Sheer Ignorance or Duplicity?
by Jim Beers
The Washington Times 8 December 2007 front page, above-the-fold, features an
article titled "Drug makers look East for testing". This lengthy feature by
a Washington Times reporter is so symptomatic of the sophisticated
propaganda of the animal rights radicals, the role of the media, and the
disappearance of citizen awareness and responsibility as to be beyond
belief.The article details how "Ten years ago, 86 percent of all clinical trials
were done in the U.S." and today, "only 57 percent are". While "FDA is
taking steps to increase its drug approval rate", "drugs will will reach the
US market faster, if the trend towards more drug overseas clinical trials
continues". Company names like Johnson and Johnson, Wyeth, and Novartis
pepper the article. "Blockbuster drugs" being tested are for things from
schizophrenia and depression to diabetes. India and China are slated to
receive billions of such new business in testing for both new drugs and "$29
billion worth of drug patents set to expire in the next two years and $160
billion worth by 2015". We are told these (Kyoto-exempt) nations that we
should treat differently than others will "cut in half the cost of the same
trial in the US". While "there is concern among physicians whether the
clinical data collected overseas can be generalized to patients in the US";
any reasonably informed person might ask if Chinese toys contain lead and
date-rape drugs, who wants to turn over drug testing to them? The final
paragraph puts such trifles to rest by assuring us that "US companies will
want a hold out there for future growth opportunities" according to the
"leader of US Pharmaceuticals & Life Sciences Services at
PricewaterhouseCoopers".There you have it: only something is missing. As we become aware of this
very disturbing trend (for economic, medical, and future political
ramifications like the way Russia withholds oil and gas from Europe or
Venezuela uses its oil power to attack us) this newspaper and this reporter
have done us all a great disservice that we should all be keenly aware of.In the mid 1970's as the Nixon drama unfolded and bitter political battles
ensued and South Vietnam was told not to worry; a flurry of diversionary
"feel-good" Federal laws were passed to tickle (as in divert the attention
of) the vast majority of folks that had no idea where such laws would lead.
While we burbled about saving dolphins from tuna nets with the new Marine
Mammal Protection Act, no one would have believed the ways in which whales
would be allowed to decimate commercial fisheries or how pinnipeds (seals
and sea lions et al) would be allowed to destroy fisheries and harbors.
While we opined about elephants and eagles and the "need" for the new
Endangered Species Act; no one would have believed that almost half a
million elephants in Africa aren't "enough", or that eagles did just fine
without the Act, or that wolves and grizzlies would be forced on rural
America to kill livestock and pets and people, or that "races" and
"populations" and "distinct population segments" of everything from flies
and worts to mice and deadly predators would be sufficient justification for
revoking private property rights and vacating rural America. Like the
Wilderness Act that was just "lifting off"; were I have to said that
Wilderness declarations would proliferate everywhere and lead to Roadless
Areas and "Wildlands" and "Corridors" and "Native Ecosystems" receiving
similar quasi-theological and irrevocable status: I would have been laughed
out of the room and marginalized or fired from my former federal job status
(come to think of it, that is just what eventually happened).In the midst of this orgy of animal and environmental fervor and
"quasi-religious" establishment of animal sacredness in Federal statutes,
there was also a law passed called The Animal Welfare Act. As with all the
other ones, this one would "never affect rats and mice" and certainly it
would not "affect state jurisdiction" and all the other acceptable
"lies-of-the-day" that everyone was so happy to believe. So "Animal Welfare
Committees" were formed at Universities. Soon (just like the federal
agencies) these "Committees" were taken over by radical activists
(professors, veterinarians, biologists, etc.) that were animal rights
(meaning anti-animal ownership and use) oriented. Research and animal
testing (cleverly not mentioned in the Washington Times article that bunches
everything under the euphemism "clinical trials") became more and more
difficult, expensive, and problematic. Animal research labs were vandalized
and records were stolen or destroyed. Security costs skyrocketed.
