Author Archive | Karen De Coster

This is the future of GovernmentCare (not ObamaCare): “Do what I say and don’t ask any questions.” And then, of course, for children there is the requisite Safety Nazi rundown (don’t play, don’t move, don’t touch hot things, etc.). This is modern American medicine. And the medical establishment considers this tactic of “covering all the bases” to be “quality initiatives.”

Built more like a former professional basketball player than an elementary schoolteacher nearing retirement, the patient dropped a bagful of prescription medications on the table in the examining room and fell back into a chair. He couldn’t remember what most of them were for.

Several weeks earlier, he had seen a new doctor who’d prescribed several new drugs and spent much of the visit reciting a list of advice — lose weight, exercise more, stop smoking, eat more fruits and vegetables. Before he even arrived home, he realized he couldn’t recall any of the details of what the doctor had said.

“I felt like I was in a Charlie Brown cartoon,” he said, recounting the visit with a laugh. “All I can remember the doctor saying was, ‘Waw, waw-waw, waw-waw.’ ”

It’s comforting to know that your doctor can make you sick and waste so little of your time doing it. Thanks to James Porter for the link.

Folks may know how I like to pick on the cupcake craze because I see it as just one of many boom-bust absurdities that were born during the years of excess spawned by government monetary policy that encouraged and triggered credit addiction and high time preferences. During the boom years, we saw the rise of the cupcake craze, just one of many infantile fads that attract people driven to excess by cheap money and the have-pulse-will-loan mentality of the boom years.

In reaction to this story, “Security Theater” TSA Confiscates Woman’s Frosted Cupcake,” a reader shares his thoughts on my Facebook page: “KDC’s worst nightmare–which enemy does she side with??!!!“ While the story seems hilarious at first reading, it is indicative of the much larger problem of the government’s $20 billion industry of terror that has spawned the TSA, Homeland Security, and the militarized police state.

A Massachusetts woman who flew home from Las Vegas this week says an airport security officer took her frosted cupcake because he thought its vanilla-bourbon icing could be a “security risk.”

…“The TSA supervisor, Robert Epps, was using really bad logic – he said it counted as a gel-like substance because it was conforming to the shape of its container.”

In this case, it is easy to side with the helpless and peaceful cupcake, as opposed to our enemies and oppressors in the government terror industry.

The FDA has asked a sperm donor to cease-and-desist in the case of his community service, er, um, sperm donation. Trent Arsenault, a minister’s son from the San Francisco Bay area, just wants to help women who cannot afford governmentized sperm donor banks. Trent has fathered 14 children in five years and has four more bunnies on the way.

The case of Trent Arsenault of Fremont has drawn attention to the practice of informal sperm donation, which physicians and bioethicists call unsafe but some people say is a civil liberties issue.

…The U.S. Food and Drug Administration sent Arsenault a cease-and-desist letter late last year telling him he must stop because he does not follow the agency’s requirements for getting tested for sexually transmitted diseases within seven days before giving sperm.

Violators of FDA regulations on human cells and tissues face up to a year in prison and a $100,000 fine, according to guidelines published on the agency’s website.

I can’t help but note how the article makes a point that the FDA’s rules and regulations will make it impossible for Trent ”to keep offering his sperm for free.” That leads me to post this quote from the article: Continue Reading →

Ron Paul and two of his congressional colleagues, Congresswoman Chellie Pingree (D, ME) and Ed Perlmutter (D, CO), have sponsored a screening for the movie Farmageddon, The Unseen War on American Family Farms on Capitol Hill.

