Monsanto and Genetically Modified Soy - It's Poison.

There is never enough that can be said about just how awful the American corporation Monsanto truly is.  When you think about it, there should probably be a law against corporations that used to make chemical weapons from merging into the food business.  That seems rather obvious, doesn't it?

Besides the facts that soy upsets human hormonal balances in and of itself, the genetically modified version made by Monsanto, of course, is even worse.  I'm not aware of a single good that Monsanto produces that isn't toxic to humans - please let me know if you happen to know of one.

"Roundup Ready!"  Yes, indeed - but Roundup is toxic to humans, and when you spray it on weeds it gets into the soil, and the water

I don't know many Americans who know who and what Monsanto is.  Luckily for the Europeans, they do know, and now our Untied States Government wants to punish nations like France and Germany for NOT wanting to buy poison.  Monsanto poison is sold everywhere here though.

History of Monsanto; Profiteer of World Food Crisis

*The World Bank says that 100 million more people are facing severe hunger. Yet some of the world's richest food companies are making record profits. Monsanto last month reported that its net income for the three months up to the end of February this year had more than doubled over the same period in 2007, from $543m (£275m) to $1.12bn. Its profits increased from $1.44bn to $2.22bn.... The Food and Agriculture Organisation reports that 37 developing countries are in urgent need of food. And food riots are breaking out across the globe from Bangladesh to Burkina Faso, from China to Cameroon, and from Uzbekistan to the United Arab Emirates. Benedict Southworth, director of the World Development Movement, called the escalating earnings and profits *immoral* late last week. He said that the benefits of the food price increases were being kept by the big companies, and were not finding their way down to farmers in the developing world. Multinationals make billions in profit out of growing global food crisis In fact, Monsanto ... has gotten farmers to accept seed prices twice the level of a decade ago*

Best known for the toxic pesticide, Round-Up, Monsanto is a leading global provider of agricultural products and systems. Created in 1901 by John Francis Queeny and named for his wife's family, the company produces biotechnology and genomics and herbicides for corn, cotton, oil seeds, and vegetables. They also produce genetically altered seeds to tolerate its flagship product, Roundup.

In the past decade, Monsanto remade itself from toxic pesticide producer into a major seed and biotech company, as opposed to one focused on agrochemicals. The transition was accelerated by the acquisition of Delta and Pine Land. Other products have included Agent Orange, the now ubiquitous PCBs, DDT, Recombinant Bovine Growth Hormone (rBGH) and Aspartame.

In the fiscal year ending in August of 2010, the company reported sales of approximately 10.5 billion dollars and had 27,600 employees.

Many people are unaware that the friendly makers of RoundUp were heavily involved in the creation of the first nuclear bomb for the Manhattan Project during WWII. The Dayton Project was headed by Charlie Thomas, Director of Monsanto's Central Research Department. He later became the company's president. Monsanto also operated a nuclear facility for the federal government in Miamisburg, Ohio, called the Mound Project, until the 1980s.

In the 1950's, Monsanto created several attractions in Disney's Tomorrow Land. These rides/attractions were blatantly used to promote and advertise the virtues of chemicals and plastics. The Monsanto *House of the Future* was constructed entirely of plastic and years later found to be nearly indestructible. 

The following is excerpted from The Legacy of Agent Orange.

Agent Orange was manufactured by Monsanto, Dow Chemicals (manufacturers of napalm), Uniroyal, Hercules, Diamond Shamrock, Thompson Chemical and TH Agriculture. Monsanto [was] the main supplier. The Agent Orange produced by Monsanto had dioxin levels many times higher than that produced by Dow Chemicals, the other major supplier of Agent Orange to Vietnam.... Monsanto's involvement with the production of dioxin contaminated 2,4,5-T dates back to the late 1940s. 'Almost immediately workers started getting sick with skin rashes, inexplicable pains in the limbs, joints and other parts of the body, weakness, irritability, nervousness and loss of libido,' to quote Peter Sills, author of a forthcoming book on dioxins. Internal Monsanto memos show that Monsanto knew of the problems but once again a cover-up was the order of the day....

