approve safer products over helpful ones.
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Yeah, riiiiiight, the FDA is so good at protecting us. Google for issues with nutrasweet (thanks, Rumsfeld) for instance.
(OK, here’s a good place to start:
http://www.stevia.net/aspartame.htm
)
Newsflash- in case you haven’t noticed, the federal government isn’t very good at looking after you and I- they’ve been alot better at looking after big industry that lines their pockets.
I think Ron Paul is right on with his take on the FDA.
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You ever get the impression that this is how the Heaven’s Gate followers talked about David Koresh? I do.
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And of course, by “Heaven’s Gate” I meant “Branch Davidians.”
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On July 11, the U.S. House of Representatives passed the bill HR 2900, which grants additional power to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) while at the same time ensuring deeper financial ties between the agency and pharmaceutical companies.
The law does make some efforts to reduce conflict of interest, including mandating the publishing of a clinical trials database and forbidding more than one FDA official with ties to the industry to sit on a drug decision panel.
However, at the same time, the FDA will actually be allowed to work with drug and biotech companies to develop and launch new drugs. In an unprecedented conflict of interest, the new law places the FDA “in charge of drug design, drug patents, drug licenses, and the creation of new marketing entities/companies.”
The law also allows the FDA to evaluate dietary supplements as they do prescription drugs, which means they can remove supplements from the market as they see fit.
“Which they will. Lord knows they don’t want any competition for Merck, EI Lilly, and the rest of the good old boys”
Again, whoes in charge of congress now? Oh yeah the statist, liberal dems, they replaced the fascist, rotten neo-cons last year remember?. Have fun payin’ $10 a tablet for your One-A-Day’s sucker.
Hopeless liberals, the government can’t even bridge good bridges. Love your David Koress comment lol. Unforunately for you, your the one that prays too corrupt ass, worthless Federal Government. Save me! Save me from myself please!
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The FDA kills tens of thousands of Americans a year by denying them access to medicine and treatments they and their doctors might wish to choose after survey available medical options.
Often these FDA non-approved treatments and medicines have been used safely for years in Europe, Canada, Japan, and other medically advances areas of the world.
The FDA kills. Pfizer saves lives. We need to kill the FDA.
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Grumpylion,
The FDA/USDA protects the meat industry, not the consumer. Allow me to explain:
If a bunch of people get sick from tainted meat and they try to sue the meat packer, the FDA/USDA supercedes the lawsuit, and it is dismissed.
The meat packer can simply enter the FDA inspection report into the record and his lawyer will say something like “It’s not our fault, we followed every regulation to a ‘tee’, and here is our Officcial, stamped, inspection report to prove it.” the fact that 120 people in 5 different states all got sick, and one child died will have absolutely no bearing in the court.
The problem with your “go eat some chinese food” reasoning, is that this is what happened with the FDA supposedly on the job. None of that happened during some Libertarian uptopia when there was no FDA/USDA.
Let’s talk about the piss-poor record of the FDA on Vioxx.
The FDA/USDA doesn’t do what it is supposed to do. It does the opposite, it concentrates power for corporations to bid on during the election campaign.
Free market can work, look at Underwriter’s Labortories, Consumer Reports, Kosher food inspection. these are all Voluntary associations, and they work great.
The question isn’t will we have food inspection services or not, the quesiton is who will provide it.
Now this is not a fool (or a fraud) proof system. But at least when people are caught, they will have to pay lots of money to the victims of their carelessness. This will deter corporations far more effectively than some government inspector who can be counted on to sleep on the job, or who can be bribed or blackmailed.
Later.
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Oh this world odear oh dear.
I know you visit me sometimes, And I visit you to. today I introduce myself. You are welcome to read why I am as I am.
greetings sofia
http://sofiawinterborn.wordpress.com/2007/08/03/sofiamy-i-introduce-my-self-to-you-i-am-a-loner-and-starwalker-i-walk-from-star-to-star/
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Dude, I don’t know who or what has brainwashed you, but if anything we do NOT want to give more money, control or power to the FDA, FTC, FBI, CIA, DIA, MIA, FEMA or any of these Shadow Government Agencies that are working hard and well to destroy America, and use it’s own citizens as profits to help keep Food Industries, Airline Industries, Military Industries and Drug Companies in business.
These government agencies have been wreaking havoc on the entire universe and the economy. The power to control something by helping to regulate it is synonymous with the ability to help deregulate it. These agencies DO NOT CARE and NEVER WILL CARE to correct anything. They need to be abolished and replaced with entirely new organizations to protect our food, drug supplies, etc.
Believe me, I would be more concerned about what the government controls in terms of what they control you to eat. The Government DOES NOT CARE ABOUT YOU PERIOD.
America is not a country, it is an Idea. It’s manifestation is a global empire, but the United States is the only landmass that we seem to like to define as “America the Beautiful” which is really in actuality, ugly.
Freedom and Independence are illusions and are being taken away from us even more with every passing day. In no time, we will be a Third World Country, it’s coming soon.
If anyone cares to know more about what’s really going on, let me know, E-mail me.
Sincerely,
Jason
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Freedom and Independence are illusions
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Some of you idiots including the editor wouldnt know liberation if it hit you in the face. Time to wake up. Free? and Brave? not to hear you losers. You dummies are the problem.
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Wow! I’m insensate, idiotic, an editor, and a dummy, apparently sleeping through all these attributes.
