It's relevant because it's the basis of your point. I want to know how you got there. I always say if you can't justify your point, it could be that you don't have one.
As for the FDA in the second part -- that IS exactly their job. As you yourself noted further down (I'll bold it).
No it is not. You are still missing the entire concept that I am talking about. You want to keep focusing on the why even though I gave you many already that you simply do not want to acknowledge. The fact remains that all of that is completely irrelevant. It does not matter why one want to do the things that they want to do. No one is the arbiter of your motivations. If you cannot get past that simple fact then I fear that you and I are of so different minds that we are varelse to each other. I see your thought process as tyrannical because you seem to require that I justify myself to papa government BEFORE taking any action whereas I believe that freedom entails the government needing to justify itself before limiting my actions.
"Government" has nothing to do with this particular point. I'm not asking you to justify anything to the government, but to me. I'm asking you to justify your point rhetorically. Again, if you can't articulate a justification, then you just might not have a justifiable position. You need to make your case -- that's what's missing. You're not required to do so, but if you don't -- you simply haven't made a case.
Not that that puts you in an unusual position-- the question of "what are you deprived of" had been open throughout this thread. No one else has come up with an answer either. That's what the FDA comment period is for -- someone to come up with that answer.
The two concepts are miles apart.
Now you're injecting degrees where none existed. Nobody said "zero". Or any other number. We speak of substances that have been shown to be harmful AND have no redeeming qualities. It's not even a trade-off. There is nothing good in it.
Considering which, again, why do you want to eat it? I haven't seen an answer on that yet.
Again, irrelevant. I am really tired of going over this. I DO NOT HAVE TO JUSTIFY MYSELF. Period. That is simple reality in anything that resembles freedom. I’ll give you a reason though: I want to eat it because it makes me think of fairies which reminds me of the forest that brings me to thinking about grass and the thought of grass makes me happy. Now, who are you or the FDA to decide that is not good enough? Who are you to decide that my irrational thoughts need to be controlled because you don’t think it is ‘redeeming’ enough? The reason (and I gave you some in the last post not to mention that the FDA even gave a few in their own statements) that I, my neighbor or anyone else gives is utterly irrelevant.
That is what tyranny is – <insert agency here> deciding what I am allowed to do because they have unilaterally decided what is best for me WITHOUT my consent.
I'll have to take this as a concession that there is no such justification then, per above. Sorry, you don't get to claim "tyranny" on a point you can't justify because a freaking food agency does the job it's always been there to do. And since that agency is put there by Congress, which is an elected body, it's not at all without our consent. And
again again, if you still object, we're in the 60-day comment period within which you can make your case TO the FDA. But you're gonna have to come up with something more of a basis than you've shown here since basically all you've posited is "I don't wanna".
This is real life, not Government Conspiracy Comics. There are definitely times when government overreaches. That doesn't mean
everything the government does is overreach. Part of government's role is the safety and security of its people, and that means ensuring the water is safe to drink, it means ensuring the food and drugs sold meet safety standards, that planes in the air don't fly into each other, et cetera. What you're arguing here is that one particular food chemical should
not meet safety standards.
Again -- why woud you do that? This is absurd.
RE tobacco-- we already established that FDA has no authority over tobacco, so that's not a valid comparison.
No, we established nothing of the sort. You made that statement which is flatly false.
What part of FDA regulates tobacco products?
The Center for Tobacco Products is a section of the FDA and they regulate (surprise) tobacco products.
Established here -- Post 506, November 9:
2000 - The U. S. Supreme Court, upholding an earlier decision in Food and Drug Administration v. Brown & Williamson Tobacco Corp. et al., ruled 5-4 that FDA does not have authority to regulate tobacco as a drug. Within weeks of this ruling, FDA revokes its final rule, issued in 1996, that restricted the sale and distribution of cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products to children and adolescents, and that determined that cigarettes and smokeless tobacco products are combination products consisting of a drug (nicotine) and device components intended to deliver nicotine to the body.
I am only getting the same answers because you are refusing to accept that there is a dofference in consumer notification and regulating a product or practice. You are restating the same things without actually addressing the FACTS. People are consuming less trans fat WITHOUT GOVERNMENTAL INTERVENTION IN ITS USE. Period. That is fact – cold and hard – yet here you are advocating that the government NEEDS to get involved to reduce the consumption of trans fats. Do you not realize exactly how silly that is?