Let's not forget to mention that Monsanto partially funds the anti-organic Center for Global Food Issues, a project of the right-wing Hudson Institute. It is run by Dennis Avery and his son Alex Avery. Both men have been to repeatedly distort studies or cite non-existent studies while acting as Monsanto’s official spin masters against natural and organic foods.

Among other major humanitarian accomplishments, Monsanto developed special *Terminator Technology*, a.k.a. *suicide seeds*, known technically as V-GURTs (varietal Genetic Use Restriction Technologies) in which the seeds resulting from the first year's planting would be sterile thereby forcing farmers around the world in the Roundup Ready System to buy their seed from them every year rather than saving their best seed for the next years planting, a traditional and economical practice.

Repeated warnings were also given that Monsanto's terminator genes could spread to wild plants. According to the UN Commission on Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture, *Cross-fertilizing V-GURT containing crops may cause considerable effects in neighboring crop stands and wild relatives.... The fact that in North America, large stands of GMO varieties are grown & contamination of non-GMO varieties by GMO germplasm has been observed ... suggests that this scenario is a realistic probability*

Food crops are not the only area Monsanto and others have hoped to cash in on with their technology; a range of genetically engineered "designer" trees and forests are also high on their list. From trees modified to withstand Monsanto's Roundup to trees designed with a reduced lignin content (lignin gives trees strength and rigidity) to appeal to the paper making and construction industry to "terminator trees" which don't produce seeds. This has met with fierce resistance from activists and scientists alike, but again, to no avail. 

Growth in Dairy  -The FDA approved the use of recombinant bovine growth hormone (rbGH) being injected into cows on February 4th, 1994. Both Europe and Canada turned down Monsanto's application for approval. Developed and manufactured by the Monsanto, this genetically engineered hormone forces cows to artificially increase milk production by 10 to 15%. (Note: rBGH is banned in every industrialized country in the world except for the U.S., Mexico and Brazil.) Posilac (rBGH) creates additional Growth Factor One (IGF-1) in milk (a growth hormone which is identical in cows and humans). IGF-1 is considered to be a fuel cell for cancer growth and has been identified in the rapid growth cancer. Cows injected with rBGH also have a 25% increase in udder infections and a 50% increase in lameness.

The need for any increase in milk production is questionable since the dairy industry has been overproducing for 60 years. Between 1986 and 1987, under the Dairy Termination Program, dairy farmers were paid over 1.3 billion dollars to slaughter their cows. 144 dairy producers received over one million apiece to refrain from dairy farming for five years and one California producer received 20 million dollars. 

In August 2008, Monsanto sold their Posilac division to none other than pharmaceutical giant and makers of Prozac, Eli Lilly for a mere $300 million dollars.

Recently, U.S. organic farmers and seed dealers, along with The Public Patent Foundation (PUBPAT), have filed a lawsuit on behalf of more than 50 organizations challenging the agricultural giant's patents on its genetically modified seeds. The group is seeking a ruling that would prohibit Monsanto from suing the farmers or dealers if their organic seed becomes contaminated with Monsanto's patented biotech seed germplasm.

Monsanto has an annual budget of $10 million dollars and a staff of 75 devoted solely to investigating and prosecuting farmers. The largest recorded judgment made thus far in favor of Monsanto as a result of a farmer lawsuit is $3,052,800.00. Total recorded judgments granted to Monsanto for lawsuits amount to $15,253,602.82. Farmers have paid a mean of $412,259.54 for cases with recorded judgments.

2010 Campaign Cycle Contributions (Openly) Made By Monsanto

Monsanto gave $658,207 to federal candidates in the 2010 election cycle through its political action committee (PAC) alone - 48% to Democrats, 52% to Republicans.

Largest contribution was to Roy Blunt R-MO $10,000. Monsanto's second favored was the appropriately named Mike Crapo R-ID. $9,500 However, Monsanto has not forgotten its Democratic friends. Blanche Lincoln D-AL, chairman of the Senate Ag committee got $7,500.

