Tag: land of the free

Is America Finally Having Its Raw Milk Moment?

American media is abuzz with news of President-elect Donald Trump’s nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be the head of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Seemingly every story mentions his controversial views on topics from vaccines to fluoride in the water to raw milk—a longtime libertarian cause célèbre. Though it’s hard to envision a more unlikely catalyst, RFK Jr.’s nomination may be the final push that gets raw milk across the legalization finish line.

Until the late 1800s, raw milk was simply known as “milk” and was the only game in town for Americans desiring a delicious dairy beverage. But when it was discovered that heating up products like milk could reduce the presence of potentially harmful bacteria, the pasteurization craze was underway. Given reports of thousands of babies dying from bacteria-riddled milk around this time period, pasteurization was seen as a remarkable public health breakthrough.

This set off a wave of 20th century state and local government mandates that required milk to be pasteurized. Finally, in 1987, a federal court cemented a federal ban on all interstate raw milk sales. But not long afterward, the modern organic food movement was born, and raw milk became a cult favorite among the crunchy political left. Now, raw milk has increasingly been adopted as a sort of culture war status symbol on the political right.

“Long a fringe health food for new-age hippies and fad-chasing liberal foodies, raw milk has won over the hearts and minds of GOP legislators and regulators in the last few years,” writes Marc Novicoff in Politico. In addition to its inherent deregulatory appeal, Novicoff recounts that “conservatives discovered that raw milk fit neatly inside a worldview that was increasingly skeptical of credentialed expertise.”

Over the last decade, numerous states have passed laws to legalize raw milk, leading food policy expert Baylen Linnekin to declare that the “raw milk restoration is underway.” Could it now be about to kick into overdrive, potentially even spreading to an overturn of the federal interstate sales ban?

Whatever one’s views of RFK’s potential adeptness—or lack thereof—at navigating the federal bureaucracy to pursue his agenda, he may not be the only member of Trump’s cabinet to be a raw milk enthusiast. Rep. Thomas Massie (R–Ky.), who has run a bill in Congress for the last decade to overturn the federal ban, is heavily rumored to be the next Secretary of Agriculture.

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“It’s a wrong policy”: Questions arise after Buffalo Outer Harbor takes down kites

Questions are being raised about kite rules after a man was surrounded by five park police officers at Buffalo Outer Harbor State Park on Sunday.

“A park ranger came and said you need to take those down. And we were nice to him and said no sir it’s a special day, it doesn’t come around in Buffalo that often where you have a perfect sunny day and 10 mph winds” said Jim Emanuele, who was flying about 10 kites with a friend in the park.

After refusing to take down the kites, the situation escalated.

“I’ve been here before and they told me to take it down. That’s why I don’t come here often” said Emanuele.

As it turns out, kite flying is not allowed in Buffalo State Park without a permit.

“It’s a wrong policy, why you can’t fly kites here right here on the outer harbor. People enjoy, there’s no risk, there’s no powerlines there’s no airport around here so what is the reason that you cannot fly kites here”

Channel Two reached out to New York State Parks for an answer. In a statement released to us, they said quote:

“large kites such as the ones in question can pose a safety risk to park patrons or result in property damage, which is why state park regulations require permits to fly such kites. In this case, no permit was requested or granted.”

Jim says that for him and many other kite flyers, permits are not ideal because you just never know when a perfect kite day will be – but despite the unpredictability, the rule still stands. 

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Legalizing And Regulating Drugs Is The Only Way Out Of The Overdose Crisis

Should heroin and cocaine be legally available to people who need and want them? If we are serious about stopping the crisis of drug overdose deaths, that is exactly the kind of profound change we need. Yes, extensive regulations would be necessary. In fact, the whole point of regulating drug production and sales is that we can better control what is being sold and to whom.

After British Columbia’s Provincial Health Officer Dr. Bonnie Henry testified to the all-party health committee in Ottawa in May that regulating these controlled drugs would minimize harms, B.C. Premier David Eby said he disagreed. He is quoted saying that “in a reality-based, real-world level, (it) doesn’t make any sense.” But does our current approach of drug prohibition “make sense?”