I'm forced to repeat the same answer yet again-- it's
not without government intervention at all; the FDA
required those labels (which again don't cover every instance of trans fats), and THAT is what has reduced its use. The food manufacturers certainly aren't going to police themselves, because, once again we repeat this too-- FOOD SAFETY IS NOT THEIR INTEREST. Food
profits are. There would have been no public reduction in trans fats use without this previous government action. So if you're against the current proposal "denying" you something you can't define, then you have to also be against the previous action that spurred companies to reduce their own TF content after gummint made an issue out of it.
Drug companies, same thing; that's why I bring up Thalidomide, because if not for the denial of the FDA (which didn't happen elsewhere in the world) we would have had Thalidomide babies popping out like they were in the rest of the world. Why didn't we?
Because the FDA did its job to deny the public its "choice" to have derfomed babies, that's why. Tyranny! The horror!
The fuller story on this was in
Post 508.
By your logic we should have just passed Thalidomide in the name of Randism. I've got a friend who's terminally ill because the FDA
wasn't as vigilant with another drug (Fen-Phen). I'm sure it makes her feel better that the tyranny of gummint overreach was averted, granting her the right not to breathe. Please. Somebody's got to advocate against the tyranny of irresponsible profiteering, and I guess with so many people intoxicating themselves on Ayn Rand's half-baked musings that falls to me.
You do realize that I have been making the same claim all along – the ‘dangers’ of trans fats are not even in the ballpark of many legal substances not to mention not in the same league as the substance that you mention.
Irrelevant. We're not here to discuss all substances ever. This is about trans fats. Period. You keep trying to deflect. Stay on topic.
As far as the labels go, I advocate (and have stated SEVERAL times) for the strongest labeling that the FDA can come up with. Why are you then brining up that the labeling is inadequate? If that is the case then increase labeling requirements. That is ALL that is required. You keep coming back to this straw man even though it has nothing to do with my points considering I already advocated for stronger labeling.
Because as also noted upthread, those labeling requirements don't apply to everything. If you'd rather the FDA mandate labeling all TFs everywhere PLUS restaurants, you're in the comment period. But the bottom line is STILL that the action simply requires trans fats to justify their own safety, and that scrutiny is what you're arguing against, so that's the case you're going to have to make. And
making a case that a potentially harmful-to-the public substance should not be proven safe is a task I don't envy.
For a flesh-out of the label inadequacy question I refer you to post 524:
For years, only true diet detectives knew whether a particular food contained trans fat. This phantom fat—the worst fat for the heart, blood vessels, and rest of the body—was found in thousands of foods. But only people who knew that the code phrases “partially hydrogenated vegetable oil” and “vegetable shortening” meant that trans fat lurked in the food were aware of its presence. Now, at least for foods with food labels, anyone can tell. Since January 1, 2006, the U.S. has required that trans fat must be listed on food labels along with other bad fats (saturated fats) and good ones (unsaturated fats).
... Of course,
many foods don’t come with labels, such as foods sold in bakeries, cafeterias, schools, and restaurants. Because consumers cannot tell whether these unlabeled foods contain trans fats—and, in turn, cannot make the choice to avoid trans fat-laden foods—many cities and states have passed or are considering laws to eliminate trans fats in these foods. California’s governor recently signed legislation to phase out trans fats from restaurants by 2010 and from baked goods by 2011, the first state in the nation to do so. New York City became the largest city in the nation to require its restaurants, cafeterias, and schools to go trans free (the city has a “Trans Fat Help Center” to help food professionals comply), and other cities and towns, such as Boston, are following its lead.
--- you'll note, once again, that proposed legislations mentioned on state and municipal levels once again are aimed at food producers -- not consumers. So don't even go there.
That is unequivocally crazy. I have never been forced to purchase anything whatsoever from any corporation anywhere. The ONLY time I am forced to purchase anything is when the government gets involved.
Put the strawman down, nice and slow. I didn't say you were forced to buy something; I said they have control over what they sell. That's not "force"; it's power. It's owning all the marbles. And if your last sentence is a reference to the ACA, I fully agree.
You have 100 percent of the power because it is YOUR money. This very conversation is solid proof of this.
Your money (or mine) can only buy what is sold. When something either is not sold, or is sold only in a form you don't want, that's all the choice you have. As an example I mentioned my own preference for sugar free tomato sauce. Doesn't exist.
