Holy cow! EPA exposed to be using aerial surveillance on Midwest feedlots

From Omaha.com, more indications that the EPA is out of control. I’m beginning to think the EPA is an enemy of the citizens of the United States with behavior like this. I guess we’ll need genetically engineered cattle with built in camouflage now.

Image: free wallpaper from scenicreflections.com

EPA told to come clean on feedlot flyovers

By Joe Duggan

WORLD-HERALD BUREAU

LINCOLN — A spy in the sky over Nebraska and Iowa has gotten under the hides of some livestock producers and their representatives in Washington.

The Environmental Protection Agency’s aerial photo surveillance of livestock feeding operations in both states flew under the radar for nearly two years.

But now the flyover program, conducted to help enforce the Clean Water Act, has prompted a demand for answers from all five members of Nebraska’s congressional delegation.

The delegation delivered a joint letter Tuesday to EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, listing 25 questions about the legality of the surveillance and the privacy rights of business owners. Although the letter stopped short of calling for an end to the flyovers, the two senators and three representatives want to know more about their purpose.

“Nebraskans are rightfully skeptical of an agency which continues to unilaterally insert itself into the affairs of rural America,” Rep. Adrian Smith, R-Neb., said in a statement.

EPA representatives in Washington, D.C., did not immediately return messages seeking reaction. A spokesman for the agency’s Region 7 office in Kansas City said he was not authorized to comment.

In 2010, Nebraska had 862 concentrated animal feeding operations and Iowa 1,607, making them the two leading livestock states in Region 7, says the agency’s website. The region also includes Kansas and Missouri.

The livestock operations fall under an assortment of state and federal regulations intended to protect streams and aquifers from animal waste pollution, which can occur in the form of runoff from feed lots and discharges from manure lagoons.

The two-page letter was written at the urging of the Nebraska Cattlemen, an industry group made up of cattle producers.

“The frustration for livestock producers really is just the idea that the government has resorted to spying on facilities,” said Kristen Hassebrook, the group’s director of natural resources and environmental affairs.

Full story here. h/t to WUWT reader “Neo”.

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June 2, 2012 3:32 pm

The writers of “The Simpson’s Movie” were more prescient than we ever knew. As Grandpa Simpson opined, “EEEE PAAAA, EEEE PAAA”, as the Agency put the glass dome over the city of Springfield utilizing helicopters.

Green Sand
June 2, 2012 3:35 pm

Pssst, have SAM will travel!

June 2, 2012 3:36 pm

Nebraska Congressmen question EPA aerial surveillance on ranches
Brett Wessler, Staff Writer | Updated: May 30, 2012
Congressmen from Nebraska sent a letter to EPA Director Lisa Jackson seeking an explanation after livestock operations in the state were monitored via aerial surveillance.
Republican Reps. Adrian Smith, Jeff Fortenberry and Lee Terry, as well as Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson and GOP Sen. Mike Johanns are concerned with privacy and other issues for the livestock operators and other landowners monitored by the agency.
“Farmers and ranchers in Nebraska pride themselves in the stewardship of our state’s natural resources,” wrote the Nebraska lawmakers in a release on Congressman Adrian Smith’s website. “As you might imagine, this practice has resulted in privacy concerns among our constituents and raises several questions.”
The bipartisan group asks almost two-dozen questions about the flyover and if findings resulted in additional enforcement activities. The letter asks for a response by June 10.
continued… http://www.cattlenetwork.com/cattle-news/latest/Nebraska-Congressme

Robert of Ottawa
June 2, 2012 3:37 pm

Out of control indeed. I bet they also have more powers of siezure than the police.

Reply to  Robert of Ottawa
June 2, 2012 3:40 pm

EPA WILL COST YOU AND YOUR JOBS AND MONEY

June 2, 2012 3:42 pm

The EPA is truly out of control. Another governmental agency created to interfere with citizens.

June 2, 2012 3:46 pm

Don’t worry, it’s just Big Brother watching.

clipe
June 2, 2012 3:50 pm

clipe says:
June 2, 2012 at 3:31 pm
[edit] Meanwhile, back at Chateau Hansen…
Will carbon dioxide demand outpace supply?

Mac the Knife
June 2, 2012 3:55 pm

As many farmers and ranchers know from first hand experience, it isn’t paranoia if they really are out to get you!

June 2, 2012 4:11 pm

Time to cut their budget. If they have money, they WILL find mischief to get into.

Steve
June 2, 2012 4:23 pm

Any warrants?
What did Americans do the last time their government insisted they didn’t need warrants?

Luther Wu
June 2, 2012 4:32 pm

I’m waiting for:
“Well, if they aren’t doing anything wrong, why should they care?”
The EPA and it’s cohorts use nothing but logical fallacies to justify their actions.

Owen in Ga
June 2, 2012 4:33 pm

Congress is complicit in this! Never pass a law that states “the secretary shall determine…”. The clean air and clean water acts were chock full of this kind of language. As a result, the EPA has realized they have carte blanche to do whatever they want – with congresses approval!

u.k.(us)
June 2, 2012 4:34 pm

Is this such a surprise ?
I KNOW every comment I make here, is run thru certain filters in the NSA,
Anthony has caught their attention.
Let them watch, it is all very boring.