Monsanto spent $6,560,000 for lobbying in 2010. $1,030,000 was to outside lobbying firms with the remainder being spent using in-house lobbyists.

In the last few months, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has cleared the way for biotech sugar beets, alfalfa, and a new type of biotech corn developed for use in ethanol.

Top biotechnology companies are Monsanto, DuPont, Syngenta and Bayer. (Syngentais owned by AstraZeneca and Novartis. Aventis' agribusiness division was bought out by Bayer.) Together they account for almost 100% of the genetically engineered seed and 60% of the global pesticide market. After numerous acquisitions, they now own 23% of the commercial seed market. In 1999, almost 80% of total global transgenic acreage was planted in GMO soy, corn, cotton and canola. Until then, farmers could spray herbicides before planting, but not after, as herbicides would kill the intended crop. The other 20% of genetically modified acreage is planted with crops that produce pesticides. Monsanto’s *New Leaf* potato kills potato beetles, but is itself registered as a pesticide with the EPA. The five largest biotech companies in the world are also the five largest herbicide companies.

Since 1990, the United States of Monsanto, er, CorpoAmerica, I mean, er – our duly and fairly elected government official have claimed that genetically modified foods are no different from their natural counterparts that have existed for centuries. This is a political, not a scientific assertion.

Numerous scientists at the FDA consistently described these newly introduced gene-spliced foods as cause for concern. In addition to their potential to produce hard-to-detect allergies and nutritional problems, the scientists said that *The possibility of unexpected, accidental changes in genetically engineered plants might produce unexpected high concentrations of plant toxicants.* GM crops might also have *Increased levels of known naturally occurring toxins…appearance of new, not previously identified* toxins, and an increased tendency to gather *toxic substances from the environment* such as *pesticides or heavy metals.*

The scientists recommended testing every GM food before it enters the marketplace. But the FDA was under orders from the first Bush White House to promote the biotechnology industry, and the political appointee in charge of agency policy was the former attorney for biotech giant Monsanto—and later became their vice president. The FDA policy ignored the scientists’ warnings and allowed GM food crops onto the market without any required safety studies.

 Since polls indicate that the great majority of Americans who are aware of these issues want labels on all GMO products. Many question why consumers in Europe have the right to know through labeling which foods contain GM ingredients and thus to make an informed choice – while consumers in the United States, purportedly the bastion of freedom, democracy and the *free market* in the world are denied this same right?

Attempts to accomplish some kind of labeling have repeatedly been rebuffed due to tremendous opposition from biotech, which fear loss of sales if people know.  For example, in 2002 Oregon tried and failed to pass just such a labeling initiative (Measure 27). The campaign cited big money and misinformation propagated by biotech as contributing to the defeat.

Monsanto, ever on the lookout for a new financial opportunity, especially one which, on the surface at least, appears to be benevolent found one in biofuels. The growing of corn, in Monsanto's case, genetically engineered corn, for the production of ethanol purportedly to reduce the use of fossil fuels. Unfortunately though, as is often the case with Monsanto, this silver lining has a rather large and ominous cloud, and in the massive diversion of land once used to grow food to growing crops for the fueling of automobiles yet another crisis has ensued.

David Pimentel, Cornell professor in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, was quoted as saying,*Abusing our precious croplands to grow corn for an energy-inefficient process that yields low-grade automobile fuel amounts to unsustainable, subsidized food burning*  In 2004 George Monbiot warned  that *The adoption of biofuels would be a humanitarian and environmental disaster*. *Surely, if there was unmet demand for food, the market would ensure that crops were used to feed people rather than vehicles? There is no basis for this assumption. The market responds to money, not need. People who own cars have more money than people at risk of starvation. In a contest between their demand for fuel and poor people’s demand for food, the car-owners win every time*. That is precisely what happened. As the world pays more to eat due to the engineered shortage of land for food crops & driving up prices Monsanto et al. have been making gigantic profits.