Primates, dogs, cats and a host of animals like rabbits were all but
eliminated from use as test subjects. British executives were attacked at
their homes by thugs and their business transferred to the US where
demonstrations were allowed to continue (they are all such "nice" young
people and are "only" trying to "save" animals don't you know). Soon
lawsuits (with activist federal employee collusion) evoked from a court that
rats and mice were "covered" and incredible record-keeping became mandatory.
Like the young vegans recruited to "release" mink from their owners cages,
college and high school-dropout volunteers at Animal Rights Conferences
looking at how to "do something" were as common as buzzards on a deer
carcass and so were aimed at disrupting every animal testing or other animal
use in the drug development area. Lies and staged photos were eagerly run
by the media, always anxious to run such emotional and human interest
pieces. Costs and security worries of Executives (and their families)
skyrocketed.No one cared. Drug companies are like oil companies and timber companies
and dog breeders: they don't provide a vital commodity or diversify habitat
or provide owners with desirable animals; they charge old folks "too much"
or "destroy the wilderness" or "just add to the pet 'overpopulation'". It
is easy to accept demonizing them and "doing something" to them to make them
'shape up'".When the labs were burned or the regulations tightened (just as is being
done with all animal ownership and use in the US) hunters and fishermen and
dog owners and cockfighters and loggers, et al shrugged (like the German who
observed how he said nothing when "they" came for the gypsies and then the
Jews and then the Slavs and then the Christians and then when they came for
him "no one was there") and "took care of themselves" (so they thought).So the companies are moving offshore to India and China. With the exception
of cows in a Hindu area, these societies will no doubt treat animals as they
should be treated, as property. "Demonstrations", by young tinker belles
and other busybodies who want to force their views on others every bit as
much as Imams under Sharia law in many Moslem countries or Hindus noted
above in their areas, will likely not be treated by the government as
something to smile at. Rather they will be treated as the thugs and bullies
they are. Ironically this legitimate government function is disappearing in
the US as it is supplanted by business acumen and common sense in nations we
continue to treat as "emerging" instead of as fierce competitors.The Animal Welfare Act is an illegitimate and harmful extension of federal
power. Combined with the animal rights radicalism it is a large part of the
reason the drug companies are abandoning the US. This economic and social
revolution is not only harming animal owners and users: it is significantly
harming the national interest in many other ways. The drug companies are no
doubt reluctant to speak of this since it is just another reason (they are
"mean" and "cruel" and "insensitive", etc) to hate them as they move
billions of dollars and jobs overseas. The politicians won't mention it
because they are poised to repeat the 1970's "animal/enviro publicity orgy"
as we enter the Presidential season and once more debate fighting a foreign
threat (Communism or now Middle East Terrorists) there (South Vietnam or now
Iraq/Afghanistan/Iran?, etc.) or here and watching political enmity and
misinformation of epic proportions.Today the Congress has drawers full of environmental and animal rights
proposals and federal power growth hormones to change us into a Russian
style state overnight. These will be introduced by both parties as it suits
their political agendas. None of this is mentioned in the media. Like the
cataclysmic forest fires routinely shown on the news anymore, we will absorb
(like the wife in Fahrenheit 451 watching the state TV) prattle about "Santa
Ana winds" and "homes where they shouldn't be" or "brave firefighters" while
ignoring no habitat management, no firebreaks, no roads for firefighter
access, and no plant management for fire-resistant characteristics, etc. We
will ignore all the "Critical Habitats" and "Reserves" and "Parks" and
"Natural Areas" and bans on grazing and logging, and all the other etceteras
that are the real cause of these cataclysms. We will vilify anyone
questioning the Endangered Species Act or the Marine Mammal Protection Act
or the Wilderness Act or, in this case, the Animal Welfare Act.Remember the title of this piece, Sheer Ignorance or Duplicity? Too often
we get hung up motives for "why" such a paper, for instance, would fail to
mention this important aspect of such an important matter. Like arguing
