’)This is the sort of thing I like to highlight when people complain about not enough changes coming. There are whole host of things, as the Bush administration showed, subject to the power of the executive branch and a new president with a sane political philosophy can make those changes.
During the Bush administration, the Justice Department did not file a single case under antimonopoly laws regulating a dominant firm. But that stretch seems unlikely to continue.
This year, the Obama Justice Department tossed out the antitrust guidelines of its predecessor because they advocated ‘extreme hesitancy in the face of potential abuses by monopoly firms.’
‘We must change course,’ Christine Varney, the Obama administration’s chief antitrust enforcer, said at the time.
Of all the new scrutiny by Justice, the Monsanto investigation might have the highest stakes, dealing as it does with the food supply and one of the nation’s largest agricultural firms. It could also force the Obama administration, already under fire for the government’s expanded role in the economy, to explain how it distinguishes between normal rough-and-tumble competition and abusive monopolistic business practices.
Monsanto says it has done nothing wrong.
Teddy Roosevelt time
So THIS is why they had to drop the already-won Black Panther voting rights case in Philadelphia, and why they don’t have time to investigate ACORN — “there’s someone making money AND food, and that’s GOTTA stop! How dare they charge what they want for their property?”
Such things must, of course, be squelched as quickly as possible.
So THIS is why they had to drop the already-won Black Panther voting rights case in Philadelphia, and why they don’t have time to investigate ACORN
You want me to look over where?
“there’s someone making money AND food, and that’s GOTTA stop! How dare they charge what they want for their property?”
Yeah, you’re right, the Obama administration hates it when businesses make money. Especially if they’re a producer of food. It’s really not just them, it’s all the socialist fascist communist Nazi Marxists (SFCNMs). I know that if I were president, my agenda would be to get legislation passed that would make it a felony to make any money. That goes for individuals as well as corporations. Any profits made by the private sector would go to my government, where I would use the money to pay for abortions and gay marriages. Some money would undoubtedly go to financially support Al Qaeda, because I love terrorists and sympathize with their plight. Anything left after that would just ship over to Iran or North Korea as a gesture of my support for their regimes and my hatred of America.
The latest strawman is that the libruls are anti-food. Where do conservatives FIND these people?
Joe is saying that because a company produces a product everyone needs, and controls that entire market, then it couldn’t possibly abuse its monopoly power. Joe does not understand how a monopoly operates.
About damn time. Monsanto is “making money AND food” by bankrupting indigienous farmers throughout Central America (our national trade and agriculture policy, largely written by Monsanto lobbyists) is the biggest reason for the waves of illegal immigration — we’ve made it impossible for thousands of poor farmers to make a living. Hey wingnuts! If you wanna stop illegal immigration, destroy Monsanto!
Also wingnuts like to pretend they’re in favor of personal property rights… Explain then how they can also be in favor of, say, a “salt of the earth” midwestern farmer being sued out of existence because some bioengineered crop pollens drifting over from the nearby giant agribusiness collective cross-pollinates some of the farmer’s corn crop, and all of a sudden that farmer is “violating Monsanto’s Intellectual Property rights” because he has a portion of his crop growing with a genome partially “copyrighted” by Monsanto. He’s gonna need to pony up the cash to Monsanto’s IP lawyers if he can’t control the winds and the bees!
Monsanto is among the most thoroughly evil corporations out there. I’d put it up there with Blackwater/Xe and Goldman Sachs for corporations that need to have everyone above the level of executive vice president publicly hanged.
I’m with Rheinhard. Monsanto also forbids harvesting seeds from its crops. This ancient practice has been a hedge against drought and other disasters literally since the dawn of agriculture, and yet Monsanto forces farmers in the third world – who often have no where else to go for their seeds – to sign an agreement saying they will not harvest their own seeds.
Agreed.
The copyright story Rheinhard talked about also happened over here in Canada. Monsanto’s bad practices have harmed people all over the world and if a few lawsuits can scare it into acting a little better, then it’s great news!
Rheinhard, it’s not copyright, it’s “patent.”
And ooh, Monsanto sunk a bunch of money and took some big risks into something that worked out really well. Those bastards! From the article:
So… Monsanto made a fantastic product with Roundup. Then they used that to come up with other products that work very, very well with Roundup. They sunk literally billions into the two, with no guarantees of success, and they want to reap the rewards of their efforts.
