NoNAIS.org

Thank you for all the letters of concern asking how we’re doing. Everything is fine here on Sugar Mountain. Our neighbors are fine. Further away in the valleys they did lose some bridges and roads. You can read a more detailed report on my Sugar Mountain Farm blog where I also talk about how I’ve been building terraces over the years to deal with water.

Keep well.

From the Food Business News article “Report notes rising recall rates” notes:

Stericycle’s report found undeclared allergens or other allergen concerns were the primary cause of recalls

In otherwords, “Oops, it was misslabeled.”

The rest of the recalls are caused by problems in processing that introduce disease organisms into the foods such as the E. Coli in vegetables, sprouts, ground turkey, etc. In other words, animal traceability is not the issue. The problems are not coming from the farm. The disease traceability issues are at the processing plants.

If Big Ag want’s to have “traceability” so they can pretend they’re local then they need to implement their own voluntary version at their own cost with their own suppliers.

If the exporters want traceability so they can crack foreign markets then they need to implement their own voluntary version at their own costs.

Tax payers, consumers and small farmers should not be burdened with these traceability programs or their costs.

The USDA needs to back off and leave us alone.

The USDA is making it’s links difficult for people to submit comments on the new NAIS proposal. This may be on purpose - a classic technique for filtering out people you don’t want is to create hurdles and then tell the people you do want to comment how to go around the hurdles.

So… I’m telling you how to get around the hurdles. Instead of use the USDA’s Press Release links which are not working for a lot of people instead use this one which works in all the web browsers I’ve tested:

www.regulations.gov/#!submitComment;D=APHIS-2009-0091-0001

Be sure to put the www. at the beginning - this is one of the hurdles they’ve employed to block users. It is either purposeful evil or simple incompetence on their information technology geek squad’s part. Take your pick. Frankly, I’ll bet the geeks will severely object to being called incompetent and would rather point out that they were told to make it difficult by their bosses.

In any case, go there and leave comments objecting to the USDA’s NeoNAzIS program which it had promised it was not going to do after virtually all the comments last time opposed it.

The price of freedom is eternal vigilance. Keep fighting these over regulators. They are not your representatives. They are not elected. They are appointed bureaucrats making regulations that act as laws.

My comment below. Feel free to borrow ideas but it is best if you reword to write your own comments in your own words:

I am opposed to NAIS, Animal ID, Animal Traceability or what ever you wish to change the name to. It all comes down to the same thing.

The USDA, had previously promised in the winter of 2010 to drop NAIS. Now the USDA is going back on their word - a shameful two-faced liar.

During this tight economic times the USDA is not able to get funding from Congress for the massively over budget NAIS they had so now they are trying to foist the costs and responsibilities for NAIS off on the states who also do not have the funds to enact or enforce such a program. This program should be called “No Cow Left Behind” because it is going to burden states with high costs without giving real benefits just as the disastrous “No Child Left Behind” has done.

Traceability is a violation of our Constitutional rights and freedoms. It is not necessary for the prevention of disease spread nor is it necessary for the notification of livestock owners. Traditional forms of media and the new media such as the internet are more than sufficient.

It is simply for the benefit of Big Ag & Exporters who want traceability so they can claim the marketing value that small producers have and so they can enter into foreign markets. If they want traceability they should create their own voluntary private system rather than a government subsidized system.

It will hurt consumers by raising food prices and limiting diversity in the market as the Big Ag producers destroy the small producers. The USDA needs to stop subsidizing Big Ag with tax payer money.

The worst of it is that the USDA is going down the path of Hell to repeat the terrible errors of the British government who killed almost 7 million healthy animals in a paniced reaction they later admitted was an error and that they had caused the diseases.

Any form of mandatory Premise ID, Animal Traceability & Animal ID is a bad idea. It should not be promulgated by unelected bureaucrats, stripping away our rights to farm and homesteading.
-Comment Tracking Number: 80ee4937 on Document ID: APHIS-2009-0091-0001: Traceability for Livestock Moving Interstate

Beware that uses almost all of the allowed number of characters.

Beware that the USDA form is not noting all of the fields which must be filled in so it then rejects comments that have just filled in the *’ed fields. My advice is to fill in all the fields - this is another game they’re playing, making a hurdle to block commenters - or perhaps it is just government incompetence, again.