David S
June 2, 2012 4:36 pm

America takes another step towards totalitarian dictatorship as government becomes bigger, more powerful, and unaccountable. The solution to this is small government and Ron Paul would have been the man to make it happen. That possibility seems increasingly remote now. So will Obama or Romney rein in the EPA? Not Likely!

June 2, 2012 4:40 pm

Now I know what is wrecking my peace and quiet. I thought it was Omaha scoping out the next land-grab.
I suppose it would be rude to ask where they are getting their carbon credits from and who is paying for them.

Ted
June 2, 2012 4:50 pm

The EPA is poisoning the economy of America, by order’s from community organizer Obama!
America’s actual health and welfare crisis
It is EPA rules that most gravely threaten our energy, economy, health, welfare, justice, and civil rights progress
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson says we face grave threats to human health, welfare and justice. She’s absolutely right. However, the dangers are not due to factory or power plant emissions, or supposed effects of “dangerous manmade global warming.”
They are the result of policies and regulations that her EPA is imposing in the name of preventing climate change and other hypothetical and exaggerated environmental problems.
It is those government actions that are the gravest threat to Americans’ health, welfare, and pursuit of happiness and justice.
30 May 2012
http://www.climatechangedispatch.com/home/10213-americas-actual-health-and-welfare-crisis?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+climatechangedispatch%2FnkcO+%28Climate+Change+Dispatch+news%29

June 2, 2012 5:06 pm

Beginning to think…?

June 2, 2012 5:06 pm

I believe the EPA can be compelled to answer questions regarding this. I’m no lawyer but this sounds very much like random surveillance without probable cause to conduct the surveillance. I would think these actions should require a court order. I don’t think this should be allowed to slide. They should be subject to a subpoena.

Pamela Gray
June 2, 2012 5:42 pm

November cannot come soon enough. If you voted for Obama last time, like I did, join me in voting for anybody but a Democrat. Hell, a space monkey would do.

June 2, 2012 5:58 pm

Outdoor humourist Pat McMannus (sp?) wrote, “I grew up before there was such a thing as ‘pollution’. We just called it ‘dumpin stuff in the crick’.”
Any bureaucracy is like a gun. When it’s used to defend us, it’s great. When it’s used to rob us, it’s bad.
USEPA regulations should not have the force of law without Congressional review and without unbiased scientific review. By Congressional review I mean that a proposed regulation has no effect until Congress votes on it.
It is the nature of any bureaucracy to eventually lean toward totalitarianism (They answer to no one and no one is accountable.)

betapug
June 2, 2012 6:00 pm

I assume they are using Reaper drones…armed with the latest “Crucifier” anti-polluter missiles.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/30/breaking-epas-crucifier-resigns/

June 2, 2012 6:01 pm

The EPA protects the enviroment from we the people. But who is going to protect we the people from the enviroment? (Let alone protect us from the EPA?)
There are analogs which predict that, if a weak El Nino sets in, (which seems likely,) we may be in for a winter as different from last winter as the winter of 1976-77 was different from 1975-76.
Just as this hard winter hits the EPA-inspired coal-plant shut-downs will start effecting Ohio, and electricity rates will go through the roof. Ohio will learn first hand what the words “fuel poverty” mean. Of course, the winter will not truly set in until after the election on Nov. 2.
I urge the people of Ohio to study what is going to happen to their electrical rates, before the election, and not wait until a winter like 1976-77 sets in.
If we the people don’t watch out for we the people, as sure as shooting no one else will.
Oh oh. I used the word “shooting.” What is that buzzing noise overhead?

jorgekafkazar
June 2, 2012 6:11 pm

Today Nebraska; tomorrow the World!

DirkH
June 2, 2012 6:13 pm

u.k.(us) says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:34 pm
“Is this such a surprise ?
I KNOW every comment I make here, is run thru certain filters in the NSA,
Anthony has caught their attention.”
Ahem. I don’t have an URL handy but there are publically accessible websites that track all blogs. You can select commenter names and see their entire comment history. That’s all pretty cheap to set up and some people did. I mean, google or bing do it for the entire web all the time.

June 2, 2012 6:30 pm

Reblogged this on 323 Archery Shoot and commented:
..I’m only re-blogging this because I REALLY WANT A CAMO COW now….

Greg Rehmke
June 2, 2012 6:33 pm

Ghostbusters is available on Netflix streaming. Much of this evil EPA guy seems to get edited out for the various TV broadcasts. But Netflix streams the full version in HD. Few movies have better portrayed the arrogance (and incompetence) of government power than “WALTER PECK, junior E.P.A. administrator.”

Barbee
June 2, 2012 6:47 pm

Now that there’s no more need to patrol our border(s)-what else are we to do w/ all that Taxpayer funded equipment?

Gary Hladik
June 2, 2012 6:48 pm

Are they flying black helicopters?

Insufficiently Sensitive
June 2, 2012 7:01 pm

Calm down. It’s just the nomenklatura keeping track of the kulaks.

aharris
June 2, 2012 7:22 pm

It’s just flyover country. Who would possibly notice?

