BLOGGING:

HERE AT MOLLY'S BLOG:

It's been a good year and a bad year. Personally, Molly has had a "little touch of colon cancer" which involved surgery and a recovery period at exactly the right time of the year ie that time when there is little money to be made but lots of unreasonable demands being made. ( Not now, not "right now", but "right fucking now"- for free) .I'll be back at work in early January, and I'm already able to do the various ballet contortions that say I can do what I have to do in my regular work, but I will go with my general "age restriction" and refuse to lift 100 lb weights and carry them "with dignity" like those who would never even conceive of doing such a thing imagine that I should do.) There are, after all, people from the local crematorium who will send out two young strong guys to do such labour. How fast I can throw my body out of harm's way to avoid death or permanent disability is still in doubt. That can't be judged by exercises. Enough bitching. I've done this job enough years to learn to defend myself from the idiocy of the public and their demands. You have never "hated" until you get a phone call at 7:00 am from an idiot (whom you don't answer) who has an appointment with another veterinarian at 10:00 am who thinks he can get you out at 7:30 am ( at, of course, less of a charge than the guy who will see his animal at 10:00 am). In such a situation one is tempted to phone the other vet and ask him or her to raise the price by 20% for the "asshole charge".

Ah well, enough of "the job". I hope to impress the surgeon on January 6 when I go back for the recheck.

The guy was Dr Momah, here in Winnipeg who did a very fine job, though I have to admit that my own determination had a lot to do with my rapid recovery. I was up and booting it less than 24 hours after having some of my guts cut out. I refused all pain killers because I wanted "my mind" during recovery, and I was right, as was evidenced by the the final visit of the "pain nurse" to my bedside shortly before my recovery.

Her point- "she had never said that "veterinarians knew more about pain than people in human medicine", even though, of course, she had never said such on our first meeting shortly after the surgery. My point- "I really don't know about that statement. But I offered her an article that I was reading about pain from Nature Magazine, and I tried to figure out why what she said "might" be true. What was left unsaid , to my great disgrace, was that my refusal of pain relief was not because I was a veterinarian and "knew more" (which she thought and I doubted even though I am a member of the IVAPM) but because I am who I am, and I have an unique sensitivity to certain drugs. It was very personal, and it influences the way that my anaesthesia was handled as well.

Quite frankly, should the US Empire ever get so deluded that they would put me into prison and torture me there is literally no pain that I could not endure. Most of it I would be capable of laughing at. All this to gain the fact that I know nothing. Pain might be frightening to those who have never experienced it before, and it also might be frightening for those whose emotions determined that they should "run from it". Neither case is applicable to me. Pain is my ete3rnal companion in every second of mty life.

OK, enough of my personal situation. As to this blog, over the last year it has essentially doubled its readership. This has been at the cost of time spent in "blog promotion", which means time away from posting new items. This is obviously necessary, but it is still annoying because of the "objections" that others have to this blog. I've tried to search down such objections, and at least one has been resolved. Molly's Blog, of course, isn't a money-making business. Any fool who thinks he can make money off "a Blog" is usually quite deluded.

Yet, there is other opposition that is pretty consistent. All of these sources eventually come together despite their different reasons. One source for labour blogs is that only social democratic posts will be allowed (or less than social democratic in the USA). Another for "Canada blogs" is that the interests of right wing readers and those who think that the actions reported are not "anarchist enough" coincide. This transfers over to those posts listed as "anarchist" where that tiny little part of international anarchism that is the deviation known as "anarcho-capitalism" in the USA objects to anything reported by Molly that might be "socialist". I will leave the ignorance of the Americans as to the term "libertarian socialist" to others.

All that I can say here is...that I will continue. Someone who can get up from gut surgery and walk the same day is hardly likely to be intimidated. Quite frankly, I am "on the side of the angels", in a general sense. Not every thing I say is right, but the objections have less validity than what I post here. I will walk on because am the toughest son-of-a-bitch that has walked this Earth since Roman times.