The President of the United Nations General Assembly stated,

*The essential purpose of food, which is to nourish people, has been subordinated to the economic aims of a handful of multinational corporations that monopolize all aspects of food production, from seeds to major distribution chains, and they have been the prime beneficiaries of the world crisis. A look at the figures for 2007, when the world food crisis began, shows that corporations such as Monsanto and Cargill, which control the cereals market, saw their profits increase by 45 and 60 per cent, respectively; the leading chemical fertilizer companies such as Mosaic Corporation, a subsidiary of Cargill, doubled their profits in a single year*.

These agri-giants spent $100 million on getting their way in the Farm Bill, an investment with huge dividends – for Monsanto’s CEO Hugh Grant anyway. Grant chose to exercise stock options - 116,000 shares worth – that netted him a profit of over $114 PER SHARE making him a hefty $13,000,000 off this perfectly legit little deal.

A report by Friends of the Earth revealed that between 2008 and 2022 federal subsidies (paid for with OUR taxpayer dollars) to the biofuel industry will total over $400 billion dollars.

If Obama proposals for 60 billion gallons per year are realized, subsidies would top $120 billion per year by the end of the period. This would result in a cumulative subsidy of more than $1 trillion.  In return for this modest investment, we will accelerate land conversion and exacerbate a wide range of environmental problems. Already, the ecological impact of increased biofuels production is evident, both in the U.S. and abroad, including deforestation, water pollution and increased greenhouse gas emissions. 

Sign the PETITION TO BRING DOWN THE MONSANTO MONOPOLY

Source Links –

Source Watch http://www.sourcewatch.org

·  ↑ Company Description: Monsanto Company, Hoovers, accessed January 2011

·  ↑ Key Monsanto Company Financials, Hoovers, January 2011

·  ↑ Chapter 2: High-Flux Years, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Review, accessed January 2011

·  ↑ Biographical Memoirs V.65, National Academy of Sciences, 1994

·  ↑ Alex Constantine Nutrapoison, Znet, July 2003

·  ↑ A Short Curriculum Vitae of I.G. Farben, Biblioteca Plaeyades, accessed October 2009

·  ↑ IG Farben to be dissolved, BBC, September 17, 2001

·  ↑ Disneyland's Home of the Future, Mindfully.org, accessed January 2011

·  ↑ Time line: History of Monsanto Co., Reuters, Nov 11, 2009

·  ↑ John Robbins Genetic Engineering, Part I, The Food Revolution, accessed December 2009

·  ↑ The Issues: Corn and Soy, Sustainable Table, accessed December 2009

·  ↑ Charles Benbrook Evidence of the Magnitude and Consequences of the Roundup Ready Soybean Yield Drag from University-Based Varietal Trials in 1998, Mindfully.org, accessed January 2011

State Police Using Cellphone Extraction Devices

It is no shock to me that there are devices that can get into your computer and steal or manipulate information you have stored on it. But now Federal and State police can now extract information from your cellphone without your knowledge.

Imagine being stopped because you went through an intersection as the light went red and the local police pull you over. While they are running your license and registration they also go through your cell phone without you knowledge. It is happening right now in this country. The Department of Homeland Security has taken it upon themselves to even do this to traveler's laptops when going through the airport, ports of entry and Border Patrol check stations up to 100 miles inside the US.

The state of Michigan' State Police are even have used these devices to access information from cellphones that officers asked drivers they have pulled over to give them. Giving your private information to any local, state or federal official should not be asked at a traffic stop, coming into our country or even being in our country. The 4th Amendment which guards against unreasonable searches and seizures should include our computers and cellphones. Oh wait a minute it does but that damn Patriot Act thing is still stripping away our rights.

The state of Michigan's ACLU has asked the Michigan State Police (MSP) why they are using these "Extraction devices" but the MSP have been throwing some red tape out there to get this information. The MSP have said that they are working "in accordance with the Freedom of Information Act."

OK, cool let me request the information. I know there is a small fee for the information so, what's it going to cost to get the information from these devices? According to the Michigan State Police the information for these devices under the FOIA is going to cost about $500,000.00. The is a big red tape being wrapped with a not a chance from the State Police.

So if you get pulled over, stopped at a Border Patrol Check Station or going through an airport do not give them your cellphone or computer. It is best to always have them turned off and even the battery removed to prevent them from accessing your private information.