Owen in Ga
June 2, 2012 7:47 pm

It’s called flyover country by the coastal “elites”, so the EPA thought that was a directive.

Curiousgeorge
June 2, 2012 7:54 pm

Y’all do know that there is an incestuous relationship between the EPA and the UNEP don’t you? Specifically, a certain MS Fraenkel is UNEP North American Regional Director. Formerly worked as senior policy advisor in the Office of International Affairs within the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, among other influential political positions. http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?ArticleID=5732&DocumentID=411&l=en
I’m pretty certain she and goodolwhatshername running EPA these days get together to discuss ‘things’ on a regular basis. We all know UNEP and EPA have nearly identical goals. Sustainability and all that.

Eve Stevens
June 2, 2012 7:57 pm

I always figured the EPA as an enemy of the people since their political decision, not based on science, on DDT. That was 40 years ago.
BTW, back from the Bahamas and evidently June is too soon to come back to southern Ontario.

June 2, 2012 8:25 pm

Eve Stevens says:
June 2, 2012 at 7:57 pm
I always figured the EPA as an enemy of the people since their political decision, not based on science, on DDT. That was 40 years ago.
BTW, back from the Bahamas and evidently June is too soon to come back to southern Ontario.
=======================================================================
I’ve never been there, but from what I’ve heard, any month is to soon to come back from the Bahamas.
If the Hockey Team is right, maybe the Bahamas will come to me?

Tom in South Jersey
June 2, 2012 8:34 pm

The chill in the atmosphere is that our government is no longer of the people and by the people. It sees itself as distinct and separate from the average citizen. In many ways it has become an occupying force. Possibly this is from too many decades of occupying nations abroad. Regardless, the government of the US is paranoid over it’s own people and has forgotten that the people are supposed to be sovereign and self governing. Part of the problem is that all aspects of life are now regulated at the local, state and federal levels. The average person has no idea how many regulations and laws there are, but they can rest assured that at any given moment they are in violation of any number of them. This situation has turned us all into criminals, and therefore the government has developed an “us versus them” attitude. It will only get worse as people begin to circumvent what it sees as absurd laws and demand the right to buy 32 ounce soft drinks, thereby reinforcing the governments perception that the people can not be trusted.

old44
June 2, 2012 9:14 pm

Almost in the same league as the Australian Labor Party sending an F111 to spy on the Tasmanian dams in the 70’s

Zip
June 2, 2012 10:39 pm

“I’m beginning to think the EPA is an enemy of the citizens of the United States…”
Just beginning?

MattA
June 2, 2012 11:21 pm

What have the ranchers got to hide? – the epa is welcome to fly planes over my home as many times as it want to make sure I am not violating regulations. Simply because I dont believe CO2 causes warming does not mean that I think industrial level meat producers have anything other than their own interests at heart.
If we expect all data from climate scientists to be available for open review. I equally expect open examination of industries by the EPA. Then let results be published and archived where all can see them.
What have they got to hide?

June 2, 2012 11:50 pm

David S says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:36 pm
“America takes another step towards totalitarian dictatorship as government becomes bigger,more powerful,and unaccountable. The solution to this is small government and Ron Paul would have been the man to make it happen.”
That be why he was lied about and if possible ignored. By the very folks who reminded us almost daily of President Reagan. Who wouldn’t bad mouth a fellow Republican.
I like your comments, we must demand responsible government, preferably smaller and more affordable. Also…
http://m.townhall.com/columnists/charlespayne/2012/05/30/stealing_from_the_poor__for_their_own_good
Found this to be very thought provoking.

June 3, 2012 1:01 am

The Worldwide Wacky Fraud mafia, WWF, are busy conning the Australia industry organisation to enter into one of its sustainable roundtables for beef. WWF Australia on its web site tells us how it plans to police whatever meaning of sustainability it comes up with. You guessed it from above in this case by satellite
http://www.wwf.org.au/our_work/people_and_the_environment/transforming_markets/sustainable_beef_industry/
BTW the USA industry organisation NCBA has already signed up with WWF.

Myrrh
June 3, 2012 2:37 am

Luther Wu says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:32 pm
I’m waiting for:
“Well, if they aren’t doing anything wrong, why should they care?”