CURRENT EVENTS:

TAINTED BABY FORMULA NOW:

Last year the news in the spring was all about tainted pet foods which were laced with melamine in order to give a false high protein content. These products were produced in China, and the Chinese government made claims that it had addressed the problem. This year the news is restricted to China itself, and the victims are human, babies poisoned by infant formula adulterated with melamine. The following article from the IUF website tells how there is another culprit in the scandal besides the Chinese government- the Nestlé corporation. Molly would like to extrapolate from what is said below to insist that what the IUF says is very much true, that consumers cannot depend upon either the corporations or the state for protection, that there has to be independent organizations to monitor both government and the corporations. Note also how the Chinese government is still in its own business of censorship, something it seems to do quite more effectively than monitoring food safety.

................................

Nestlé Puts Public Relations Before Precaution in China Milk Scandal:

Share this article.

The Olympics have come and gone, and melamine, the toxic chemical used in the production of plastics, fertilizers, fire retardants and inks, among other products, is back in the news. Melamine, which can cause acute kidney failure when ingested, has become a favorite ingredient of Chinese food manufacturers to boost apparent protein content in adulterated products. In early 2007, it turned up in North American pet foods, including those marketed by Nestlé's Purina brand. It periodically surfaces in animal feed and even toothpaste. Now it's the culprit in the widening scandal arising from the contamination of Chinese-made milk products, fresh and powdered, which has resulted in the death of at least 4 babies, sickened over 53,000 and hospitalized some 13,000.

While other dairy producers initiated recalls and suspended production, Nestlé, putting public relations before safety, asserted that "that none of its products in China is made from milk adulterated with melamine." Shortly thereafter, the Hong Kong government found traces of melamine in a Nestlé milk product manufactured in mainland China. The traces were low, according to the government authorities, but it was recommended that it not be given to children. Following on a recall by leading supermarket chains, the product was eventually recalled at the request of the government. Nestlé responded with a press statement that all its milk products manufactured in China are "absolutely safe".

Massive, often fatal food contamination scandals have become a matter of such routine in China that no company, operating directly or through a joint venture, can claim to be manufacturing safely unless all stages of production and distribution are monitored for every possible source of contamination and adulteration. The policy of official laxness bordering on complicity was summed up in the official China Daily, which observed that the largest dairy manufacturers were exempt from safety inspections on the grounds that it was necessary to assist "internationally competitive producers of high quality products" by…sparing them regular testing. The explosive growth of China's booming market for dairy products, which saw annual sales double over the last five years to USD 18 billion, was an important spur to this regulatory exemption. Several Chinese commentators (since banished from the internet) have suggested that melamine adulteration was one way for companies to pass on rising input prices.

In this context of widespread corruption, criminally loose standards and the total absence of independent worker organizations to monitor worker and consumer health and safety, companies bear a particular responsibility. Repeated iterations of product safety aren't enough. Death and illness are the price of laxness

Safety concerns with Nestlé milk products aren't new. In 2002, Nestlé imported spent milk powder to Colombia, where it was repackaged (with new best before dates). Health inspectors found it before it was released for sale. Nestlé said it was repackaging the powder for health reasons.

In 2005, Chinese authorities detected excessive levels of iodine in Nestlé infant milk formula. Nestlé contended that the levels were "only a little bit higher" than the prescribed limits, and had to be dragged into a product recall and eventual apology. In 2005 again, this time in Europe, 30 million litres of Nestlé baby milk products were confiscated in Italy and the products were recalled in four other European countries when ink was found to be leaking off the packaging into the contents. Tetra Pak, maker of the packaging, claimed it had been aware of the problem and changed its production methods in September. The recall came only in November, after Italian police began confiscating the product from supermarkets, depots and lorries. Nestlé CEO Brabeck called this "a tempest in a teapot", insisting that the product posed no health risks.

Other transnational producers with operations in China have hardly covered themselves with glory in this affair - there are significant gaps in the chronologies spanning the discovery of the contamination and the effective implementation of product recalls and suspensions of productions. But Nestlé - the world's largest food company - has again distinguished itself by its dogged insistence on spin over precaution.