Okay, the weirdness of food safety activism is coming back to me. As in, realizing the kind of dreadful food that is being irradiated and then actually calling on people to avoid it because it’s being treated with radiation. Um, people, you shouldn’t be eating this dreck in the first place.

It reminds me of when we learned many years ago that the Hormel Corporation was thinking about irradiating SPAM. So what? was my first thought. How much worse can a little radiation make its dreadful contents? But a campaign is a campaign and, more importantly, more carcinogens in SPAM are still more carcinogens in SPAM. We won’t bother with the nutritional arguments here.

Well, it’s déjà vu all over again here. Because my new irradiation research has revealed that one of the biggest supporters of meat irradiation in the U.S. is Schwan’s, the home-delivery company whose yellow trucks should be familiar to anyone who’s spent time in the suburbs.

Let’s be clear: Schwan’s food equals dreck. Period. End of story.

So, in that case, it’s not surprising that Schwan’s would see a need for a little radiation-cover-up. Imagine, for example, where their beef comes from? Hint: The largest and most industrial (read: cheap and filthy) sources. And then imagine the factories where tens of thousands of pounds of this fecal matter-riddled beef gets processed into the pre-formed patties and other products that should very loosely be considered “meat” in the first place.

It’s a recipe for disaster (pun intended).

But for corporations like Schwan’s, the solution to their dirty food problems isn’t to clean it up. Hardly. Instead, they reach for one toxic-quick-fix after another that only makes the underlying problem (dirty food) worse.

They try more antibiotics. They try chemical rinses. And now, they’re trying irradiation. Worse, they’re employing all these gimmicks on the same hamburger patties. Hmm, I wonder what irradiated antibiotics and chemical rinses taste like? More importantly, I wonder what they do to your health? No one knows, because the Food & Drug Administration has never bothered to ask or study or, apparently, care.

But let’s get back to the “radiation-cover-up” theme. It’s the marketing Achilles heel of the technology. Corporations employing irradiation are doing so because they know they’ve got a filthy product. In the case of meat, the filth is fecal matter. But they are counting on their consumers to be so uninterested in the contents of what they eat that they won’t care that irradiated fecal matter is still…well…fecal matter. Yum.

While avoiding Schwan’s foods should be one of the easiest things to do, avoiding the precedent of Schwan’s use of irradiation is a different matter. By contracting with irradiation corporations, Schwan’s is keeping the technology alive, endorsing the further industrialization of the food supply, and stymieing critical efforts to move the food supply in a safer and saner direction.

Stay tuned.

Different around here, huh? New look and all. And content! Well, I guess I shouldn’t push it.

Here’s the deal: I’m working on another site right now. I’ll give you the url when it’s ready. But it involves a semi-revival of my previous life: Food & Water. Yeah, the organization.

My return was inspired – if going backwards in your life can be an “inspiring” move – by some serendipity.

Last April marked the 15-year-anniversary of the death of my mentor, Dr. Wally Burnstein. His death rocked my world. For nearly ten years, Wally and I created and ran a kick-ass activist organization – Food & Water – that nearly-single-handedly stopped food irradiation and put the fear of boycotts in the hearts and minds of many corporate food honchos. Better yet, we had a blast doing it.

But cancer claimed Wally in 1996. And with him – for me and many others – went the joy of activism. And activism without joy cannot succeed. It can only be avoided.

Oh sure, I’ve had my fun (thanks, Boots), but it’s been far from organized and consistent. Worse, it hasn’t paid. And there is nothing wrong with a good activist job as long as the activist with the job knows that the top priority is to succeed to the extent that your job is no longer necessary. Hint: You are not an institution. And if thoughts of your 501(k) or a dinner-party invitation trump your desire to stick your metaphorical finger in your opponent’s eye…well….get another job. Or cause.

Wally and I thought we had organized ourselves out of existence shortly before his death. We had successfully defeated fruit and vegetable irradiation, chicken irradiation and meat irradiation, leaving many corporate food giants like Perdue, Hormel and Kentucky Fried Chicken humbled by their encounters with us.

Done, we thought. Let’s move on.

I did what Wally always wanted to: I moved to the great woods of the Northeast and pursued the joys of homesteading. A successful activist life, Wally counseled, must also be rooted in the hopes and possibilities beyond what you are fighting against.

If unhealthy food is what you’re against, demonstrate a path to healthy food. And live it. And be it. And, for crying out loud, find joy in it. Otherwise, shut up about it.