I’m surprised you had to wait seven hours..
David S says:
June 2, 2012 at 4:36 pm
“America takes another step towards totalitarian dictatorship as government becomes bigger,more powerful,and unaccountable. The solution to this is small government and Ron Paul would have been the man to make it happen.”
There’s only one reason this is happening, because they can, and they can because they have unlimited supplies of money to make it happen. Nothing’s going to change until that changes and it’s not going to happen by piecemeal defunding of departments or tweaks to legislation, they’ll just create something else to replace them, it will happen when all Americans get together for the final battle for their independence..
..you’re the only ones with a history in this battle.
The rest of us have been in thrall for so long we don’t even know there could be battle, or are so recently manipulated we can’t see there’s a curtain to draw back.
The funding for all this comes from the Banking Cartel who create money out of nothing. Literally out of nothing, by the stroke of a pen or now, by a stroke of a key. All your taxes through the IRS, all of it, every cent, doesn’t go to the Government, it goes to pay interest to the Banking Cartel which owns the Federal Reserve, a private bank, which has taken over control of your money supply since 1913 and sells notes to your government at interest. Notes your government should be printing debt free, without interest. This is fraud on a grand scale against every American taxpayer. The IRS is its private company collection arm of the privately owned Federal Reserve, it is not a Government department.
http://www.iamthewitness.com/books/Andrew.Carrington.Hitchcock/The.History.of.the.Money.Changers.htm
There are two things that every American should know, that the American nation came into existence by a revolt against the central banking system of England, and, that in 1913 the central banking cartel in England took it back. The Federal Reserve is their private bank just as is the Bank of England, deliberately named to con the people about its real owners, not the people, but a banking cartel of money changers who control governments. Voting for one man to make a change isn’t going to work because they can always game the system, it needs a change of consciousness to get rid of all those in government in cahoots with the banking cartel, the Federal Bank, and a return to debt free, no interest notes produced by your government for you – see conclusion on that link for Milton Friedman suggestion for the changeover.
From the history link above:
“1694
The Charter of the Bank of England (1694)
Following a costly series of wars over the last 50 years, English Government officials go, cap in hand, to the money changers for loans necessary to pursue their political purposes. The money changers agree to solve this problem in exchange for a government sanctioned privately owned bank which could issue money created out of nothing.
This was deceptively named the, “Bank of England,” for the sole purpose of duping the general public into believing it was part of the government, which it was not.
Like any other private corporation the Bank of England sold shares to get started. The private investors, whose names were never revealed, were supposed to put up £1,250,000 in gold coins to buy their shares in the bank, but only £750,000 was ever received. Despite that the bank was duly chartered and began loaning out several times the money it supposedly had in reserves, all at interest.
Although the Bank of England’s private investors were never revealed, one of the Directors, William Paterson, stated,
“The Bank hath benefit of interest on all monies which it creates out of nothing.”
Furthermore the Bank of England would loan government officials as much of the new currency as they wanted, as long as they secured the debt by direct taxation of the British people. The Bank of England amounted to nothing less than the legal counterfeiting of a national currency for private gain, and thus any country that would fall under the control of a private bank would amount to nothing more than a plutocracy.”
These are the people the Americans fought against for independence, independence from the money system the bankers put in place which gave them carte blanche to create money out of nothing and make the people pay them interest on it by their taxes.
Which you have had back since 1913.
“764
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin is asked by officials of the Bank of England to explain the prosperity of the colonies in America. He replies,
“That is simple. In the Colonies we issue our own money. It is called Colonial Scrip. We issue it in proper proportion to the demands of trade and industry to make the products pass easily from the producers to the consumers. In this manner creating for ourselves our own paper money, we control its purchasing power, and we have no interest to pay no one.”
As a result of Franklin’s statement, the British Parliament hurriedly passed the Currency Act of 1764. This prohibited colonial officials from issuing their own money and ordered them to pay all future taxes in gold or silver coins. Referring to after this act was passed, Franklin would state the following in his autobiography,
“In one year, the conditions were so reversed that the era of prosperity ended, and a depression set in, to such an extent that the streets of the colonies were filled with the unemployed … The colonies would gladly have borne the little tax on tea and other matters had it not been that England took away from the colonies their money which created unemployment and dissatisfaction.
The viability of the colonists to get power to issue their own money permanently out of the hands of King George III and the international bankers was the prime reason for the revolutionary war.”
Control of America’s money system will change hands 8 times since 1764.”
Time for the final showdown? I heard a few days ago that the 100 year 1913 charter for the Federal Reserve runs out at the end of this year. If this is true, then it becomes easier to take them out.
The Federal Reserve controls the booms and busts by manipulating money supply, making it freely available for the booms, withdrawing supply for the busts:
“1891 The money changers spent the last decade creating economic booms followed by depressions, so that they could buy up thousands of homes and farms for pennies on the dollar. They were preparing to take the economy down again in the near future, and in a shocking memo sent out by the American Bankers Association, which would come out in the Congressional Record more than twenty years later, the following is stated,
“On September 1st 1894 we will not renew our loans under any consideration. On September 1st we will demand our money.
We will foreclose and become mortgages in possession. We can take two-thirds of the farms west of the Mississippi, and thousands of them east of the Mississippi as well, at our own price … Then the farmers will become tenants as in England … ,”
1891 American Bankers Association, as printed in the Congressional Record of April 29, 1913.”
And,
“1907 During the early 1900’s, the money changers were anxious to advance their business of setting up another private Central Bank for America. Rothschild, Jacob Schiff, the head of Kuhn, Loeb and Co., in a speech to the New York Chamber of Commerce, stated, or rather threatened,
“Unless we have a Central Bank with adequate control of credit resources, this country is going to undergo the most severe and far reaching money panic in its history.”
J. P. Morgan
They put Rothschild agent, J. P. Morgan at the forefront of their charge. Interestingly J. P. Morgan’s father, Julius Morgan, had been America’s financial agent to the British, and after Julius’ death, J. P. Morgan took on a British partner, Edward Grenville, who was a long time director of the Bank Of England.
This year was the year of the money changers attack. J. P. Morgan and his cohorts secretly crashed the stock market. They were aware that thousands of small banks were so vastly over extended, some only had reserves of 1% under the fraudulent fractional reserve principle. Within only a few days, bank runs became commonplace across the nation.”
Fractional Reserve – this is the fraud of creating money out of nothing, don’t be fooled by such explanations as in wiki – that this means banks can lend out 90% of their money, it is the creation of that 90% out of nothing.
Imagine if you could put your salary into an account and could magic it up by a factor of ten..
That’s why they can buy up the world. This is fraud. Not only have they stolen your money through the IRS collecting your taxes, they owe you all the money they have stolen plus compound interest, plus a penalty for the fraud.
Time to bankrupt the bankers?