You can read more here if your head is not spinning enough.

Corporate Driven Nanny State Declares War On Parental Rights

Hey, American Parents! Listen up! This is a warning shot fired across the hood of your SUV, your eco-car or whatever you may chariot your children around in to transport them into the ever-lovin' arms of their (socialist overrun and/or corporate owned) learning institutions.

This article cited below out of Chicago is chilling and if other parents in other cities, counties and states are not made aware of the corporate and profit driven motives and influences behind these kinds of *district wide* mandates, they too will find themselves with children being fed the same low cost, soy and hormone filled meals they also feed to the convicts down the road.

At his public school, Little Village Academy on Chicago's West Side, students are not allowed to pack lunches from home. Unless they have a medical excuse, they must eat the food served in the cafeteria.

As a mother, no matter how unconventional of one I may be, I do not recall ever wanting some corporation or state run institution to mandate what my children put into their bodies. My children are not now, nor have they ever been, state property - there is no way in HELL that I would ever give away my parental rights and consent to my child to being force fed unhealthy, unnatural and genetically overrun FOOD PRODUCTS.

Anyone concerned about the quality of food in their school districts needs to research which food distribution corporation holds the contract for their county or district. If your child's cafeteria has recently been *updated*, renamed into some cool sounding mall hangout or splashed with bright colors and other visual stimuli meant to detract from the actual quality of food, it is likely sign of outside private interest influences. Corporations like SODEXHO and Aramark spend millions in researching ways to *sell* YOUR KIDS into a lifestyle of corporate owned foods and food sources.

The full article of the Chicago school district's takeover of parental rights can be found on the Chicago Tribune.  I suggest every parent go read it and take warning; there is a concerted effort by corporations to take over control of your children, of their values and perceptions of moral and ethical behaviors...they spend millions - if not billions, of dollars paying experts to dissect your kids' brains and manipulate them into being hooked on their products from the cradle to the grave. They do not have your best interest at heart and think nothing of paying off local and state legislators in contributions, vacations, etc., and then following up with well studied sales pitches of saving money for the schools that fiscally scared folks eat right up.

The Chicago story clearly states,

Any school that bans homemade lunches also puts more money in the pockets of the district's food provider, Chartwells-Thompson.** The federal government pays the district for each free or reduced-price lunch taken, and the caterer receives a set fee from the district per lunch.

Unless you are willing to trust that a corporation that exists to make maximum profit with minimum expenditure knows more about the health and well being of your children, it is time to sit up and pay attention. Find out which corporations and industries are taking over your schools and do not ever allow them to take away YOUR RIGHT to send your kid to school with a homemade lunch!

Thank you, Mr. Shaw - you set fire in me about this again with your email this morning and set me off on a right and proper motherly rant!










** For those not familiar with  Chartwells-Thompson 
the following excerpt will help you see how they operate and how 
they manage to game the system to benefit from government hand-outs
at the expense of local tax and federal taxpayers, of course. 

Chartwells and Thompson (a minority owned business that has a strategic partnership with Chartwells parent Compass Group North America to co-manage select public food service contracts) received a one-year deal in St. Louis whose cost is contingent on overall student enrollment and on the number qualifying for federally subsidized school meals.

Presenting President Barry At Open Mic Night...

Our president was on the hot mike yesterday in what he thought was a private chat with campaign donors. Barry offered candid, behind the scenes details concerning his budget ‘negotiations’ with GOP leaders. (At this point we use the word ‘leader’ loosely for both sides of the political aisle) Mark Knoller, White House Correspondent, listened in to an audio feed of the conversation with donors, after reporters had left the room…

Obama is heard whining like a kicked dog about Republican attempts to attach measures to the budget bill which would have effectively killed parts of his ‘hard-won’ health care reform program.

He complains how rough it was on him as he had to travel the country and push the health care bill through, “At great political cost” and went on to more or less say that after all his toil and suffering  by damned if anyone was going to stop the bill now.

