{"id":517,"date":"2012-03-01T07:45:48","date_gmt":"2012-03-01T12:45:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/?p=517"},"modified":"2012-03-01T07:45:48","modified_gmt":"2012-03-01T12:45:48","slug":"first-they-came-for-the-raw-milk-farmer","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/first-they-came-for-the-raw-milk-farmer\/","title":{"rendered":"First they came for the raw milk farmer…"},"content":{"rendered":"

…and eventually it will be locally-grown meat.\u00a0 (In fact, it’s already started.)<\/p>\n

The unholy alliance of Industrial Agriculture and Big Government are engaged in a campaign of harassment and intimidation targeting the small farmer who sells his products directly to the consumer.\u00a0 It’s all under the guise of protecting consumer health, but in fact the real danger to the consumer is that food in the fancy wrapping in the supermarket.<\/p>\n

This isn’t political, though Michelle is the only one closer to the President than Big Ag’s lobbyists.\u00a0 But this campaign to discourage local food production has gone on through several Republican and Democrat administrations.\u00a0 It seems to be intensifying now and I can only speculate that what’s called the “locavore” movement is starting to hurt\u00a0them.<\/p>\n

It’s also coming at a time when Industrial Food is losing its price advantage.\u00a0 I see prices at the meat counter that are even higher than Thistle Hill meat.\u00a0 And it’s sure to go up even more.\u00a0 Possibly that’s behind Monsanto’s constant legal action against small farmers—lawsuits the farmers often win, but at enormous cost and stress—and behind the swat-team tactics the government uses against Amish dairy farmers.\u00a0 Even when they try to follow the rules, the government just changes the rules or ignores them and defies you to fight back.<\/p>\n

Just one of many of these confrontations is going on in Wisconsin right now and you can take the link to read about it.<\/p>\n

http:\/\/hartkeisonline.com\/heroes-of-sustainable-agriculture\/brave-dairy-farmer-takes-a-stand-for-personal-liberty-and-private-contracts\/<\/a><\/p>\n

Now I mentioned that those of us in local meat production will be next.\u00a0 In fact, our time has already come.\u00a0 At least three times in recent years, under both Republican and Democrat Administrations, the Department of Agriculture has tried to force the registration of every farm animal.\u00a0 Not just the cattle and the pigs, but the barn cats, too.<\/p>\n

This so-called “national identification system” has been defeated every time because it has been submitted to either Congress or state legislatures for final approval.\u00a0 Now, however, the bureaucrats are coming back again and this time they’re not going to be side-tracked by any messy legislative process.\u00a0 They’re just going to institute a regulation and enforce it.\u00a0 That they’ll do selectively….wearing down farmers until they give up.\u00a0 Some of our friends are already deciding that’s what they’ll do.<\/p>\n

The process will be expensive, of course.\u00a0 More than 100-million animals will have to be tagged and their movements tracked.\u00a0 How many more bureaucrats will be needed to do that.\u00a0 When we move a cow from our farm to the butcher, we’ll have to file a report.\u00a0 When we move a cow from our farm to a neighbor’s pasture to take advantage of some fresh grass, we’ll have to file a report.\u00a0 Our neighbor will have to file a report, too.<\/p>\n

Every report will require a fee.\u00a0 Now you would think Big Ag wouldn’t like that at all.\u00a0 No, they like it a lot.\u00a0 You see Thistle Hill is small and will pay a per-cow fee.\u00a0 The big guys will get a blanket license….costing them pennies compared to the dollars the little guys will pay.<\/p>\n

The losers will be the consumers who want to know where their food comes from, how it is grown, how it is handled and who is responsible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

…and eventually it will be locally-grown meat.\u00a0 (In fact, it’s already started.) The unholy alliance of Industrial Agriculture and Big Government are engaged in a campaign of harassment and intimidation targeting the small farmer who sells his products directly to the consumer.\u00a0 It’s all under the guise of protecting consumer health, but in fact the real danger to the consumer is that food in the fancy wrapping in the supermarket. This isn’t political, though Michelle is the only one closer to the President than Big Ag’s lobbyists.\u00a0 But this campaign to discourage local food production has gone on through several Republican and Democrat administrations.\u00a0 It seems to be intensifying now and I can only speculate that what’s called the “locavore” movement is starting to hurt\u00a0them. It’s also coming at a time when Industrial Food is losing its price advantage.\u00a0 I see prices at the meat counter that are even higher than Thistle Hill meat.\u00a0 And it’s sure to go up even more.\u00a0 Possibly that’s behind Monsanto’s constant legal action against small farmers—lawsuits the farmers often win, but at enormous cost and stress—and behind the swat-team tactics the government uses against Amish dairy farmers.\u00a0 Even when they try to follow the rules, the government just changes the rules or ignores them and defies you to fight back. Just one of many of these confrontations is going on in Wisconsin right now and you can take the link to read about it. http:\/\/hartkeisonline.com\/heroes-of-sustainable-agriculture\/brave-dairy-farmer-takes-a-stand-for-personal-liberty-and-private-contracts\/ Now I mentioned that those of us in local meat production will be next.\u00a0 In fact, our time has already come.\u00a0 At least three times in recent years, under both Republican and Democrat Administrations, the Department of Agriculture has tried to force the registration of every farm animal.\u00a0 Not just the cattle and the pigs, but the barn cats, too. This so-called “national identification system” has been defeated every time because it has been submitted to either Congress or state legislatures for final approval.\u00a0 Now, however, the bureaucrats are coming back again and this time they’re not going to be side-tracked by any messy legislative process.\u00a0 They’re just going to institute a regulation and enforce it.\u00a0 That they’ll do selectively….wearing down farmers until they give up.\u00a0 Some of our friends are already deciding that’s what they’ll do. The process will be expensive, of course.\u00a0 More than 100-million animals will have to be tagged and their movements tracked.\u00a0 How many more bureaucrats will be needed to do that.\u00a0 When we move a cow from our farm to the butcher, we’ll have to file a report.\u00a0 When we move a cow from our farm to a neighbor’s pasture to take advantage of some fresh grass, we’ll have to file a report.\u00a0 Our neighbor will have to file a report, too. Every report will require a fee.\u00a0 Now you would think Big Ag wouldn’t like that at all.\u00a0 No, they like it a lot.\u00a0 You see Thistle Hill is small and will pay a per-cow fee.\u00a0 The big guys will get a blanket license….costing them pennies compared to the dollars the little guys will pay. The losers will be the consumers who want to know where their food comes from, how it is grown, how it is handled and who is responsible.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,9,8,21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-517","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-food","category-health","category-nutrition","category-on-the-soap-box"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=517"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":518,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/517\/revisions\/518"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=517"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=517"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.thistlehill.net\/wpblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=517"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}