How dare you call me an editor?!
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What makes you think that the FDA can SUCCESSFULLY protect us from foreign-imported foods WITHOUT continually driving the cost of those foods upward, forever growing in cost? The reason I ask is that that is EXACTLY what the FDA has done to prescription drugs. They have protected us to the point where it costs close to a billion dollars PER DRUG to get FDA approval. The result: no one can afford them!
Your solution would actually make the problem much, MUCH worse.
If you are truly committed to making food safer, the first thing you should do is to abolish the FDA, not reward it for doing such a dreadfully bad job. Then, you should be arguing for legislation that holds corporations who distribute unhealthy food accountable to their victims, without placing liability limits on that responsibility.
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Good. Let’s not regulate the corporations then. Just pass a law that says after they’ve killed X number of people they can be held accountable if someone gets around to suing them. Given that the FDA has been so politically corrupted by Republican refusal to allow regulation and by putting corporate people in control (and not just the FDA, but virtually every regulatory agency), we have a situation similar to what you suggest. Minimal regulation. And people dying. Bad food. Bad drugs. West Virginia is being destroyed by coal companies practicing mountain topping. And as long as the corporations have free reign to buy as many politicians as they want, to in fact write the very legislation they want, there is no way to hold them accountable. Nor will there be. Maybe you should be explaining your view to the families who lost people to Vioxx, deaths that could have been prevented under a good regulatory scheme.
Free markets serve marketers and the rich, not the people. And marketers and the rich don’t give a fuck whether you live or die or how much you suffer from their actions.
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I agree with every one of you that is against the Fraud and drug administration. My burning question is” does the FDA live the same lifestyle as the rest of us? Do they rely on the same meds and eat the same foods? If they do then they are killing themselves too!”
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Ron Paul is commited to changing the FDA that is as of now run by drug companies.Think about it, do you really think Drug companies are out to make you better! Just Visit Drug.com and you will see the great head of evil. Now that they are running ads on tv people are becoming more and more aware of just how badly these drugs can effect there bodies. Maybe if the FDA wasn’t so greedy their there wouldn’t be the over prescription of antibotics, antidepressants, the list goes on and on, filled with names of drugs that further depress and deprive the body of our own internal healing powers, while curing a symptom of a problem but not the problem itself and we would be turning instead to body preservation and restoration instead of neglect and maintenance. It’s about time the people of the US stopped living to work and killing themselves with the fast cure. Which as it turns out is more like a symptom blocker, which carries along with it a number of potential risks to your body. Your body is a temple of your energy and spirit. It has become more and more apparent to the citizens of America can we can not trust own government FDA, drug companies, or for that matter practitioners of purely western medicine/surgery to care about or help to preserve our well being any longer. Instead they wait for us to become ill and then hold out their purses and prescription forms. Did you know that doctors are paid to incentives by drug companies to prescribe you the latest drug. Drug companies pay for the schools that teach these doctors to prescribe their drugs to you and pay them to sell more. Essentially they are Drug salesmen!
I recommend looking into natural cures and homeopathy as a way to gain control over your own health Chee-gung, a breathing exercise developed in Indian, is also a good way to stimulant your bodies internal powers of preservation through energy control and balance.
RON PAUL 2008!
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I go into detail about FDA corruption here
http://forums.christianity.com/The_FDA_and_health/m_3795161/mpage_1/tm.htm#1
and here
http://forums.christianity.com/Red_Yeast_Rice_and_the_FDA/m_3777330/mpage_1/tm.htm#1
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“The FDA kills tens of thousands of Americans a year by denying them access to medicine and treatments they and their doctors might wish to choose after survey available medical options.”
It’s amazing how the government allows us access to cigarettes, a substance that has killed millions, yet they deny us access to red yeast rice containing lovastatin, a substance that has harmed practically no one. The hypocrisy. They’re not interested in our health, they’re interested in big business.
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“Ron Paul is commited to changing the FDA that is as of now run by drug companies.” Yeah, unfortunately, big business will not fund ads for Ron Paul, they only fund ads for those that favor big business. The media is highly controlled by big business and, just like they have managed to gain control the media over the last 30 or so years (ie: you will probably never hear about my posts on the FDA on mainstream television, like the red yeast rice one, at least not from a point of view that threatens pharmaceutical profits) through FCC deregulation, it’s not that big of a leap to assume that those same evil rich entities that have gained control over mainstream media are attempting to gain the same control over the Internet. We need to be more proactive in ensuring that our freedoms do not get taken away and in assuring that important news doesn’t get censored from mainstream media. Our attitude should be one to assume that they will take control of every aspect of our lives to the benefit of their profit margins unless we stand up and ensure they don’t.
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Good stuff keep me in touch
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Why do people think that the government is so much more virtuous then corporations? All in all they have the same goal: money. Food and Drug corporations control the FDA at this point in time anyway and without the FDA there would be nothing different from what there is with the FDA now.
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The person who wrote this article is narrow minded and an idiot. The FDA does not prect the people it protects the interests of pharma and food that you should not feed to a stray dog. Why are they so hard on local farmers? why are they trying to ban vitamin supplements? This is a corrupt governement organizations and the ignorant fat cats who run it should be charged with negligence and fraud.
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The FDA is evil.
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It is also feasible to bet on the house, gamers or a tie. There are many variations, many games, and variations in guidelines and betting and strategies. Make sure you know what is what before you decide to dabble.
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