They already are, of course, but now they want to spend your dollars to propagandize you! Action Alert!
Hidden within a large federal spending bill is a proposal for $3 million to go toward consumer education and outreach to “promote understanding and acceptance of agricultural biotechnology”—a campaign to be carried out jointly by the FDA and the USDA.
In plain English, this proposal would spend taxpayer dollars on an effort to convince Americans that GMOs are just fine—perhaps even that they shouldn’t be labeled.
This is far from the first time that the feds have spent taxpayer money to browbeat those same taxpayers with government propaganda. Last year, we reported on federal efforts to enhance “vaccine confidence”—essentially, an attempt to steamroll citizens who have legitimate concerns. Now it’s the same on the GMO front.
Sneaky maneuvers like this are only necessary because an overwhelming majority of Americans want to see their food labeled for GMO ingredients. Consumers have spoken loud and clear on this issue, and luckily Congress listened: industry-backed voluntary labeling legislation failed to pass the Senate, and a compromise is not likely to be reached by the time Vermont’s mandatory labeling law goes into effect in July.
Strong grassroots support for mandatory GMO labeling was defeated in California, Washington, and Oregon—but only after massive campaign spending promoting all sorts of misinformation by the Grocery Manufacturers Association and its allies.
Clearly, it is some members of Congress, not consumers, who must be “educated” on the lack of information confirming the safety of GMOs and the millions of tons of toxic herbicides that are being dumped on our food as a result of this technology.
Action Alert! Write to Congress and urge your representatives to oppose the inclusion of a rider that would spend taxpayer dollars on “education” programs to convince Americans to “accept” GMOs. Please send your message immediately.
Other articles in this week’s Pulse of Natural Health:
Fighting for Naturopaths
CDC Whistleblower Backtracking?
Feds Lobbying for Monsanto
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