John Marshall
June 3, 2012 3:08 am

The EPA is a cure far worse than the disease.

ozspeaksup
June 3, 2012 3:44 am

us govt has something like 30k drones either approved or waiting to be approved for flyovers in many states now.
recently a private? drone overflew a processing plant,
the film showed a red stream..
seems someonme diregarded health safety and clean water laws and diverted waste blood etc into a nearby river.
and while some jerks keep doing this, the EPA can use it against everyone.
that aside CAFOS are a rotten way to raise and keep any animal. a crowded stressful and foul way to make max profit with max discomfort to animals,..
and as for the DDT issue..well its an organophosphate and while it may help in Malaria areas it sure shouldnt be used widely., to everyone saying its safe? than how come its still showing up in people?

TonyO
June 3, 2012 4:06 am

Maybe they’re worried about cows with guns????

John Wright
June 3, 2012 5:08 am

Holy cow! It’s a bull, a beauty (didn’t you notice that, Pamela?). It’s now wallpaper on my new computer.

June 3, 2012 5:34 am

@MattA, do you have curtains on your windows? Why don’t you want government employees looking in your house? What have you got to hide?

Don B
June 3, 2012 5:35 am

Obama’s EPA will leave no stone unturned in its quest to run our lives.
For example, they fined a school bus company $500,000 for “excessive idling.”
http://downloadpolitics.com/showthread.php?28252-EPA-slaps-school-bus-co-with-500-000-in-fines-for-quot-excessive-idling-quot

June 3, 2012 6:15 am

Robert of Ottawa says:
June 2, 2012 at 3:37 pm
Out of control indeed. I bet they also have more powers of siezure than the police.

Considering that the EPA operates under the aegis of the Justice Department, and considering that the Justice Department is currently run by Eric Holder — yeah, you’re right.

ferd berple
June 3, 2012 6:38 am

Myrrh says:
June 3, 2012 at 2:37 am
the Federal Reserve, a private bank, which has taken over control of your money supply since 1913 and sells notes to your government at interest.
========
It is surprising how few Americans are aware that their money is not controlled by their government.

Gail Combs
June 3, 2012 6:42 am

AND the reply from the government bureaucracies…

….In July 2000, USDA officials claimed in our court hearing that, “The farmers have no rights. No right to be heard before the court, no right to independent testing, and no right to question the USDA.” The arrogance of the agency has only grown…. http://www.vtcommons.org/node/595

You can say that again!
In 2001 the USDA swooped down on two farmers in Vermont and killed all their sheep without proof of any disease in the animals.

…A few weeks later, Linda Faillace heard there was more information held by the USDA and used the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to request the data. Two weeks after the request, the FOIA revealed four hundred negative results on sheep, including additional negative tests on the four sheep that Rubenstein and the USDA claimed were positive. Davis Buckley asked the court to force the USDA to surrender their entire file, which consisted of over 1,000 pages.” Source

Rubenstein “POSITIVES” were done at an unlicensed lab using an unproven test method. He was also a pal of the USDA agent.
FOIA: shows sheep negative: http://foiamadsheepmadrivervalley.blogspot.com/
The government-industry revolving door puts industry-friendly experts in positions of decision-making power.
That was the USDA. Then we have the FDA
FDA’s Views on Freedom of Choice – FDA’s Response to FTCLDF Suit

Here are some of FDA’s views expressed in its response on ‘freedom of food choice’ in general….

“There is no absolute right to consume or feed children any particular food.” [p. 25]
“There is no ‘deeply rooted’ historical tradition of unfettered access to foods of all kinds.” [p. 26]
“Plaintiffs’ assertion of a ‘fundamental right to their own bodily and physical health, which includes what foods they do and do not choose to consume for themselves and their families’ is similarly unavailing because plaintiffs do not have a fundamental right to obtain any food they wish.” [p. 26]

“There is no fundamental right to freedom of contract.” [p. 27]

Growing numbers of people in this country are obtaining the foods of their choice through private contractual arrangements such as buyers’ club agreements and herdshare contracts. FDA’s position is that the agency can interfere with these agreements because, in FDA’s view, there is no fundamental right to enter into a private contract to obtain the foods of choice from the source of choice…..