Here’s another farm raid that hasn’t made the news. Quail Hollow Farm CSA is a farm in Nevada, about 50 miles north of Las Vegas, that grows and sells fresh food to its CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) members. The philosophy of the owners and the purpose for the CSA is reflected as such:

The purpose for Quail Hollow Farm CSA is fourfold. Number one, it is our desire to be good stewards over our land. Nothing seems more beneficial than to plant a garden and orchard in which we may share the abundance of our harvest with friends and family. The second reason is that we believe that fresh locally-grown fruits and vegetables are indispensable for optimal nutrition and health. The third is a strong desire for self-sufficiency. And lastly, is simply the joy of the whole gardening process: working the soil (literally being grounded,) patiently watching the growing process, the taste of the first ripe tomato, and the harmony of the seasons.  In addition, it is our desire to share this experience with others, offering enjoyable hands-on opportunities to learn the science and skill of gardening and preserving the harvest, and to pass on this knowledge for future generations.

That all sounds evil and barbaric, doesn’t it? On October 21, 2011 farm owners Monte and Laura Bledsoe were holding their first annual Farm to Fork dinner for folks who desired to check out the farm. The dinner is described this way: Continue Reading →

The flu paranoia season is upon us, and, as usual, the government-medical complex is ramping up its fear mongering over … the flu. Coughing, sneezing, sore throat, diarrhea, fever, and other simple stuff has been elevated to life-and-death status. When I was a child, no one thought much about the flu – no one wanted to be sick, but if you got the flu you did your best to plow through it and get over it. Sure, the flu can kill some folks whose immune systems are not prepared for the onslaught, as can many other minor seemingly minor events, but healthy people also die falling off of porches and ladders in an unexpected manner.

I wrote about this issue at great length during the 2009-2010 scare campaign, pointing out that the whole crusade – first the swine flu, and then the seasonal flu – was driven by special interests (Big Pharma rent-seeking) and government control (growing federal power/bureaucracy and promoting collective health as superseding the individual). Additionally, the whole campaign was undergirded by scientific misinformation (studies promoted and funded by the beneficiaries of flu shots) and media acceptance of the falsehoods and folly.

Back in August, when the flu shot fear mongers began to flaunt the propaganda, USA Today produced this article: “CDC: Don’t Skip This Year’s Flu Shot.” “Don’t skip” points to the fact that after the swine flu hysteria fail of the 2009-2010 season, a declared pandemic that was nothing more than a spit in the wind, the general public caught on to the dog-and-pony show. Overall, in spite of those folks who still live their lives on sounds bites from the government-media propaganda machine, many people began to reject the nonsense, and therefore they spurned the flu shot. The government did not expect that after all of its purposeful misinformation and spin, people would “skip” the all-important flu shot because they began to question the hype. The perfidious pandemic and its propaganda promotion quickly became a bust, a flop, a non-pandemic. Continue Reading →

The Atlantic does a good job of covering the Rawesome food club raid. Rawesome was a private, voluntary cooperative of consenting members who take responsibility for any potential risks. (“Private” and “voluntary” being key words.)

Rawesome members even signed waivers before becoming a food club member. With all of the agencies involved (USDA, FDA, LA County Sheriff, CDC) over a period of a year, this had to cost a whole lot of taxpayer dough. The LA Weekly described it this way:

The official word from the DA’s office is that Stewart, Palmer & Bloch were arrested on criminal conspiracy charges stemming from the alleged illegal production and sale of unpasteurized goat milk, goat cheese, yogurt and kefir. The arrests are the result of a year-long sting. The 13-count complaint alleges that an undercover agent received goat milk, stored in a cooler in the back of Healthy Family Farms van, in the parking lot of a grocery store. While it’s legal to manufacture and sell unpasteurized dairy products in California, licenses and permits are required. Rawesome may have violated regulations by selling raw dairy products to non-members.

Here is a link to the 21-page complaint. Among the many charges against owner James Stewart is one that immediately stands out: entering into private leasing arrangements with consumers. This charge is still fuzzy, and I am sure the feds can produce a whole book of crimes.

