Cartoon 786 Mad Cow

Ante Scriptum

As a result of the announced Mad Cow discovery in California, Indonesia has blocked American cows. Japan had blocked American cows throughout the last decade and only recently relented. The “right wing” government of South Korea unblocked American cattle a little over a year ago. It caused rioting and such political upset the government was in danger of recall. Do you know the Bush Administration made it illegal for a cattle owner to test all his cows back in 2002? If they had allowed it, I suspect big beef users such as McDonalds and Wal-Mart, would have made it a requirement. It would also highlight the magnitude of the contagion in the meat supply.

Cartoon 501: Mad Cow reprint from 2002

It was just last Sunday [2002] that I was telling someone I have not deliberately eaten beef in several years. They asked why? I said Mad Cow is likely rampant here, you just do not know about it.

Back when Mad Cow disease was discovered in Europe, the television show “60 Minutes” did a segment on how America was handling the potential threat. The answer was little or nothing and allowing the potential for spreading the diseases in bovine food supplies to go unchecked. The show also indicated we check maybe one “healthy” cow in a million and use the most antiquated, time consuming, and expensive test. The question was posed why are we not testing all sick cows? Especially since sick cows are grounded up and become food for other cows. Nothing much ever came of the revelations presented by “60 Minutes”.

The “reportedly” first American case of Mad Cow Disease was announced [2002]. I wonder how it happened to get out? Both the Clinton and Bush Administrations have blocked all knowledge. The New York Times devoted a large section of the Christmas day paper to Mad Cow disease. Most interesting was the article by Sandra Blakeslee. She interviewed Dr. Stanley Prusiner, a neurologist at the University of California about the safety of the meat supply. Dr. Prusiner won the Nobel Prize for medicine in1997 with his work on prions (incubation vehicle of the diseases). He was outraged at the American approach to the disease over the years. He even sought a meeting with Ann M. Veneman, the secretary of agriculture, when the disease broke out in Canada. He was rebuffed. Then he ran into Karl Rowe, the President’s senior advisor. As a result, six weeks ago he got to meet with Ms. Veneman. His message was that it is only a matter of time before Mad Cow is discovered here. I am going to quote the rest of his reported statement in the article.

The department had been willfully blind to the threat, he said. The only reason mad cow disease had not been found here, he said, is that the department's animal inspection agency was testing too few animals. Once more cows are tested, he added, "we'll be able to understand the magnitude of our problem."

This nation should immediately start testing every cow that shows signs of illness and eventually every single cow upon slaughter. He said he told Ms. Veneman. Japan has such a program and is finding the disease in young asymptomatic animals.

With all the secrecy laws since 911, it is actually illegal to announce the presence of Mad Cow. Therefore, you have to believe there is a lot more to this story. Why was this allowed to be announced? Was it to punish a Democrat State, make an example of the beef industry because of their magnitude of campaign contributions or did this just happen to slip out?

The Administration is probably having a very unhappy holiday. The beef industry is one of the most powerful lobbies in the country. The Administration is probably drafting damage control scenarios right now. They can probably spin it here in America and limit the negative impact domestically. But countries such as Japan test every slaughtered animal and seemingly healthy animals. That is why Japan and some of the other countries in the world have immediately blocked the import of America beef. They are going to want to see some serious steps taken at this end that have been lacking.