The NANNY STATE in all its glory is alive and well. The USDA uses satellite surveillance to monitor farms. According to a friend whose daughter had a summer job dealing with the satellite data, they can even count the animals in your field!
Straight from the USDA:
Satellite Imagery – Global Crop Production Analysis – USDA.gov Very nice for the likes of Goldman Sachs and Cargill, ADM, Syngenta, Monsanto, and Yara who want to make money from starvation.
This ia an old article by Mary Zanoni who has done FOIAs on the USDA. She was correct NAIS did not die. Like the vampire it is, it arose again and again.

Let Those Who Have Ears Listen Very, Very Closely:
 USDA and State Agency Doublespeak on Mandatory Animal ID
 
Pennsylvania Assistant Director of Animal Health Admits that Federal and State Governments Plan to Track Individual Homes and Animals, Even Pets, by GPS Satellite Surveillance
 
By Mary Zanoni….
Ms. Zanoni is a graduate of Cornell University (Ph.D., 1981) and Yale Law School (J.D., 1987).  She has been an Assistant Professor at The University of Texas at Austin, and has served as law clerk to a Justice of the Supreme Court of New Jersey, to a federal District Judge, and to a federal Third Circuit Court of Appeals Judge.  A former associate at a major New York City law firm and former head of the Staff Attorneys’ Office of the federal District of New Jersey, she now lives in rural upstate New York.
http://www.vicfa.net/Zsmf.doc

Robertvdl
June 3, 2012 6:47 am

One authority estimated that not less than 40 million buffaloes lived on the plains, 30 million on the prairies (including the prairies of Arkansas, Louisiana, western Tennessee and Mississippi), and 5 million in the forest regions — a total of 75 million.
Others placed the total number at between 50 million and 60 million; and still others believed that the number must have been at least 125 million.
The ancient range of the buffalo was from the Atlantic seaboard west to the deserts of central Nevada, and from Texas and the Gulf States north to Great Slave Lake.
http://deltafarmpress.com/livestock/buffalos-decline-tragic-part-national-history
So William Frederick “Buffalo Bill” Cody was an EPA agent protecting streams and aquifers from animal waste pollution.

Robertvdl
June 3, 2012 6:50 am

TonyO says:
June 3, 2012 at 4:06 am
Maybe they’re worried about cows with guns????
http://fc00.deviantart.net/fs4/i/2004/225/e/8/Cows_With_Guns.jpg

Chris B
June 3, 2012 6:51 am

Fartgate?

ferd berple
June 3, 2012 7:14 am

http://www.federalreserve.gov/aboutthefed/section7.htm
A) After all necessary expenses of a Federal reserve bank have been paid or provided for, the stockholders of the bank shall be entitled to receive an annual dividend of 6 percent on paid-in capital stock.
(c) Federal reserve banks, including the capital stock and surplus therein, and the income derived therefrom shall be exempt from Federal, State, and local taxation, except taxes upon real estate.

Robertvdl
June 3, 2012 7:18 am

Myrrh says:
June 3, 2012 at 2:37 am
Time to bankrupt the bankers
Get your money from the bank and pay all cash no plastic money. Do not borrow money from banks save until you have the money . Invest in Gold and Silver. Vote Ron Paul.
I think We all know what 4 more years of Obama & Co means !

Jaye Bass
June 3, 2012 8:08 am

This type of behavior is the Progressive fixed point.

John M
June 3, 2012 8:11 am

ozspeaksup says:
June 3, 2012 at 3:44 am

and as for the DDT issue..well its an organophosphate

Not quite
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DDT

to everyone saying its safe? than how come its still showing up in people?

Whether or not it’s “safe”, has nothing to do with “still showing up in people”.
I would recommend you not have your blood analyzed for formaldehyde, lest you run off screaming into the night.

John from CA
June 3, 2012 11:32 am

This is off the charts and likely to cause a huge law suit.
The HLS use of drones wasn’t authorized until recently and the EPA chose to violate Property Rights without any authorization 2 years ago.
Its a very good thing that we no longer tar, feather, and ride out of town on a rail.

John from CA
June 3, 2012 11:43 am

Gail Combs says:
June 3, 2012 at 6:42 am
========
…and everything that comes out of the back end of feed stock is a natural fertilizer.
This is a Stupid waste of tax dollars and a complete infringement of land owner rights.

stpaulchuck
June 3, 2012 12:39 pm

So THAT’S what those black helicopters were all about. Who knew.

June 3, 2012 2:49 pm

Obviously, if the EPA has money to waste on watching cows, they have too much money. What a waste of OUR money. The EPA should be gutted for wasting of money.
Government exists to serve the people, not to monitor and slap them down and waste their money on pointless endeavors which at best are an invasion of privacy.

Henry chance
June 3, 2012 4:42 pm

1 year ago, I called my cousins and they tell me the regulations are flowing from Central Planning. There are much heftier regulations for feedlots that have over 1,000 head.
The USDA is involvd iwth agriculture. The EPA is clueless as we saw when Chu acted the rookie in the Gulf oil spill.
The EPA has been shamed in court recently due to the Idaho land grap and water contamination claims pertaing to drilling. They are on the war path and aggitated. Like african bees. The sister Comrades were shamed recently when they tried to use nanny laws pertaining to farmer children that work.

