Political Cortex: Brain Food for the Body Politic

As far as the White House was concerned it was indeed un-enlightening as the Bush-Cheney government has known all along the truth about their misdeeds.

But for the American public to go along with this truly terrifying White House agenda is displaying ignorance or stupidity, or both.

For example, it is a scientific fact that eating beef contaminated with Mad Cow Disease can be deadly.  

South Korea and Japan have rebelled at renewing American beef imports.  But the gullible American consumers accept the dangers involved in this frightening policy, with hamburgers being considered almost as sacred as mom and apple pie.

When some beef which was so contaminated that shipments to U.S. school children were mercifully sent back to beef producers to destroy, concerned parents demanded that contaminated beef be shipped back to where it came from.  

South Korea's Trade Minister Kim Jon-Hoon asked exporters to export meat only from younger cattle which he felt had less risk for Mad Cow Disease.  Meat producers have not agreed to this request.

This caused a conflict as in April of 2008 South Korea had agreed to scrapping nearly all quarantine regulations that the U.S. had followed earlier to curb Mad Cow disease.  However, South Korea protesters say that scrapping quarantine regulations put Koreans at greater risk for Mad Cow Disease.  

South Korea's foreign minister has demanded that beef come only from cows younger than 30 months in age.

President Lee Myung-Bak of South Korea is to be commended for putting the health of his people above all else.

Japan is also to be congratulated for demanding that U.S. beef imports meet their health and safety standards, but George Bush is exposed as a president more concerned with the beef industry profits and enhancing the greed of beef producers than the health of U.S. citizens.

When Creekstone's beef producers wanted more federal beef inspection, George Bush thwarted this request.

Creekstone felt that stringent inspection of every cow before slaughtering at their beef processing plant would give them an edge in sales as customers would conclude that their safety standards would mean that their products were worth more money when purchased in stores.

But other beef producers complained that if Creekstone could make more money on advertising their meat while they met higher standards, they would then lose money if the cows they slaughtered were found to be contaminated since they couldn't sell them and would stand to lose money.

The Bush administration agreed and the federal inspection of cows before slaughtering is less than 1 percent.  

When it comes to clean air in California, California's efforts were to regulate green house gas effects.  The Federal Environmental Protection Agency decided against California's request for permission to impose tougher standards for air quality regulation.

When Congress wanted information to investigate into Bush's role in the California emissions decision a Seattle Times headline read:

BUSH DENIES INFORMATION REQUEST INTO ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY CASE

The article by Rob Hotakainen for the McClatchy Newspaper Service read:

"California had been granted such waiver (to impose tougher air quality regulations than federal law called for) numerous times over the years, but the Bush administration delayed and then rejected its requests for authority to regulate carbon-dioxide emissions."

Whether it is the beef you eat (with only less than 1 percent of beef tested) or the air you breathe in smoggy American cities or the un-needed war in Iraq with its death, destruction and debt, George Bush and his Republican controlled administration should be impeached along with other complicit figures operating on his behalf.