Guest guest Posted February 10, 2009 Report Share Posted February 10, 2009 Hi again, As I wrote before, I think it's a good time to try to steer change towards veganism. Herein, I'm sharing a rejected OpEd I submitted to the SF Chronicle, in case my ideas help stir others' creativity. The more editors & legislators hear these ideas, the likelier they are to act on them and let them influence others. BTW: My essay references a PCRM article from 15 years ago. Mitch [submitted to SF Chronicle, 2/3/09] For Open Forum: Drought Measure: Early Retirement Package for Cholesterol Farmers = A Health Stimulus California faces severe drought, water-rationing, depleted fish populations and overly-thirsty wildfires. Dairy farmers struggle to stay afloat (SF Chronicle, 1/11/09). California’s and Congress’s Agriculture Committees promise bold ideas and action. President Obama promises change, boldness, new ideas, heeding science, alleviating foreign energy dependence and better healthcare. Let’s generously offer to buy back water allocations from the most resource-inefficient & government-subsidized cholesterol farmers in exchange for them & their herds permanently retiring from the cholesterol business. This yields significant benefits, both immediate and long-term, which are sound from fiscal, health and environmental perspectives. Cattle-raising unsustainably wastes our limited water, grain, energy and topsoil. Over 12 pounds of plant-protein yield 1 pound of edible beef protein. Add biofuel demand, and scarcity leads to worldwide food riots. Different sources claim each pound of beef requires hundreds, if not thousands, of gallons to produce. Driving a SUV 30 miles to eat soy burgers uses less energy than eating beef at home. Cattle aren’t the only culprits: large confined poultry farm runoff pollutes the Chesapeake Bay so much that fish populations are severely threatened. Researchers on agribusiness & pharmaceutical grants may deny consuming animal protein “causes” disease, but the undeniable truth is that in nations and villages where meat and dairy consumption is minimal, diseases common to Americans are also minimal; and vice versa. These include expensively treated & medicated diseases such as obesity, osteoporosis, cancer, heart disease, strokes, diabetes, high blood pressure and erectile dysfunction. In 1994, the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine showed up to $60 Billion could be saved from the annual US health budget via surgically reducing excessive animal protein from Americans’ diet. Profit-maximizing lobbyists inflate unhealthy RDAs. America’s individual and fiscal health is now worse, and potential annual savings are higher. Barring food allergies, healthy human bodies make sufficient cholesterol from eating a variety of fruits, nuts, grains and vegetables. Only animals produce cholesterol, and eating & drinking excess animal protein is a destructive, artery-clogging “luxury”. Much invasive and expensive chemotherapy & surgical procedures can be prevented by surgically reducing animal-based entrées into tasty condiments to plant-based entrées. Dr John McDougall’s medically-supervised nutrition program reports great success reversing disease until expensive medicines are cut from patients’ lives and budgets. With a simple nutrition education campaign, Americans can “have it all” by reducing excessive animal protein. Government won’t completely purge animal products & flavor from America’s diet, but government can remove cholesterol from our clogged deficits. Without deficit-subsidized water allocations and grain for cholesterol farmers, market forces would reduce animal-protein portions, making people & our planet healthier. Give today’s budgets the Net Present Value of tomorrow’s health. Cut supply to boost price, rather than spreading deficits & waistlines via school lunches. The vast majority of California’s unsustainable animal “crop” is sold to people in other nations and states, at a huge cost to & sacrifice by Californians. Encourage cholesterol farmers to cultivate sustainable cholesterol-free plant-based crops: protein-rich grains, calcium-rich vegetables (e.g. collards, bok choy, kale, broccoli) or biofuels. Nationally, encourage cholesterol farmers to harvest wind-turbines or solar-arrays. Encourage large scale, intensive-confinement, grain-fed operators into grass-fed operations. Provide all-expense-paid nutrition-education retreats (such as those by Dr McDougall) and on-going healthcare to ex-cholesterol-farmers who agree to highly-publicized example-setting, paradigm-shifting follow-up monitoring for confidential research studies by the NIH, Kaiser Foundation, Cleveland Clinic, etc. Unlike studies sponsored by pharmaceutical companies, results that seem “unprofitable” to cholesterol- & E.D.-pill sellers will not be suppressed. Invite PBS & other networks. A desperate water situation may be the catalyst to open discussions for government action on diverse, intertwined social issues. There are many excellent doctors, scientists and experts who would gladly participate in this discussion. Let’s advance into a sustainable 21st century. Envision worldwide food & energy abundance. Let peace & health flow as a mighty river. _______________ Windows Live™: Keep your life in sync. http://windowslive.com/explore?ocid=TXT_TAGLM_WL_t1_allup_explore_022009 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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