Ian H
June 3, 2012 5:46 pm

I like the idea that somebody is keeping an eye on these farmers. Do you really TRUST them not to empty that manure lagoon into the nearest stream when it gets full? With nobody watching? It costs real MONEY and EFFORT to manage waste runoff properly. You expect farmers to do that out of the goodness of their hearts?

ECK
June 3, 2012 7:36 pm

There are certainly more, less invasive, ways to monitor these operations. Like, show up at the door and ask to inspect (I assume that’s perfectly OK’d-allowed. Random inspections of oversight authorities go way back). Really, helicopters? I’ll guess they’re black! It does just go to show you how out-of-control this agency and government is. Abolish it! Future monitoring of existing laws can easily be handled by other agencies.

June 3, 2012 8:13 pm

ozspeaksup says:
June 3, 2012 at 3:44 am
us govt has something like 30k drones either approved or waiting to be approved …

Cite please?
(I’m guessing this is not a personal observation here in the states, since your handle is ‘ozspeaksup’ )
.

meemoe_uk
June 4, 2012 3:04 am

It’s a modern weapon in an ages old war :- the farm war.
Powermongers have always been at odds with farmers because farmers have some control over a vital resource – food. Today supermarkets and their suppliers are still giving small holder farmers a hard time. Every head of livestock has to be accounted for by the farmer. Any slip in farmers paper work will be an excuse for harrassment.
I heard my local farmers here in the uk talking about the same problem ( satellite survailence of live stock in europe ) a couple of years ago.
These satelittes will be at least sponsored or maybe fully owned by some supermarket group.

Myrrh
June 4, 2012 4:15 am

Hmm, if I were such a farmer I’d be tempted to go into the crop circle creation business, something incorporating the sentiments ‘eff off wankers’, ‘it’ll make you blind’.

woodNfish
June 4, 2012 8:45 am

“I’m beginning to think the EPA is an enemy of the citizens of the United States with behavior like this.”
It’s good you are beginning to come around, Anthony, but you are a little slow. What part of the outright lies that polar bears and spotted owls are endangered, Those lies along with the claim that the snail darter needed protection destroyed entire towns, farming and logging communities, and the livelihoods of the people who lived in those places. What about the hundreds of thousands of jobs destroyed with the EPA’s crusade against fossil fuels such as coal, and offshore drilling? There is more than enough evidence that the EPA, and in fact the entire federal government, is the enemy of the people of the US.

Myrrh
June 4, 2012 11:37 am

ferd berple says:
June 3, 2012 at 6:38 am
Myrrh says:
June 3, 2012 at 2:37 am
the Federal Reserve, a private bank, which has taken over control of your money supply since 1913 and sells notes to your government at interest.
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It is surprising how few Americans are aware that their money is not controlled by their government.
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Because tied in with your Constitution which is no longer taught if Obama’s statements about it are anything to go by, he taught the subject. I envy Gail’s filing system, mine works on the Chaos Principle; it’s there somewhere connected by some logic, but the pattern doesn’t always appear when I want it to.., somewhere there is a discussion where I found this peculiar teaching which showed Obama didn’t have any grasp of the basic principle.
From 1913 on I imagine it all became tweaked as the bankers sought to hide the real history of why independence became an issue. As they’d done in England they made their private bank appear to be government, Bank of England, so the Federal Reserve deceit a simple copy of what worked.
The history tweaked to fit as physics basics are tweaked now through the education system to support AGW, there’s just enough sounding as if it’s real physics that the majority who will never have the need to explore will just assume what they’re being taught is real, and those with interest but with no need for real facts will just blunder about as happens in these Global Warming arguments; only those who specifically require accurate information to make stuff work will know, and that is more difficult in ‘Constitution’ than in real science. Applied scientists who don’t know the real physics basics in their field wouldn’t get a job or would be taught on the job, but the ‘Constitution’ can be made to seem arbitrary even by those who are required to apply it, judges required to uphold it, but as one judge said, the Constitution was anything he ruled it to be.
We’re majority ignorant about the banking fractional reserve fraud and the reason for the War of Independence because we’re meant to be. Those who created the banking fraud have had centuries of practice in keeping control of it; manipulating history by taking over countries, starting huge wars lending to both sides, these aren’t amateurs… Those who do find out how it works who haven’t become part of it as have the smaller banks and politicians, have been relatively few, and it’s really only since the vast interactive personal library/school which is the internet that their knowledge has been able to spread.
It’s always been the pattern of dictators to destroy knowledge of those they’re in the process of subjugating, the difference now is that it is Fabian inspired methods not the mass murder of the educated and book burning, but through the gradual takeover of education. But even now, although the knowledge is out there, it’s still mixed up in the general confusion of information available, and, as in AGW science, there’s also deliberate misinformation mixed in designed to confuse.
I don’t know how I stack up in this compared with others, but I’ve only been discovering it in dribs and drabs over the last year or so – it would have been easier to put together if I hadn’t also become interested in the AGW arguments which I discovered only three or so years ago and my hackles raised at the deliberate dumbing down of science education and so what time I had available went into exploring this through discussions. I don’t know which it is, whether it’s because I’ve become more aware of the banking connection or that it is somehow much more ‘in the air’ – I have been verbally passing on the info on banking scam creating money out of nothing, but not until a couple of weeks ago when I was invited to a friend’s grandson and granddaughter’s confirmation that I found anyone who knew what I was talking about. I was introduced to the brother of the wife who was the sister of type of introduction to someone who not only knew, but had recently in his county taken part in a welcome crowd for some visiting elected member of one of the parties, with a banner with the members name and Nazi on it. It really surprised me, because of course none of this type of protest ever gets reported. Reminds me of the Monckton visual when last in Australia.
We still overwhelmingly voted to go with the next Lisbon scam.., though I don’t know anyone who voted yes, but this time no need for a second vote.., and, for the first time, no how did you vote survey at the poll’s exit..
However, there was a huge campaign to reject registering for the house tax – “Don’t register, don’t pay” – and I think around a million of us thought it a good idea; maybe more, because they would downplay rejection of it, wouldn’t they?
I think that history link I posted is the best summary I’ve seen, takes a lot of skill to precis the battles you’ve had against private central banking since independence – my gut reaction is to trust what stuff new to me because much of it I already knew and had checked out for myself, although I hadn’t understood the time line. I’d certainly recommend it as a blue print but obviously with the tacit caveat that people should check for themselves, as I shall continue to do.
This is where you have the advantage; your history is still documented, you know the characters in play, you have a wealth of historical arguments about this – since it was a private fait accompli in England between monarch and banker none of that exists. We, all in the British colonial system, need to understand this through you. As knowledge about the real reason for your fight for independence and the history to your loss of it in 1913 spreads as you get better educated, we all get better educated.
There’s a story told by a guide to one of the big houses torched in The Troubles here, the English owners had left it empty. One old local man who’d taken part in smashing up the place with a sledgehammer said with deep regret to the guide on the first tour of the place, “We don’t know how to create, all we know is how to destroy”. The bankers cartel appear to be huge and clever and powerful, but exposure shows them to be nothing but a miserable gang of organised criminals lacking real creativity. The Wizard of OZ.

