[Vision2020] Re: Vision2020 Digest, Vol 12, Issue 7

Mon May 2 23:51:15 PDT 2005

Dick,
There is clearly top down pressure to avoid enforcement of any 
regulations that might have a negative impact on business. In the 
pharmaceutical business you can see this by comparing the number of 
letters sent to drug manufacturers for illegal/poor practices during the 
Clinton administration verses the Bush administration. It could hardly 
be more obvious. When you couple your observation with mine and couple 
what any person would read about other industries (for instance 
energy),  you'd have to be living under a rock not  to see  the truth.

A thoughtful, observant, but somewhat presumptive person might read into 
this and see signs of desperate attempts to avoid a meltdown of the U.S. 
economy. The European Union, China, and India are in increasingly strong 
competition with us. We can't afford our social programs and also an 
illegal war in Iraq. Our tax base isn't high enough, but increasing 
taxes might slow the economy. We have a huge trade imbalance. 
Competition for limited worldwide oil reserves guarantees stress on the 
economy. We have taken temporary actions to prop up the stock market, 
and are still trying the same vein by promoting privatization of social 
security. Although the general standard of living of normal people is 
going down, corporate welfare and trickle down have temporarily kept the 
economy perking along, at least on paper. Is it a house of cards? The 
desperation tells me that it might be. I hope I am wrong.