And that pisses off their competitors, like Dupont, who are blessed with a horde of willing tools like you to jump on Dupont’s bandwagon and punish success.
So, O, how much is Dupont paying you to shill for them on this?
(I know the answer already — zero. Why pay for what you can get for free? But I thought I’d pre-empt the “you’re just a shill for Monsanto” bullshit I’m sure someone will toss out.)
Don’t wanna use Roundup and Roundup Ready products? Then don’t. It’s their product, their property, and if they wanted to, they could just say “fuck you all” and simply shut it all down.
Wanna use their stuff? Abide by their terms.
You say it’s different because it’s food? Fine. Then kiss goodbye future products like Roundup, ‘cuz you’ve just killed off the profit motive that brought us that in the first place.
DuPont ain’t exactly crystal clean, either. Just sayin’.
You’re not paying attention, Joe – noone is suggesting Monsanto should give Roundup away for free. The problem is that when their genetically modified plants inevitably cross-pollinate with neighboring fields, Monsanto sues the small farmer – who doesn’t have the resources to fight back – for violating their patented hybrid.
I’m waiting for them to go after bees.
Oddly enough, Quaker, there’s absolutely no mention of Rheinhard’s issues in the linked article — just that DuPont is the one pushing this anti-trust lawsuit. And some casual research showed that he’s probably talking about a case in Canada where the farmer in question violated the terms of his contract with Monsanto and was sued. During the course of the civil trial, the farmer violated a court order to NOT destroy the seeds in question and was given eight months in jail for contempt.
Oh, the court decided that the farmer DID deliberately use Roundup Ready seeds without paying for them — but since he didn’t actually use Roundup, he got off on that with just a wrist slap. The contempt charge was incidental — and Monsanto had NOTHING to do with that. If you destroy evidence after a judge specifically tells you not to, I got NO sympathy for your ass.
I don’t feel like doing any more research on Rheinhard’s behalf. Let him find his own evidence. And while he’s at it, he can learn the differences between “copyright,” “patent,” and “trademark.” They are NOT interchangeable.
Monsanto’s aggressive tactics are hardly unknown, Joe, especially in the Midwest, where Monsanto sells GE-corn and GE-soy and has also bought up the “normal seed” companies so farmers no longer have places to go for non-GE corn or soy. Since you don’t seem too interested in finding the truth out for yourself, I’ll get you started. You can start here:
…
…
Joe – you snotnosed ass – I have been reading about Monsanto’s illicit, anticompetetive trade practices for years. I have been reading about what their corporate law thugs have been doing to mainstream family farmers for years. If you’re that fucking pig-ignorant that you think this one case and that one article contains the sum total of discussion of Monsanto’s crimes, then I don’t see why it’s worth my time to try and provide you with some list of links which you wouldn’t bother to read anyway, since they’d probably use too many polysyllabic words and so Glenn Beck wouldn’t be able to summarize them for you, leaving you with no option but to cut and paste another one of your tiresome “Look over there! ACORN” screeds.
I suspect that Joe Anonymous is probably Dennis. Though if you have seen one wingnut jackass, you’ve seen them all. I might be mistaken.
What baffles me is that conservatives continue to take the sides of giant corporations against the small businesses and farmers in this country.
Shorter Rheinhard: I got nothin’.
As far as polysyllabic words… you can’t handle “copyright,” “patent,” and “trademark,” with their mere two syllables, so I’m not overly intimidated.
So, was all your study of Monsanto’s offenses done while on DuPont’s payroll or something? After all, they’re the ones pushing this case against Monsanto…
Why do you do DuPont’s dirty work, Rheinhard? What’s in it for you?
And some casual research showed that he’s probably talking about a case in Canada where the farmer in question violated the terms of his contract with Monsanto and was sued.
Joe, are you talking about the Monsanto vs Schmeiser case?
So, just so I’m clear…DuPont has an interest in backing a suit against Monsanto.
Ergo, Monsanto cannot possibly have done anything wrong.
Is that the argument, Joe?
So Joe, you agree with Monsanto that small business seed cleaners should be run out of business, whether or not they have done anything illegal?
Clearly those small farmers used wind to steal from Monsanto.
Now, Quaker, THAT’S how you make an argument.