Gail Combs
June 5, 2012 5:27 pm

Ian H says:
June 3, 2012 at 5:46 pm
I like the idea that somebody is keeping an eye on these farmers. Do you really TRUST them not to empty that manure lagoon into the nearest stream when it gets full? With nobody watching? It costs real MONEY and EFFORT to manage waste runoff properly. You expect farmers to do that out of the goodness of their hearts?
____________________________________
SAID the idiot City Slicker.
Do you KNOW how much commercial fertilizer COSTS??? I PAY a neighboring farmer to take that “waste run-off” and put it on my fields. No farmer in his right mind is going to dump “Black Gold” into a stream and then pay $70 to 80 bucks an acre for commercial fertilizer.

Incorrigible libertarian
June 5, 2012 8:01 pm

Gail Combs says:
June 5, 2012 at 5:27 pm
Do you KNOW how much commercial fertilizer COSTS??? I PAY a neighboring farmer to take that “waste run-off” and put it on my fields. No farmer in his right mind is going to dump “Black Gold” into a stream and then pay $70 to 80 bucks an acre for commercial fertilizer.
—————————————
…and that’s precisely the point, and intended outcome, and the end-result of Regulatory Capture where we have a revolving door between the Regulatory Agencies and the Industries they regulate. Doesn’t matter what Agencies. Commercial Banking to/from Treasury, CBO, Fannie Mae, Freddy Mac; USDA to/from Archer Daniels Midland and others; ‘Defense’ Dept. to/from Raytheon, Boeing, Rand, and an almost endless list of others.
Industrial bureaucrats become Agency Bureaucrats and impose regulatory edicts upon the industry. For the farmers the plan is *forcing* them into paying the “$70 to 80 bucks an acre for commercial fertilizer” – to the Industries who’ve captured the Regulatory Agency that’s imposing the force.
The outcome is, of course, that eventually the small family-type farmer is forced out of business due to the rising costs and we’re left with mega conglomerates who use only the “commercial fertilizer” – “Black Gold” be damned … there’s no money in it, for the Regulated Industry, so it must be stopped.
What’s not to like? … for the Industries producing the “commercial fertilizer”
What’s not to like? … for the bureaucrat who gets that great job with the Industry when he leaves his post at the Regulatory Agency
What’s not to like? … for the Industry sycophant looking for an appointment to a post in the Regulatory Agency.
What’s *to* like? … for the rest of us?

Gail Combs
June 5, 2012 8:30 pm

Incorrigible libertarian says: @ June 5, 2012 at 8:01 pm
…and that’s precisely the point, and intended outcome, and the end-result of Regulatory Capture where we have a revolving door between the Regulatory Agencies and the Industries they regulate….
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I could not agree more.
You might like Dr Evans Climate Coup – The Politics: How the regulating class is using bogus claims about climate change to entrench and extend their economic privileges and political control. He really captures the essence of the current crisis in personal liberty as the bureaucratic octopus slowly strangles the tax paying class.