Do you really think that it is the companies choosing not to use cheap trans fats? Hell, do you think it was even them that wanted to use them in the first place? NO! It was the consumer. The consumer, by spending his/her cash on those products completely controls the market and what it produces. It is a GROSS misunderstanding of how business works to think otherwise. When a product falls out of demand it matters not how much the companies want to produce it because those that refuse to change disappear.
Good, let's do this.
No, I don't think it's Big Food taking the
initiative to eliminate/reduce TFs; it was government action on labeling that brought attention, and they in turn responded to
that. Without that intervention we'd be ingesting more on the level we used to, and dying accordingly, (see Harvard School of Public Health insert above) because as long as there was some profit motive in it, the food company doesn't care --
that's the FDA's job. The consumer didn't have jack shit to do with that. As noted above, companies can and will disguise undesirable substances to slip under the radar (you want to talk tyranny? hellloooo)... basically you're arguing against "government tyranny" so that
corporate tyranny can just do whatever the **** it wants. Not on our watch, hell no.
This idea that the consumer is somehow in charge is profoudly illusory. The merchant leads; we have no choice but to take what's offered. Example: Remember the mass demonstrations in Detroit in the 1990s where we the public demanded that cars be bloated up into upside-down bathtubs on truck frames so that we could pay more money for less safe lower mileage cars? Me neither.
The entire reason that trans fats have been going by the wayside is that Americans are becoming health conscious after ignoring it for so long. They have stopped purchasing those products in the same way that they used to and major companies have responded by ditching those products themselves.
Not the "entire" reason at all. For the umpteenth time, without the watchdog action, that consumer choice doesn't happen because we had no way to know. We're bombarded with advertising at every turn telling us why we should buy Zippo donuts; we get nothing of the sort about why we should not.
To state that you have no power over your purchases is completely incorrect. To disregard the fact that is what drives the entire market is equally incorrect.
Refuted above.
Yes, government has more power over my life than any industry. Your example has absolutely ZERO to do with this fact.
My
example has everything to do with it. It's a direct look at a case where a food substance was ushered in by corrupt government officials who looked the other way. I can't think of a more relevant (if inconvenient) example. Please don't tell me you're unaware of the DC revolving door and lobbyism. Michael Taylor? Tim Geithner? Hank Paulsen? Any of these conflict-of-interest names ring a bell? Now
that is government overreach -- or more correctly, government corruption.
You like to look up at the government puppet strings on its people; that's a good thing. We need that. Now look further up at the puppet strings
above that level, i.e. the strings above
them. I'm not stating something new and revolutionary here.
Let me ask you- what company can take your children away from you and place them in another home if you do not conform to their standards? What industry can come into your house and search it if it suspects that there is something in your house they disapprove of? What industry can place you into an 8x10 room for years if you decided to ingest a substance that it finds unfavorable? What industry determines that you are not cap[able hearing the word **** over the airwaves? What industry determines that you will either comply with rules concerning the speed you drive, where you walk or where you will place your garbage and then take your check from you if you fail to comply? What other industry can demand you be in a specific place at a specific time or you will see that 8x10 room again?
What industry can determine that I am a threat to its bottom line and eliminate me? The answer is non – period. The square peg that you are trying to fit into the round hole is the power that industry gains by influencing government. They do this precisely because government has much more power than they do. They try and convince government that we all need a specific product (like light bulbs) and oddly enough you support that activity so complaining about the power industry has over government is somewhat disingenuous. To the point though, I reiterate that there is absolutely zero argument that industry has more power over me than government.
Those are government domains, rightly or wrongly, and some of those are, as in the Aspartame example noted above, subject to heavy influence by those interests that stand to gain financially, such as prisons, radar gun manufacturers and the like. But you're comparing apples and oranges here anyway; FDA doesn't lock people in rooms or take your check. It polices what
food purveyers purvey. That has nothing to do with what you and I do.
And just to note one that is in my field of expertise, nobody says you can't hear the word
**** on the air -- doesn't work that way. The way it
does work: Station X broadcasts the word
****. What happens? Nothing. Not until Citizen Y files a complaint, which is then investigated by FCC (it's
reactive). If that complaint is found to have merit, then the station might be fined. If egregious and expansive, the station may have its license not-renewed (I'm not sure this has ever happened in history but it's possible). But that license was already granted as a public trust to use the airwaves which are already defined as belonging to the people, so corporation-worship is again misplaced here. And by the way we give them that public airspace for free.