I apparently found too much joy in it of late – the homesteading part, that is. Because it dwarfed my activism. Which leads me to: now.

A week or so ago I got an inquiry from a European journalist working on an article about food irradiation. The article was obviously precipitated by the E.coli crisis that has gripped the region. It happens fairly frequently: E.coli outbreak = calls for irradiation = calls for a comment about why I would oppose a technology that could save death, pain, and destruction.

But this time it was different. Because this time it was the “worst” case of E.coli contamination ever. And it is, indeed, terrible. Thousands of people have become seriously ill from the novel germ with the not-so-novel prefix: E.coli.

And then another call came. And then a few emails. And then a letter in the mail (imagine that?), all wondering the same thing: Where’s Food & Water on this?

The answer: We’re here. And we’re ready.

But, be warned, I have a keen sense for joy. I’m not getting in the ring with you nuclear and industrial food fools without a very true commitment to laugh my ass off while I kick yours.

It’s not personal. It’s just what I believe in.

Game: On.

Join me, friends.

Well, someone had to do it. And, of course, we did. We being: Boots, Bel and I.

I’m speaking about the public hearing held on Monday night about the Douglas Administration’s out-of-nowhere plan to allow all-terrain-vehicles (ATVs) access to public lands. And while Douglas’ cronies at the Agency of Natural Resources (ANR) tried to make the whole thing look legitimate, the whole process stinks more than an ATV exhaust pipe.

First, ANR officials admit almost proudly that they talked exclusively with one and only one group during its planning process for this new regulation to allow these machines to “rip it up” on our state lands: VASA, the ATV association in Vermont. And then they sprung the new rule on the citizens of the state just a couple of weeks ago, planned a hastily-prepared “public hearing,” and gave the public all of ten days to comment on it.

Can you say: Political games? I knew you could. And Governor Jim Douglas plays them like nobody else plays them. In case you don’t have an imagination, let me spell it out for you: Douglas got his political ass kicked during the last legislative session, having two of his vetoes overridden (gay marriage and the budget) and he’s looking like little more than political road-kill of late. So what’s a right-winger to do in such a circumstance? Well, throw a political bone to the ATV crowd, of course.

And so he did, and the VASA crowd lunged for it like a Michael Vick dog. Grrr….give us our rights to do what we want, when we want, where we want, however we want, and to whomever we want. Whatever.

Logic, of course, was an endangered species at Monday’s public hearings. The hundreds of well-organized VASA members who showed up were clearly looking for a fight. But little did they know that Vermont’s mainstream environmental community is about as lame as lame can be when it comes to taking a firm stand – especially when faced with a throng of hydrocarbon-breathing machines-equal-a-sport crowd.

Take, for example, the opening words of the “communications director” of the Vermont Natural Resources Council (VNRC), Jake Brown: “I’ve owned an ATV for eight years and I love to ride it as much as I can on weekends.” Huh? Remember, VNRC is the group that has been pegged by the fawning (read: lazy) Vermont media as “the opposition” to the proposed new ATV riding rule.

And so it went, the ATVers were all ready to rumble but their opponents were mostly looking like deer caught in the headlights and far too meek to mutter even the most benign opposition. Take, for example, the VNRC folks (Brown and his colleague, Jamey Fidel) who droned on about “process,” “fairness,” and Brown’s out-of-the-closet proclamations that he was “one of them.” Good luck with that.

But I’d be remiss if I didn’t take a moment to tip my hat to those who showed up and didn’t melt from the heat of being surrounded by two hundred angry men: Mollie Matteson of the Center for Biological Diversity, Anthony Iarrapino of the Conservation Law Foundation, Les Blomberg of the Noise Pollution Clearinghouse and a few private individuals that, unfortunately, I failed to hear their names or affiliations.

This hearing was absurd. And, frankly, we knew it was going to be absurd given the quickened pace of the process and the all-too-predictable meekness of the eco-crowd. That’s why we planned something equally as absurd for our testimony.

Yep, as the headline would suggest: We brought a chainsaw. Partly because we represent Horse Loggers for Peace (and the executive committee – oops, I mean: the entire group – okay, okay, I mean: both of us – decided to add “and Quiet” to our name for the evening) and partly because we knew how the pro-ATV crowd would be testifying. As in: “It’s public land, we pay taxes, and we want to play with our machines on the public’s land.”

Fine. Let’s play.

The plan was simple enough: Boots was going to testify about the health affects of ATVs – ever seen a room full of ATVers? – and when he got to his concluding statement about noise and air pollution I was going to fire up my chainsaw for a little demonstration. But we’d be in tune with the ATVers’ argument: Being on public land and playing with our own toys and all. We wanted to be as absurd as the proposal at hand.

