Gourmet Beef

Dating a medical student who is in the mist of studying microbiology one becomes quickly paranoid about what to eat and where to swim. You learn chlorine kills very little of what will actually kill you and all your food is a death trap. For instance, Taenia Saginata, Beef Tapeworm:

“A cow rancher arrives at the EW [emergency ward] terrified after discovering a worm-like structure protruding from his anus. After reassuring the man and taking a proper history and physical, the doctor examines a stool sample. As expected, the doctor finds rectangular proglottid segments with the naked eye and uses a low-power microscope to detect eggs… [doctor prescribes medicine]…The doctor also instructs the patient to avoid poorly cooked beef in the future.”

Now this is just 1 note card of 140. Fortunately for the rancher this disease did not prove fatal. But looking at the effects of even worse pathogens such as mad cow disease, a prion that is virtually undetectable until symptoms arise and basically without a cure, we find a much more frightening ending. Over the last year several outbreaks of mad cow disease surfaced over the Canadian Provinces (America Jr.), and meat from these ranches ended up in the US food circulation. This contamination hurt the beef industry all across America, and the pain continues to this day.

Knowledge that busses made in Hungry explode when they reach 50 miles per hour does not decrease the sale of Mack trucks. This is because buyers have labels telling them who built their automobile and where the vehicle was made.

Former Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle and South Dakota Senator Tim Johnson both lead a fight to put labels on packaged meat describing at minimum their country of origin and with hopes of displaying the specific farms and slaughter houses the beef in package attended. Implementing these types of regulations on what we consume is strategic in keeping a solid agricultural industry as well as a healthy nation. However, with such logical steps toward National Defense (strengthening our agriculture and protecting the common health) these two senators found resistance with republicans calling on only unjust war and exorbitant military spending for national priorities. South Dakota being among the top beef states in the country one would expect that at least their republican senator to back this initiative. Even if the issue doesn’t directly favor big business and big oil it was a campaign promise, and a potentially big program for the state he is supposed to represent. While John Thune continues to take trips across the country at the expense of tax payers, (Alaska, California, Washington State, South Carolina, Georgia, Virginia, Colorado, and Tennessee (8 states in 6 weeks)) South Dakotans have given up hope on their freshman Senator Thune. They have decided to implement a Ranch of Origin labeling imposed by law enforcement. The program will allow consumers to search online back to where their beef was raised and slaughtered. This could possibly make SD beef into a gourmet commodity. However, full implementation is many years off due to the lack of federal government support from republican leaders’ and initiative by John Thune. It is too bad that Thune had other interests than his Job to worry about; otherwise his “connections” to the people in Washington would have gotten this done a long time ago. With Mad Cow disease becoming more prevalent and borders becoming weaker it is amazing Thune’s prioritizes were with taking vacations and raising money, rather than protecting America and representing South Dakota.

SD Gourmet Beef

And by the way, John has also refused to help keep Ellsworth Air Force Base open in Western South Dakota; thus giving the BRAC no resistance in closing the strategic B-1 Bomber fleet and 5,500 South Dakota jobs. I am glad we elected a guy who has the ear of the president and the hand of the Senate Majority Leader.