Since the overdose crisis was declared in 2016, illicit drug toxicity deaths have become the leading cause of unnatural death in B.C. and the leading cause of death from all causes for those aged 10 to 59. More than 44,000 people have died from drug poisoning in Canada since 2016, and more than one-third of those were in B.C. An average of 22 people are dying every day in Canada because the illicit supply of drugs is toxic.

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D.C. Subpoena Causes Zyn to Suspend Online Sales

The tobacco company Philip Morris International, which owns the nicotine-pouch brand Zyn, announced Monday that it will be ceasing online sales for North America, following a subpoena sent by the attorney general of the District of Columbia. The subpoena follows from a 2022 decision by the district to ban flavored nicotine products.

The move to target Zyn comes amid Washington’s widespread crime problem. Violent crime increased by 40 percent in 2023, and the highest homicide rate is at its highest in over two decades. Nevertheless, more than 67 percent of arrests made are declined to be prosecuted, and D.C. is currently facing its largest police shortage in half a century. 

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The Greenwich Noise Ordinance Hypocrisy

Effective May 24 at 6:00pm, the use of gas-powered leaf blowers, with a few exceptions, became prohibited on residential properties until September 30. This restriction specifically targets gas-powered leaf blowers. Beginning in 2025, individuals found in violation may face fines of $100 for a first offense and $249 for subsequent offenses.

The new ordinance passed at the Representative Town Meeting (RTM), the Town’s legislative body, in January.

If you drive around Greenwich, chances are you have observed first-hand that landscapers and even some residents are continuing to use their gas-powered leaf blowers, whether in defiance of the ordinance or perhaps they are completely unaware of what the RTM has mandated.

To be clear this is not intended to “rat out” or “snitch” on neighbors in the hopes they draw fines.

However, it is important to point out a bit of the hypocrisy when it comes to the equal application of the ordinance, also known as the “rules for thee but not for me” mentality.

On this particular morning, a Greenwich resident who happened to be driving up Glenville Street toward King Street snapped a few photos of landscapers using at least two gas-powered back pack leaf blowers and a larger leaf blower toward the rear of the property. The landscaping truck had New York license plates.

Based on the photos, the address was identified and an online search of the property was performed.

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Amish Farmer Threatened for Not Giving Up Traditional Farming

Armed federal agents were used to threaten a traditional Amish farmer just 150 miles outside Washington, D.C., who does not use pesticides, fertilizer, or gas to run his farm.

In the last 100 years, there have been significant changes in the way farming is carried out. Most significant was the development of genetically modified organisms and chemical pesticides. In 1982, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA)[3] approved the first GMO product, which was developed to treat diabetes: human insulin. The first GMO foods available in the United States were alfalfa and sugar beets in 2005.

By 2015, the FDA had approved an application for genetically engineered salmon. Further bioengineered foods and plants include apples, pink pineapples, and, in 2020, the GalSafe pig, which is a genetically modified pig that eliminates detectable amounts of alpha-gal,[4] which is a sugar on the surface of pig cells that triggers a rare allergy.

As some applauded these scientific advancements, others began asking hard questions about how modifying genetic information and the application of large amounts of pesticides and herbicides will impact animal and human health. Miller[5] chose to use farming practices that have successfully provided healthy food for thousands of years.[6]

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Zoning Regulations Empower Control Freaks—and Bigots

Imagine you’re a member of a religious minority that’s on the receiving end of a lot of hate, and the local zoning board is giving you a hard time over plans to expand your house of worship. Is it regulators being their nitpicky selves? Are the neighbors weaponizing rules to squeeze out the cars and foot traffic that accompany any successful endeavor? Or could it be hostility directed at your faith? Zoning has been used and abused in all these ways, which underlines the need for reform.

Bigotry Through Red Tape

“A proposal to dramatically expand Harvard Chabad’s Banks Street headquarters failed to win approval from the Cambridge Board of Zoning Appeals during a contentious Thursday public hearing,” The Harvard Crimson reported last week. “The rejection leaves the Jewish student organization to revise and clarify the proposal before a follow-up hearing in June.”

Harvard Chabad’s Rabbi Hirschy Zarchi told me that opposition to the group’s expansion has featured many “inappropriate comments” including suggestions that the group is “too visibly Jewish.” Other criticism, he says, is more “classic NIMBY,” though it sometimes touches on the nature of Chabad in the former of objections to the presence of security often required by Jewish organizations after October 7.

