Not Surprising

<a href="http://www.billingsgazette.com//index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2005/07/15/build/nation/30-cattle-ban.inc">Disappointed, yes. Surprised, no.</a> Like it or not this is the way our system in the US works. It will be interesting to see why the three judges ruled the way they did but I bet it will come down to, "the <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> knows best." Defer to big government, they know whats best for us peons.<br />n<br />nA couple of interesting points.<br />n<br />n<blockquote>American Meat Institute president J. Patrick Boyle said the industry will be able to resume cattle shipments quickly. <br />n<br />n"Feeders in Canada and packers in the United States, working with our respective governments, had planned to begin importing those live cattle effective March 7," Boyle said. "A lot of the preliminary work is already done. I think you'll see the industry move quickly."</blockquote><br />n<br />nBut <a href="http://www.billingsgazette.com//index.php?id=1&display=rednews/2005/07/15/build/state/35-mt-cattle-ban.inc">here</a> we see;<br />n<br />n<blockquote>Edwards said he expected the "bull racks (trucks) to race south across the Canadian border directly. I'd look real carefully north before I crossed the highway."<br />n <br />nAlberta cattleman Darcy Davis discounted Edwards' scenario.<br />n <br />nIt will be a week or two before any cattle move south, said Davis, the vice chairman of the Alberta Beef Producers.</blockquote><br />n<br />n<blockquote>Davis said there would be "no wall of cattle" coming across the border all at once.<br />n <br />n"We have packing plants up here, there is feed available and the price is up," he said. "Our trucking industry has been decimated (by the border closure two years ago) so we have no excess trucking." </blockquote><br />n<br />nSo will they or won't they be bringing cattle across? The meat packers say they are going to flow across quickly but Canadian cattle producers say they won't. Who to believe?<br />n<br />nIf there are packing plants in Canada, plenty of feed, and no excess trucking, why was it so important to Canada to get the border open? Leave it closed and their own packing plant benefits. Open it and the cattle flow across so the magical <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> seal of approval gets stamped on the meat.<br />n<br />n<blockquote>Donald, president of the MSGA, said the state organization and the National Cattlemen's Beef Association had presented Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns a list of 11 conditions they wanted met before the border was opened. <br />n<br />nDonald said the condition "most unreachable" was keeping the <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> grading stamp off imported cattle.</blockquote><br />n<br />nConsumers wrongly see the <acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> stamp as a sign of US beef. Nothing will change now, the big meat packers win and everybody else loses.<br />n<br />n<blockquote><b>"This is a sad day for the cow/calf producers," he said. "<acronym title="United States Department of Agriculture, Bought and Paid for by The Big Meat Packers">USDA</acronym> made a political decision then worked backward to craft the science."</b></blockquote><br />n<br />n<b>I feel disappointed, but I don't remember just what I expected. Mason Cooley</b. <br />