Enviros Hit Dem Senator For Siding With 'Poop Polluters'

The Hill:

Environmental groups typically allied with Democrats are taking aim at centrist Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), accusing her of doing the bidding of Arkansas's Tyson Foods by pushing a measure that would ease environmental lawsuits against operators of animal feedlots.

To the Sierra Club, Arkansas's senior senator has become the face of a campaign by some lawmakers from farm states to exempt farming operations from Superfund toxic waste lawsuits. Lincoln wants language added to the pending farm bill, but environmental pressure groups are trying to stop her by spotlighting her connection to Tyson Foods, which is important to Arkansas's economy and politics.

An animated Sierra Club video clip shows lobbyists sporting "I love Blanche" buttons and Tyson stickers as they stand before piles of cash. A cartoon chicken named Fowlie Poopsalot characterizes Lincoln as an ally of corporate farms responsible for polluting rivers, streams and drinking water with massive amounts of animal waste.

Read the whole story: The Hill

Comments

[hugs4u]

They should shut down all big factory feed lots and go back to family farm type of raising animals. Food taste better and it is more humane way to raise the animals.

[Austintatious]

Senator Lincoln suggests that the Sierra Club and others advocating for our environment need not concern themselves with her proposed legislation easing environmental measures affecting concentrated animal feeding operations (CAFO's) and other producers in our "food" chain. After all, she's just trying to help out those small family farms trying desperately to eak out a living in the hills of Arkansas, wearily struggling to get by in the face of all that terrible environmental legislation, right?

On thing about our politicians - their consistency -they almost always get it wrong, both ethically and practically. Coincidentally, of course, they almost always line their personal and/or political pockets in the process.

Just a modicum of research will convince you that CAFO's are some of the worst polluters in the nation. Hogs, cattle (both beef and dairy) and, yes, chickens, billions of them over time, standing or lying in their excreta, day after day, year after year, the excreta perpetually building up and ultimately getting into the water and soil.This, folks, is how a great deal of the food we are eating is produced.

If you want to know a bit more(actually, a lot more)about the food you've been eating, including the despicable conditions in some of these CAFO's, read Michael Pollan's book, "The Omnivore's Dilemna". Enlightening! If you want to get the real poop (sorry about that), just talk to someone who has lived near one of these operations.

The producers in our food chain, even the big corporations, need not pollute to produce and market their product. There are very doable alternatives but they are not real considerations for the big producers. Their primary interest is simply to do it the cheapest way - to minimize costs and maximize profits and, to hell with you and your environment. That, folks, is exactly why we need someone watching over what they're doing, and legislation to protect our environment, not to mention the quality of our food.

Thank you, Sierra Club, for keeping an eye on polluters in our food chain and, yes, on politicians such as the righteous Sen. Lincoln.

[waynesmyer]

"I mean, what's wrong with a liile chicken shit? I feed it to my cows! Senator Lincoln,Chairwoman, Democrats For Tyson Food Corp.

[olivine]

Do you know what is IN that Tyson chicken? And how those chickens are raised?I am not a vegetarian (though I wish I was), but anyone eating those chickens in the first place is entirely ignorant of what they are ingesting.If you want to eat poultry, read Nina Planck's book REAL FOOD and eat only the chickens that are raised and fed the "old fashioned" way.Yes, it is more expensive, but you get what you pay for!