I Am Steve Marsh: Global organic protection campaign faces trial

By Rady Ananda
COTO Report

Steve Marsh’s organic canola fields in Western Australia suffered 70% genetic contamination from a neighboring biotech farm that sowed Monsanto seeds. As a result, he lost organic certification after 11 years, and his livelihood was destroyed.

Marsh is the first organic farmer in the world, according to a 22-minute video (below), to sue a biotech farmer for damages. The trial begins on Feb. 10 and he’s seeking donations to cover attorney fees.

Julian Assange to run for Australian Senate

Julian Assange (AFP/Miguel Medina)

By RT

Famous whistleblower and Wikileaks founder Julian Assange has decided to run for a seat in the Australian Senate – despite being under home arrest in Great Britain.

­The decision was announced by the Wikileaks group via twitter.

While awaiting possible extradition to Sweden over alleged sex crime charges, Julian Assange, a native of Queensland in northeastern Australia, is still eligible to run for office.  He plans to make a bid for the country’s Upper House.

Global milk war ramps up as citizens face off with regulators

By Rady Ananda

The battle for food freedom intensifies across the planet as citizens assert their right to raw dairy products unadulterated by drugs and genetically modified ingredients – in the face of authorities seeking to restrict our food choices and to criminalize entrepreneurs who operate outside the monopolized factory food system.

The State of Maine recently sued farmer Dan Brown for selling food and milk without State licenses, despite a local law that permits it. “Blue Hill is one of five Maine towns to have passed the Local Food and Community Self-Governance Ordinance,” explains Family Farm Defenders.

How Safe Is Your Food? GMOs, Foodborne Illness and Trade Agreements

Graph: Data compiled by GRAIN from government and UN sources, 2008-2010 (except Australia=2005)

By Rady Ananda

A research group that supports community-controlled and biodiversity-based food systems, GRAIN, has released a global report, Food Safety for Whom? Corporate Wealth vs. Peoples’ Health, showing how governments and corporations use “food safety” to manipulate market access and control. Rather than making food safer, domestic and trade rules “force open markets, or backdoor ways to limit market access.”

A Perfect Storm of GMOs, Chemicals and Cancer

By Rady Ananda

Several books, including Seeds of Destruction and Corrupt to the Core, along with the film, The Idiot Cycle, lay out the framework for and evidence of a concerted effort to sicken and then treat humanity, while earning obscene profits. When we factor in other recent actions taken by transnational corporations and lawmakers, the conspiracy adopts a more ominous tone.

Authors William Engdahl and Shiv Chopra appear in Emmanuelle Schick Garcia’s powerful film, The Idiot Cycle: What you aren’t being told about cancer. Both writers provide detailed evidence of a corporate-government conspiracy to adulterate the food and water supply with dangerous substances linked to a host of illnesses. The Case Against Fluoride, a book using hundreds of peer-reviewed studies, provides more evidence. In David Gumpert’s Raw Milk Revolution, we get a peek at the US government’s war on the natural dairy industry.

Breaking the Australian Silence

In a speech at the Sydney Opera House to mark his award of Australia’s human rights prize, the Sydney Peace Prize, John Pilger describes the “unique features” of a political silence in Australia: how it affects the national life of his homeland and the way Australians see the world and are manipulated by great power “which speaks through an invisible government of propaganda that subdues and limits our political imagination and ensures we are always at war — against our own first people and those seeking refuge, or in someone else’s country”.

By John Pilger

Global Survey: 74% Critical of Neoliberal Capitalism

Sao Paolo, Brazil wealth vs poverty

By Ernesto Carmona 

A global survey commissioned by the BBC revealed that 74% of 29,000 respondents in 27 countries are critical of neoliberal capitalism. This is a reversal from a 2005 survey by the same firm, GlobeScan, which found 63% in favor of a free market. The only Latin American nations surveyed all hold free trade agreements with the US, and all reject neoliberalism by vast majorities. France and Germany believe strong regulation can cure problems with capitalism.

Australia- New law to quarantine all welfare payments

• Matthew Franklin, Chief political correspondent
• The Australian
• November 25, 2009

WELFARE recipients across Australia face compulsory income-management under a Rudd government move to ensure their payments are not being wasted on alcohol, drugs or gambling.

Film suppression spawns media storm over land grab from Uyghurs

Uyghur activist Rebiya Kadeer and her daughter (New Matilda)

When the Chinese gov learned that The Ten Conditions of Love would be screened in Australia, it pressured the Melbourne International Film Festival to withdraw it. This, on top of the July 5th genocide of Uyghurs (up to 10,000 have ‘disappeared’), has brought global attention to this Uyghur documentary starring Rebiya Kadeer, labeled a “Muslim terrorist” by the Chinese government.

This is eerily reminiscent of the neoliberal land grab in New Orleans, and in Gaza.  ~RA

Aussie Vaccine Trials: Does Government-Industry Collusion Put the Public at Risk?

The connections between government and industry over monopolizing a flu vaccine do not bode well for Australians.  Competition improves any product, and with something as serious as a vaccine, product safety.