I guess the point of the above paragraph is that gummint is a bit more complex than the automatically fascist ogre you try to paint it as. It just isn't that simple.
Bullshit. Again, I am not forced to utilize any company for anything (unless, of course it is through the government). Maybe now you are beginning to realize why some of us see the mandate as so abhorrent – that is a prime example of the type of power you are railing against here. The type of power that those on your side SUPPORT!
? Huh?
Once again ----- are you a food company?
And if you are, what is the case that you can inject foods sold to the public that don't need to pass a safety test?
That's the whole issue here. Nothing more. Until you address this you're dancing. I mean conspiratorial soap opera is entertaining and all (I guess) but this is just launching rhetorical deep space missiles off the launchpad of rationality.
Entirely addressed in GRAS section at the top. And the period of time factor is another concession to industry; "we know you're selling poison but we'll let you take your time phasing it out so it doesn't hurt the almighty bottom line". Of course these industries could have been acting responsible in the first place by not using known bad stuff, but FDA is there to give them a temporary pass. Again.
No, that is entirely inaccurate. That time is because the government at least realizes that deciding that something is illegal overnight has HUGE ramifications. Ramifications that are unwarranted.
Except for the word "unwarrranted" we just said the same thing.
We don't disagree on the effective outcome; but literally it's not a ban, and those are not the same thing. But again, you're arguing on behalf of food makers (and let's be clear, you're arguing for their right, not yours) that they be allowed to sell food with chemicals that have not, and can not, prove themselves safe. Chemicals known to have adverse health effects while contributing absolutely nothing to nutrition. And you want to give them a pass.
Why would you do that?
I wouldn’t but that would be because I am not arguing for their rights because they have none. A corporation does not have rights as far as I am concerned. I, on the other hand, do and those rights include doing business and voluntarily exchanging goods as I see fit.
Then why are you wasting my time with this whole line of argument? Don't take that wrong, I respect your deductive reasoning as you know, but you're completely conflating an action on an industry into an action on the people. It has nothing to do with you as a consumer -- you still eat what you want. Matter of fact you just went to great pains to make that point above, that
you have the choice. You still do.
And yes you are arguing for
their rights to bypass safety standards,
because that's exactly what this proposal puts an end to.
So .... wtf?
Just because YOU want my argument to be about something else entirely does not make it so. Stop trying to make my argument fit your convoluted logic on rights. I have been quite clear on what I believe in this case.
Not really, but the FDA proposal is clear enough. Why can't you just call it what it is without inventing doomsday scenaria over trans fats, of all trivialities? Again, you have to also argue for the right to dysentery in your water and carcinogens in your food and Thalidomide babies and by the way all the airport control towers have to come down. Gummint overreach all. Same logic.
It is impossible to "enjoy". It has no taste. It has no benefit. It has no nothing. You're living in the abstract here and have disconnected yourself from any real world actual application. We don't live in such a world. And further, there's no regulation on "you". It's a regulation on the food company. You can eat whatever you want. As long as you keep making this conflation, I'll just have to keep shooting it down.
Sorry, but that does not fly. You have shot nothing down.
In one statement you declare that a company has control over you (even though they cannot force you to do anything) and I would have to assume that logic stems from some concept of availability. Then you state the exact opposite here.
Explain-- how are those opposites? I think you're the one with the conflict here...
The regulation is on me because it limits my ability to acquire what I want. That limit is essentially universal to boot so that logic is completely twisted. I guess you could claim that the government is perfectly within its rights to make all radio illegal except Christian talk radio. They are, after all, not limiting YOU in any way at all, just what you are capable of getting access too…
The regulation STILL has nothing to do with you; that hasn't changed. It limits the ability of
industry to
sell what it wants -- which has been the case, once again, for centuries, everywhere. But what you
acquire is still your business. This isn't comparable to cannabis as you're trying to imply. Nobody's about to bang on your door to search your house for trans fat foods and it baffles me that someone of your intellect would even entertain such a silly idea.
And no I would clearly never make such a case. Government has no say in broadcast content, and that's as it should be. And the comparison is absurd anyway; I might not like country music as a choice, but hearing it isn't going to give me and others heart attacks.