Zarchi and company aren’t alone. Just last month, the U.S. Department of Justice warned officials in Hawaii about their efforts to block operation of a Chabad house. The plaintiffs in a lawsuit against Hawaii County “have established a likelihood of success on the merits” of their claims of bias, according to Kristen Clarke, assistant attorney general of the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division.

Part of the problem in Cambridge could be general opposition to houses of worship, which draw crowds but don’t generate much money for revenue-hungry governments.

“Many land-use disputes aren’t about explicit bigotry,” Emma Green wrote in 2017 for The Atlantic. “They arise from concerns about noise, lost property taxes, and Sunday-morning traffic jams. The effect is largely the same, and can be just as devastating as outright hatred: A religious community is dragged into a lengthy, and costly, dispute with a city or town.”

Use of zoning laws to block churches, synagogues, and mosques has been such a problem that it inspired the passage of the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act in 2000. “Zoning codes and landmarking laws may illegally exclude religious assemblies in places where they permit theaters, meeting halls, and other places where large groups of people assemble for secular purposes,” notes the Department of Justice in a commentary on the law. That the effort wasn’t fully successful is apparent from the fact that the Justice Department is still cautioning jurisdictions over land use regulations that, as in Hawaii, explicitly discriminate against religious groups.

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A Nanny State Idiocracy: A Tale of Too Many Laws and Too Little Freedom

We are caught in a vicious cycle of too many laws, too many cops, and too little freedom.

It’s hard to say whether we’re dealing with a kleptocracy (a government ruled by thieves), a kakistocracy (a government run by unprincipled career politicians, corporations and thieves that panders to the worst vices in our nature and has little regard for the rights of American citizens), or a Nanny State Idiocracy.

Whatever the label, this overbearing despotism is what happens when government representatives (those elected and appointed to work for us) adopt the authoritarian notion that the government knows best and therefore must control, regulate and dictate almost everything about the citizenry’s public, private and professional lives.

The government’s bureaucratic attempts at muscle-flexing by way of overregulation and overcriminalization have reached such outrageous limits that federal and state governments now require on penalty of a fine that individuals apply for permission before they can grow exotic orchids, host elaborate dinner parties, gather friends in one’s home for Bible studies, give coffee to the homeless, let their kids manage a lemonade stand, keep chickens as pets, or braid someone’s hair, as ludicrous as that may seem.

As the Regulatory Transparency Project explains, “There are over 70 federal regulatory agencies, employing hundreds of thousands of people to write and implement regulations. Every year, they issue about 3,500 new rules, and the regulatory code now is over 168,000 pages long.”

In his CrimeADay Twitter feed, Mike Chase highlights some of the more arcane and inane laws that render us all guilty of violating some law or other.

As Chase notes, it’s against the law to try to make an unreasonable noise while a horse is passing by in a national park; to leave Michigan with a turkey that was hunted with a drone; to refill a liquor bottle with different liquor than it had in it when it was originally filled; to offer to buy swan feathers so you can make a woman’s hat with them; to enter a design in the Federal Duck Stamp contest if waterfowl are not the dominant feature of the design; to transport a cougar without a cougar license; to sell spray deodorant without telling people to avoid spraying it in their eyes; and to transport “meat loaf” unless it’s in loaf form.

In such a society, we are all petty criminals.

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Cops called on Van Nuys ‘flower grandma’ on Mother’s Day

Mother’s Day weekend is huge for flower vendors, including one 83-year-old woman who can usually be seen on the corner of Sherman Way and Sepulveda Boulevard in Van Nuys.

This weekend, though, LAPD officers approached the woman known to locals as “the flower grandma,” saying they’d gotten a call complaining she did not have a permit. Other vendors in the area, including the owner of the popular Pupusa Express truck usually parked in the same corner, were upset.

“I know [the] police have to do what they have to do,” said Nelson Gonzalez, “but, really?” He reacted by taking his phone and going live on social media to show what was happening. In the video, officers are seen telling him to step back, eventually taking his phone and handcuffing him.

Seeing that scene live on social media, people began to show up at the corner. One of them, Nelson Martin Sandoval, began going live on TikTok, saying he was there to buy flowers. It wasn’t long before dozens of people showed up and bought every single flower from the woman, even saying they’d pay off her citation if she got one.

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