Rheinhard (doesn’t that sound an awful lot like “Rinehart?” Gotta be a coincidence) tossed out his accusations and then refused to back it up. Instead, he challenged me to do his homework for him.
Now, as for that pesky wind, Quaker… I took a comment from that CBS article you quoted and did some digging, and found this:
Source: PRRI Guide on notifications and Risk Assessment, 2nd Edition, p. 49. Downloadable here: http://pubresreg.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=29&Itemid=40
Monsanto’s tactics, if that CBS report is accurate (and Armen Keteyian has a pretty solid rep, despite working for CBS), are despicable. No argument. But I see that Monsanto won the case against the seed cleaner, before a jury — why?
Oh, here’s the other side of the story:
http://www.monsanto.com/monsanto_today/for_the_record/maurice_parr.asp
Parr was telling his customers that it was perfectly legal for them to violate their agreement with Monsanto and save their RoundUp Ready seeds for the next year as part of his sales pitch, that Monsanto’s contract was unenforceable, and they ought to have him clean their RoundUp Ready seeds so they can save them for the next year.
And what did big, mean ol’ Monsanto do to the old guy? They agreed to waive any damages if he promised to knock it off.
Note the link to a PDF of the settlement.
Let’s see… Rinehart/Rheinhard won’t offer any proof, Quaker steps up and offers half the story…
It seems to me that people are liking this proposed smackdown of Monsanto not on its own merits (as put forward by DuPont), but because Monsanto has it coming anyway. The relative merits of DuPont’s case don’t count; all that matters is that Monsanto be punished.
That sound about right?
See Joe, it’s not so hard to do your homework now, is it? Perhaps Parr was at fault in misleading his customers. However, that doesn’t explain why Monsanto is trying to drive the entire seed cleaning industry out of business, except to stifle the competition. Now that you’ve learned how to do a bit of research, check out the laws they are pushing in the upper mid-west concerning seed cleaning operations, making it all but impossible for small operations and co-ops to stay open.
Monsanto’s tactics, if that CBS report is accurate (and Armen Keteyian has a pretty solid rep, despite working for CBS), are despicable.
Which is why they are being sued under anti-trust laws, capiche? Buying up and making unavailable all sources of non-GMO seeds seems to fit that bill, not to mention their heavy-handed treatment of farmers and seed cleaners.
This guy couldn’t possibly be Dennis. This guy is good. Good Troll vs LiberalCommenter interaction is why I like it here.
Quaker, do a little of your own homework. Under the court decree, Parr can continue cleaning seeds — he just has to stop telling farmers that they can break their agreement with Monsanto with impunity. And they also forgave the financial portion of the agreement. It was a “go forth and sin no more” case.
Here’s the quote:
And who’s behind the anti-trust charges? Why, their biggest competitor — DuPont. Who stands to make quite a tidy sum of money if this goes through.
This ain’t David vs. Goliath here. This is Goliath vs. Goliath — and one of them wants the federal government to help them beat down their competition.
But as long as it’s red on red, though, Quaker, is that all that matters to you?
And I’m still suspicious about “Rheinhard” and “Rinehart” here. Odd that someone with so similar a name should know so many intricate details — but not be able to readily provide sources. It’s almost as if he knows this stuff intimately, for personal reasons, and doesn’t need to have to look any of it up.
What matters to me is that the government finally step in an stop some of these non-competitive practices that have been allowed to flourish over the last two decades. If the government can prove anti-competitive behavior on the part of Monsanto they should do so, regardless of who is “behind” the lawsuit. If your local drug dealer rats out his competition, would you prefer the police not to follow up on the tip just because it came from another drug dealer?
And I specifically addressed laws recently introduced into the state legislatures of Indiana and Illinois that would all but put seed cleaning out of business. Laws which were essentially written by and lobbied for by Monsanto.
And if the government wants to go after DuPont next for anti-trust violations, more power to them.
And if the government wants to go after DuPont next for anti-trust violations, more power to them.
Well, Monsanto certainly has both motive and precedent on their side if the DuPont-backed move goes through, SQ.
This surely is the highest duty of government — to help one big company fight another big company.
Ever seen what happens to the mice when elephants fight?
Neither have the elephants. Nor do they care.
Oh, and Quaker, Rheinhard should have been ready and willing to do his homework. If he puts forth something, he better be ready to back it up. I do my own homework (in this case, reading the original article and picking up on the DuPont element); he can do his own.