Speaking about his closed-door negotiations on the bill to fund the federal government until September, he told the pirates, er, lobbyists…oops, we mean the campaign donors - "I said, 'You want to repeal health care? Go at it. We'll have that debate. You're not going to be able to do that by nickel-and-diming me in the budget. You think we're stupid?”  

No sir, we do not think you are stupid; your actions since taking office has removed all doubt and we know that stupid is far too kind a word to use for what the majority of the country thinks of you. Didn’t your mammy ever tell you not to ask questions you don’t really want the answers to?

Coming Soon to Your Table - Franken-Salmon

If the Food and Drug Administration approves AquaAdvantage salmon, it could be the first genetically modified animal product you eat. Watch more Earth Focus at http://www.linktv.org/earthfocus

According to Aquabounty Technologies, the Massachusetts based company behind the transgenic salmon - the fish can grow to market size twice as fast as regular salmon. Industry experts say this will give consumers a healthy source of protein while reducing pressure on ocean salmon, whose stocks are already dwindling. The lack of conclusive evidence that the salmon is safe is not the only troubling thing about AquaAdvantage. While aquabounty claims the fish would be grown only inland and only sterile females will be sold, limiting any ability to reproduce, environmentalists fear that there are no guarantees and that if transgenic fish escape they would undermine the population of the already vulnerable wild salmon. Environmentalists also fear that the FDA's approval of transgenic salmon would lead to other genetically modified animals produced for human consumption.

Most Illegal Immigrant Families Collect Welfare

From Judicial Watch

Surprise, surprise; Census Bureau data reveals that most U.S. families headed by illegal immigrants use taxpayer-funded welfare programs on behalf of their American-born anchor babies.

Even before the recession, immigrant households with children used welfare programs at consistently higher rates than natives, according to the extensive census data collected and analyzed by a nonpartisan Washington D.C. group dedicated to researching legal and illegal immigration in the U.S. The results, published this month in a lengthy report, are hardly surprising.
http://cis.org/immigrant-welfare-use-2011

Basically, the majority of households across the country benefitting from publicly-funded welfare programs are headed by immigrants, both legal and illegal. States where immigrant households with children have the highest welfare use rates are Arizona (62%), Texas, California and New York with 61% each and Pennsylvania (59%).

The study focused on eight major welfare programs that cost the government $517 billion the year they were examined. They include Supplemental Security Income (SSI) for the disabled, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF), a nutritional program known as Women, Infants and Children (WIC), food stamps, free/reduced school lunch, public housing and health insurance for the poor (Medicaid).

Food assistance and Medicaid are the programs most commonly used by illegal immigrants, mainly on behalf of their American-born children who get automatic citizenship. On the other hand, legal immigrant households take advantage of every available welfare program, according to the study, which attributes it to low education level and resulting low income.

The highest rate of welfare recipients come from the Dominican Republic (82 %), Mexico and Guatemala (75%) and Ecuador (70%), according to the report, which says welfare use tends to be high for both new arrivals and established residents.  

Monsanto Sued AGAIN. *We Will Win* Says Spook

As you read this, please remember that this is the same company that states like Nebraska are so darn proud to work with!

Article from Green Chip Stocks

By Jimmy Mengel
Tuesday, April 5th, 2011

“Monsanto is big. You can’t win. 

We will get you. You will pay.”

That ominous threat — allegedly from a Monsanto spook — was aimed at Gary Reinhart, a small country store owner.

Monsanto claimed Reinhart had planted the company's genetically modified seeds in violation of their patent. It was a surprise to Reinhart, but an all-too-familiar scene in farms across the country...

According to Vanity Fair:

Monsanto relies on a shadowy army of private investigators and agents in the American heartland to strike fear into farm country.

They secretly videotape and photograph farmers, store owners, and co-ops; infiltrate community meetings; and gather information from informants about farming activities.