about "Section J" or "Forest Service Policy Memorandum #173" after some
catastrophe or regarding some "new" proposal's assurance of benevolence, we
are missing the point. When a government action is based on faulty
assumptions and un-American principles, all the regulations and occasional
"reasonable" bureaucrats in the world are irrelevant. Mix in all the hidden
agendas like clearing the rural countryside (of all but the Ted Turners and
Brokaws and Donaldsons of course) or outlawing animal ownership and use
(from horse slaughter and dog breeding and cockfighting to animal husbandry
and hunting and fishing and trapping and rodeos, etc.) or getting votes or
building bureaucrat's pay and pensions and you have a brew described so well
by the three witches in the opening of Act 4 in Macbeth. "Round about the
cauldron go; in the poison'd entrails throw", "Double, double, toil and
trouble; Fire burn and cauldron bubble". The motive of such reporting is
either ignorance or collusion: but that is also irrelevant.Conservative or liberal newspapers are like conservative or liberal
politicians today. Like the former "Conservative" Congress or the current
"liberal" Congress they are both accepting of the march toward socialism,
government growth, and the thin gruel of environmental and animal rights
propaganda. They both believe the federal government "must" grow. They
believe we are heading toward a "non-violent" Nirvana described in some
"Kama Sutra-type" book in a dirty-book store. The only difference is their
rate of movement and with each party they surge as it suits their purposes
of gaining or retaining power. But all this is irrelevant also.The real problem is you and I. We elect them. We buy their paper. We look
the other way when the rights, freedoms, and traditions of others are
destroyed. We actually bow to professors telling us what plants and animals
belong where. We allow certain "experts" and "scientists" to enforce their
personal views (to which they are certainly entitled and encouraged to
practice THEMSELVES) on the rest of us concerning everything from property,
public land disposition, and animal testing to horse slaughter, hunting,
cockfighting, and wearing furs. We legitimize, instead of vilify, the
extremist and radical agendas and organizations. We vote for politicians
that are responsible for these laws and who fail to hold bureaucrats
responsible because they will (we think) give us "back" more than we put
"in" government coffers.So we let the part played by the Animal Welfare Act and these radicals and
professors and vets and bureaucrats in this massive misadventure go
unmentioned. We bemoan the loss to our economy and American business but
take solace in "US?" businesses having a bright future in foreign lands? We
place our trust in human health drug testing right where we don't want our
toys manufactured. When they outlaw hunting we will probably believe it was
"inevitable". When half a state burns up we will blame it on the wind (or
maybe the Christians like Nero). When saltwater fisheries disappear we will
accept that it was "over-fishing". (NOTE: Just like the myth that
"over-hunting" wiped out the buffalo. Just what was to be done with
free-ranging buffalo in any numbers if you planned to establish towns and
grow crops and cattle, etc.: put them in pens or maybe adopt them out like
"wild" horses today?)Whether duplicity or ignorance, the result is the same: disinformation,
hidden agendas, and propaganda involving bureaucracies and non-government
entities with radical purposes that would make Lenin or Mao proud. The more
things change in human endeavors, the more they stay the same. We are
heading toward a rude awakening.Jim Beers
8 December 2007
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http://jimbeers.blogster.com (Jim Beers Common Sense)
- Jim Beers is available for consulting or to speak. Contact: jimbeers7@verizon.net
- Jim Beers is a retired US Fish & Wildlife Service Wildlife Biologist, Special Agent, Refuge Manager, Wetlands Biologist, and Congressional Fellow. He was stationed in North Dakota, Minnesota, Nebraska, New York City, and Washington DC. He also served as a US Navy Line Officer in the western Pacific and on Adak, Alaska in the Aleutian Islands. He has worked for the Utah Fish & Game, Minneapolis Police Department, and as a Security Supervisor in Washington, DC. He testified three times before Congress; twice regarding the theft by the US Fish & Wildlife Service of $45 to 60 Million from State fish and wildlife funds and once in opposition to expanding Federal Invasive Species authority. He resides in Centreville, Virginia with his wife of many decades.
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