Too much government in your free market?

Have a look at this thread on the POAC forum, courtesy Bina Becker, about a Kansas cattle operation that wants to test for BSE using a method that would permit it to export its beef to Japan.

Bina posts:

A beef producer in Kansas has proposed testing all its cattle for mad cow disease so it can resume exports to Japan, but it is encountering resistance from the Agriculture Department and other beef producers. American beef exports have plummeted since Dec. 23 when a cow in Washington State was diagnosed with bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or B.S.E., a fatal disease that can be passed to humans who eat infected cattle tissue. To assure the safety of its meat, the company, Creekstone Farms of Arkansas City, Kan., a subsidiary of the Enterprise Management Group, wants to use rapid diagnostic tests that are routinely used in Japan and many European nations. But no rapid tests have been approved by the United States Department of Agriculture, and department officials pointed out yesterday that it was against the law for any company to sell or market any unapproved diagnostic test. They said they would not respond to Creekstone's request until they evaluated the legal, regulatory and trade implications raised. Other meat producers are upset by the company's request, saying it has broken ranks in an industry besieged by bad news. Dan Murphy, vice president for public affairs at the American Meat Industry, said American beef was so safe that widescale testing was unnecessary. "Everybody is hurting from the export ban," Mr. Murphy said, "but their solution is not the right one." Any testing, he added, should take place under government oversight. --MORE-- Uh, WHAT FUCKING GOVERNMENT OVERSIGHT? More like government overLOOK, not overSIGHT. Let's face it, the USDA is only there to do PR and damage control, not BSE testing.

Blowback responds:

This is active obstruction, not just overlook. If a business wants to use a test, for export purposes, and that test is routine in the target country, you'd have to ask why a government that advocates not interfering with business would try to prevent it? The answer seems obvious. The Bush government clearly advocates corporate unionism as well as the regular US corporate welfare, now going so far as playing the role of union enforcer to try to prevent one business from breaking corporate union ranks. BushCo is very consistent in placing corporate needs ahead of human needs, even public safety. Unions are hated when they are for workers, but admired, encoraged, and now even enforced for the corporate sector. Because they create solidarity, they work, and they protect the aggregate needs of members. Business ahead of people is virtually a Bush motto.

Amen.