Farmers say that some Monsanto agents pretend to be surveyors. Others confront farmers on their land and try to pressure them to sign papers giving Monsanto access to their private records. Farmers call them the 'seed police' and use words such as 'Gestapo' and 'Mafia' to describe their tactics"

Now in order to protect themselves from Monsanto's overreaching arm, a group of organic farmers have joined together to sue the agricultural giant.
The suit, Organic Seed Growers & Trade Association, et al. v. Monsanto, was filed by Public Patent Foundation (PUBPAT) on behalf of over 60 family farmers, organic agriculture organizations, and seed proprietors.
The group is seeking preemptive protection from patent infringement, should their crops ever become contaminated by Monsanto's genetically modified (GM) seeds.
It is common for Monsanto's GM crops to cross pollinate neighboring organic crop fields. So essentially, farmers can be sued for crops that they never even planted.
“It seems quite perverse that a farmer contaminated by GM seed could be accused of patent infringement, but Monsanto has made such accusations before and is notorious for having sued hundreds of farmers for patent infringement,” Dan Ravicher, PUBPAT's executive director, said in a statement.
Monsanto targets hundreds of farmers each year for possible lawsuits.
According to Sourcewatch, it's because of Monsanto's sheer financial might that the "odds are clearly stacked against the farmer":

Monsanto has an annual budget of $10 million dollars and a staff of 75 devoted solely to investigating and prosecuting farmers. The largest recorded judgment made thus far in favor of Monsanto as a result of a farmer lawsuit is $3,052,800.00. Total recorded judgments granted to Monsanto for lawsuits amount to $15,253,602.82. Farmers have paid a mean of $412,259.54 for cases with recorded judgments.

The lawsuit also claims that Monsanto's GM seed destroys the organic seed for the same crop.
Organic canola, for instance, became “virtually extinct as a result of contamination”...
The suit alleges that unless these protective measures are taken, the same fate could befall organic corn, soybeans, cotton, sugar beets, and alfalfa — all crops that Monsanto has released GM seed for.
Monsanto is dismissing the lawsuit as a “publicity stunt”.
This is certainly not Monsanto's first legal rodeo (you can read all about their sordid past here), so we'll be watching to see how this plays out...
The farmers are indeed caught in a David and Goliath scenario, and we can only hope that this lawsuit represents a mighty stone in their slingshot.

Nebraska - Home of Monsanto's Most State of the Art Facility

How sad to see the poor people of Nebraska celebrating the *success* of something as nasty as a Monsanto plant in their state...

I wonder if anyone asked the dignitaries if they valued their profit margins more than they value their own family's future in America? How are those 1 million bags of GMO seed corn they seem so proud of going to impact the health and well being of their kids and grandkids? Do they know or care?

Are the residents of Nebraska aware that the company they tout as their economic savior resorts to scare tactics, lawsuits and open threats...all as part of their standard operating procedure?  I would be embarrassed to be an elected state official associated with Monsanto and if I were a voter in the state of Nebraska, I would be looking around for new officials who put their duty to the citizens of the state above lining their pockets with kickbacks and contributions from Monsanto and their ilk.

Excerpts from York News-Times Article

WACO, Nebraska — Governor Dave Heineman and Nebraska Attorney General Jon Bruning were among a number of dignitaries to visit the Monsanto seed corn production and research plant Monday morning, celebrating the facility’s first year in business.


Joining Heineman and Bruining were State Senator Greg Adams and Mark Messmer, representing Monsanto’s United States and Canadian corn breeding operations.

Tom Schaffran, the site manager of the Waco facility, noted that three years ago, nearly the same group assembled in a tent on the east side of what was then a cornfield, to break ground.
 
“Now, we are surrounded by concrete and there’s a roof over our heads,” Schaffran said. “A lot has happened here, in the last three years, with the construction of this state-of-the-art facility. Since operations began, we’ve bagged one million units of seed corn.”

The facility currently employs 57 full-time workers and up to 900 part-time workers during peak agricultural times throughout the year. The facility encompasses more than 160 acres of land and features and has more than 190,000 square feet of warehouse space. It also includes bulk storage, three high-capacity seed dryers, three green corn receiving lines and a 180-foot-tall conditioning tower. The facility packages an estimated 1,200 units of seed per hour. It is also the newest and most state-of-the-art of all Monsanto’s properties in the world.

Full article here