But, frankly, when I surveyed the room and began hearing the other testimony I thought it would be best to use my time speaking out rather than using my time to fire up a chainsaw and simply getting arrested. But then my daughter, Bel, put this note on top of the papers I was carting around: “I really think that you should do the chainsaw.”

Geez, nothing like pressure from an eleven-year old to not wimp out.

And when they called our names to get in line to ready ourselves for our testimony, my mind was all but made up to use the chainsaw when Bel accompanied us to the podium (the plan was for her to stay in the back and have previously assigned friends be ready to take her home if I was arrested). But there she was, at our side, and giving me the look that said: Don’t be a wimp.

And so it went: Boots got to his final line in his testimony about noise and smell and I yanked the chainsaw out of my bag – without the chain for obvious safety reasons – and fired it up.

I watched the cop across the room, waiting for him to get up and come my way. He didn’t move. I watched the ANR official running the meeting, thinking he’d jump to his feet and demand an end to the noise and smell. He didn’t budge. And I watched the crowd, waiting for them to stop me, but they didn’t move. And so I did what these folks wanted: I made noise. I made smells. And we had a blast.

“What?” I declared after turning it off. “We’re on public land. I own the chainsaw. And I pay my taxes. What’s the problem?”

It was, as I explained, an absurd demonstration at an absurd hearing about an absurd new rule to allow people who own smelly and loud toys to “play” on public land.

Mission accomplished.

Thanks, Bel and Boots.

(Stay tuned for more)

Big day. Well, if you care about all things wild in Vermont. Because the Agency of Natural Resources will be holding a public hearing tonight in Montpelier (Pavilion Auditorium, 7 p.m.-9 p.m.) to take testimony regarding its plans to allow all-terrain-vehicles (ATVs) access to state-owned land.

Proponents of the letting these gas-guzzling, carbon-emitting and otherwise just noisy and obnoxious machines onto Vermont’s public lands are trying to soft-pedal these new rules, claiming that the newly proposed ATV trails will just be “short connectors” to already existing off-road-vehicle trails on private lands.

Yeah right. If you’ve bothered to follow snowmobile or ATV issues in Vermont, you know that when you give these renegades an inch they take a mile – literally.

Make no mistake, the ANR’s proposed rule to allow ATV access to public lands – no matter how short the original connector trails are – is a huge change in public policy that will almost certainly lead to more and more ATV access to state lands, including our publicly-owned forests. The organized ATV groups – like VASA – don’t hide the fact that they want to ride practically anywhere they can put it in four-wheel drive and rip it up.

The irony in the ANR’s proposed new rule is that ATV proponents are admitting that these new trails are necessary partly due to the current illegal riding by ATVers. Just read these words by VASA’s Danny Hale, as told to John Dillon of Vermont Public Radio:

Unfortunately there’s a fair amount of illegal use already taking place on state land. And what we’re trying to accomplish with a managed trail system is give people a chance to recreate where it’s legal, so that’s going to take a large number of the illegal riders right out of the picture.

Got that? In case you don’t, let me explain: The ATV riders are riding illegally on the public’s land now so, instead of enforcing the laws banning it, the state should change the laws to make it legal.

I’m guessing you’ve got to be around a lot of burned hydrocarbons to come up with that argument.

Unfortunately (and predictably), mainstream environmental groups like the Vermont Natural Resources Council (VNRC) aren’t showing a lot of teeth when it comes to fighting back against this proposed ATV land grab. The Vermont Press Bureau, for example, writes in this morning’s papers that, according to the VNRC’s Jamey Fidel, the group “isn’t necessarily opposed” to the first new connector trail being proposed in Island Pond.

Why – oh why – is it so hard from groups like VNRC to take a firm stand? But that’s another story for another time I suppose.

To the group’s credit, VNRC does document the very real and acknowledged problems with ATV riding: pollution, noise, flora and fauna damage, water run-off issues, interference with non-motorized forms of recreation and even rider safety. But with a laundry lists of problems like this, VNRC ought to be flying the “ban ATVs flag” as high as they can.

But, have no fear, the Horse Loggers for Peace (and quiet) will there – at tonight’s hearing that is. And you won’t have any trouble figuring out where we stand on this issue. It should be fun. Join us if you can.

Below are some great links to resources from groups who aren’t afraid to speak up and act out:

Leave it Wild
Bluewater Network
New Rules Project