Jim Meyer

>-----------------------
>
>Message: 7
>Date: Tue, 3 May 2005 03:12:45 GMT
>From: <dickschmidt at moscow.com>
>Subject: [Vision2020] Mad Cow Disease
>To: vision2020 at moscow.com
>Message-ID: <200505030313.j433DNuQ039390 at mail-gw.fsr.net>
>
>All,
>
>Some of you may remember that I have posted a couple of articles on Mad 
>Cow disease in the past. When Britian had their Mad Cow problem I 
>followed it very closely daily. The following news article from the UPI 
>does not shock me in the least as there have been reports of Mad Cow 
>disease found in the past couple years but then the USDA sends out 
>the "all clear". We have a very dishonest deceitful government who does 
>not care about their citizens. Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns needs 
>the dog crap beat out of him. These bastards only care about big business.
>
>Dick Schmidt
>
>
>Feds probing alleged mad cow cover-up
>By Steve Mitchell
>Published 5/2/2005 1:30 PM
>
>WASHINGTON, May 2 (UPI) -- Federal investigators are looking into 
>allegations by a former U.S. Agriculture Department inspector that the 
>agency sought to cover up cases of mad cow disease, United Press 
>International has learned.
>
>Lester Friedlander, a former USDA veterinarian, told UPI he was 
>questioned recently by two representatives from the USDA's Office of 
>Inspector General who were investigating statements he made before 
>Canada's Parliament in April. 
>
>"I told them I think there's a cover-up," said Friedlander, a 10-year 
>veteran of the USDA who received official praise and recognition for 
>outstanding performance during his tenure with the agency. 
>
>Mad cow is a concern to public health because humans can contract a fatal 
>brain illness known as variant Creutzfeldt Jakob disease from eating beef 
>products contaminated with the mad cow pathogen.
>
>Friedlander's claims include that a USDA official told him in 1991 not to 
>say anything if he ever discovered a case of mad cow disease, and that he 
>knew of cows that had tested positive at private laboratories but were 
>ruled negative by the USDA.
>
>He said he was interviewed by Keith Arnold, from the OIG's regional 
>office in Kansas City, Mo., and William Busby, of OIG's Denver office. 
>The officials told him Phyllis Fong, the USDA's inspector general, 
>ordered the investigation.
>
>"The reason they interviewed me was there was a lot of talk about my 
>comments made in Canada and they said they were getting a lot of flak," 
>he said. "I told them I'd take a lie detector just to prove I'm telling 
>the truth."
>
>Paul Feeney, OIG's deputy counsel, told UPI the agency had no comment 
>regarding Friedlander's allegations, but he noted the OIG is conducting 
>an audit of USDA's surveillance plan for mad cow disease -- also known as 
>bovine spongiform encephalopathy or BSE -- which includes collecting 
>information from "any individuals who may have substantive information 
>about BSE-testing issues." 
>
>The USDA did not return a phone call from UPI seeking comment, but agency 
>officials, including Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns, previously have 
>denied Friedlander's accusations.
>
>Friedlander left the USDA in 1995 after reaching an agreement with the 
>agency concerning his complaints that his immediate supervisors were 
>discriminating against him for his religious beliefs. Friedlander insists 
>the agency attempted to force him out after he appeared on national 
>television programs alleging that meat from downer cows -- those unable 
>to stand -- was included in school lunch programs and a drug that is 
>toxic to people was being used to increase the volume of meat in veal 
>calves.
>
>Among the accusations Friedlander said the OIG's office is investigating 
>is an incident in 1991 in which he said Pat McCaskey, a USDA pathologist 
>branch chief, told him not to say anything if he ever found a mad cow 
>case.
>
>Friedlander said the discussion with McCaskey followed a meeting at the 
>department's headquarters in Washington about economic consequences if 
>the disease was discovered in a U.S. cow.
>
>A recent study conducted by Kansas State University researchers 
>calculated the U.S. beef industry already has lost billions of dollars in 
>exports due to foreign nations closing their borders in response to the 
>mad cow case detected in Washington state in 2003 -- the first and only 
>confirmed case in the United States.
>
>"The next day he (McCaskey) called me up at my USDA office and said, 'If 
>you ever find it, don't tell anybody,'" Friedlander said.
>
>Friedlander also told the inspectors about two cows in 1997 that other 
>USDA employees initially said looked positive for mad cow disease. He 
>said the agents told him they were going to interview Masuo Doi and Karl 
>Langheinrich, the USDA employees involved in those cases.
>
>A two-year UPI investigation found the two cows were extensively tested 
>by the USDA and the National Institutes of Health and neither agency ever 
>detected a trace of mad cow. 
>
>Friedlander said he began collecting brains from cows with symptoms that 
>could indicate mad cow disease on his own in 1989, although the official 
>USDA surveillance program did not start until 1990. He said he told 
>inspectors it was "highly suspicious when they had an official program to 
>take brains, they never asked me for one cow brain and they knew I was 
>taking brains on my own to test for mad cow disease." 
>
>At the time, Friedlander worked in a Pennsylvania plant that he said 
>would have been a good place for mad cow surveillance. The plant received 
>the most downer cows in the country -- 25 to 30 per day -- and included 
>cows coming from multiple states ranging as far west as Texas, as far 
>North as Maine and as far south as Florida, he said. 
>
>Friedlander said he sent the brains he collected to the USDA's laboratory 
>in Athens, Ga., but none came back positive for mad cow. He said he was 
>transferred from the Pennsylvania plant because he had "the highest" rate 
>of condemning animals he deemed unsuitable for human consumption. The 
>plant owner told the USDA he was losing $10,000 to $15,000 per day due to 
>the condemnations, Friedlander said.
>
>In another incident, Friedlander said Joe Oziano, a veterinarian from 
>Veterinary Services in Michigan, informed him in 1995 that a cow brain he 
>sent to be tested for mad cow disease at the USDA's lab in Ames, Iowa, 
>was thrown away by lab personnel. 
>
>Oziano had taken the brain from an old bull during the summer and sent it 
>for testing on a Friday, Friedlander said. Because it arrived after hours 
>and nobody was working during the weekend, the unrefrigerated sample 
>remained on the loading dock in the hot sun all weekend. By the time a 
>lab employee opened the sample on Monday, he said, it stunk so badly the 
>employee just threw it away. When Oziano objected, arguing that although 
>the brain tissue was badly deteriorated, it still should have been tested 
>for mad cow, the lab technician responded, "Do you think anybody really 
>cares?" Friedlander said.
>
>The USDA ramped up its BSE surveillance to more than 300,000 animals in 
>the wake of the 2003 case and has not detected any more infected animals, 
>but this strategy also has generated controversy. 
>
>In November 2004, a cow tested positive on two initial rapid tests, but 
>it subsequently was ruled negative by the USDA on a different test. BSE-
>testing experts and consumer groups have questioned the agency's 
>rationale for not using a third type of test -- called a Western blot -- 
>on the cow that may have helped clear up any confusion about whether the 
>animal was infected.
>
>The USDA plans to scale back its BSE testing program in 2006. Its 
>proposed mad cow testing budget for fiscal year 2006 would fund testing 
>of only 40,000 animals.
>
>
>
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>End of Vision2020 Digest, Vol 12, Issue 7
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