The Atlantic writer, Ari LeVaux, compares the Rawesome raid (by Federal and local agencies) to the Cargill contamination of 36 million pounds of ground turkey (77 known ill people, 1 dead). Rawesome was raided, trashed, and shut down, and meanwhile, Cargill was looking at its analysis of costs vs the potential for negative publicity from the contamination situation so they could voluntarily decide whether or not to recall the product. Continue Reading →

The mighty food safety bureaucrats are on a continual quest for some kind of safety from all of the lurking dangers that are apparently epidemic, and we need to be continually reminded that these dangers exist. Hence the invasion of food safety indoctrination into every aspect of our lives. A reader, Jon Crane, an eco-ag farmer in the northeast, tipped me off to the theme of the 2011 Lego championship: “Keeping Food Safe.”

In the 2011 Food Factor Challenge, over 200,000 9-16* year olds from over 55 countries will explore the topic of food safety and examine the possible points of contamination our food encounters – from exposure to insects and creatures, to unsterile processing and transportation, to unsanitary preparation and storage – then find ways to prevent or combat these contaminates. In the Food Factor Challenge, teams will build, test, and program an autonomous robot using LEGO® MINDSTORMS® NXT to solve a set of Food Safety missions as well as research, develop, and share their innovative food safety solutions.

So the youthful competitors will all be Superhero, FDA-like Feds, if just for the day, putting on their food safety caps and capes and rescuing America from the Contamination Gangstas who are assaulting and sullying the world’s food supply with their blatant disregard for our collective safety. More and more, we recognize that capitalist institutions – especially those outside of the sphere of the corporate state and government influence – are vilified under the pretense of “safety” because that word is something that helpless Americans can readily identify with, and apparently, take great comfort in its promises.

Reader Jon noted that one young man he knows conveyed the statement – “I thought Legos were supposed to be fun?” Not in a time and place where every issue, every concern, every misfortune, and every potential “bad” thing becomes an enormous government propaganda campaign to defend everyone from everything and everyone else.

Infowars and the Huffington Post are reporting that a combined army from the LA County Sheriff’s Office, the FDA, the Dept. of Agriculture, and the CDC (Centers for Disease Control) raided Rawesome Foods – again – and three people have been arrested and “are being charged with conspiracy to sell unpasteurized raw milk products.” One of the detainees is Sharon Palmer of Healthy Family Farms, a woman who “terrorizes” the population by selling whole, fresh, farm products to buyers who willingly transact for her fresh, non-indusrial supply foods. Oh, and yes, if you look at the cell phone video on Huffington Post, the vandals in black were wearing full-armor monkey suits. One can get severely injured, you know, handcuffing organic shopkeepers and dumping fresh food products. This craves the simple question, again: When, folks, will Americans step up and resist?

You may or may not know that Rawesome was raided once already by the Feds - because they were said to not have the “proper permits.” Thanks to the _many_ people who sent this FYI to me, including one of my favorite Ron Paul staffers. Remember that Ron Paul is one of the few politicians who dares to address this issue head on. Follow me on Twitter @karendecoster.

This article on Yahoo Finance is hardly a surprise, but it is worth a mention here. The article lists the ten states with the highest tax burdens and the ten states with the lowest tax burdens. The highest tax states are predictable – if you follow this stuff at all, you’ll get at least 7 out of 10 correct.

In the order of bad to worse: Pennsylvania, Maine, Vermont, Minnesota, California, Rhode Island, Wisconsin, Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey. See any geographical uniformities here? Such as the liberal, Yankee northeast and the east coast, with a sprinkling of very leftish midwestern states? The 10 least criminal states are also not a surprise. Here’s the order from lower taxes to lowest: New Mexico, Louisiana, South Carolina, New Hampshire, Texas, Wyoming, Tennessee, South Dakota, Nevada, Alaska. The lone Yankee state is not really Yankee by heritage – it has become the Free State. Most of these states rank among those states with the highest rate of population growth in recent years.

So yes, not only do people go to live in places where they can keep more of their money, but, more importantly, businesses gravitate to low-cost, low-tax, less bureaucratic states, and with that goes a whole host of intellectual capital looking for good jobs and more money they can keep.