Musings: Let Them Eat Poison

The rat(s) were on dawn patrol, scampering up the wall and racing around in the roof, causing me to start wondering how many are in there, why they’re still in there, if their frenetic activity was perhaps death throes because they finally ingested the poison…..

To still my mind, and since sleep was no longer possible for either Koko or me, we headed out into that edge time between morning and night, followed by moon shadows, dense clouds overhead.

When we returned an hour later, the rat(s) were still settling in to sleep, which got Koko whining and me questioning why the poison isn’t working; after all, it’s been a week, which is how long the young buck who put out the bait said it might take.

The state Legislature, meanwhile, is addressing poison of another kind in a Senate bill aimed at banning aspartame, one of those yucky artificial sweeteners that people suck up in diet sodas and other such junk. Rep. Mele Carroll introduced a similar bill in the house.

The Senate bill, introduced by Kalani English and Suzanne Chun-Oakland, begins: "The legislature finds it is imperative for the public health, safety and welfare to declare that aspartame and its derivative compounds, in all of their trade names, are poisonous and deleterious food additives due to their neurotoxic and carcinogenic metabolites.

“The legislature finds that federal authorities have not intended to or expressed an intention to occupy and preempt areas of concern regarding the prohibition of toxic, neurotoxic, carcinogenic, poisonous or deleterious food additives, and therefore the legislature may prohibit the sale of products containing aspartame and its derivative compounds in order to protect and ensure the public health, safety and welfare.”

Wow. Just think, they can start with aspartame and move on to the rest of the crap that’s passed off as food. Before long, the grocery store shelves would be bare.

Maybe they’ll even take a giant step like banning genetically engineered food crops from Hawaii and restricting the sale of cloned animal products.

I’m not a fan of government telling people what they can do with their own bodies, and I doubt this bill has a chance. After all, the fake food lobby is huge, and similar attempts to ban aspartame in New Mexico failed. (That issue is addressed in an article distributed by LightLine and written by a woman who has launched an effort to warn the world about NutraSweet/Equal.)

Still, with the nation’s health declining and kids suffering from obesity and rickets, it’s time to get serious about the quality of the food we consume.

But rather than take on aspartame, I’d prefer the Legislature fund some nutrition education, create subsidies for organic farming, enact a strict food labeling law and ensure that food given to those in state institutions is of higher quality.

After all, you are what you eat.

Hmmm, maybe I should put out some diet soda for the rats.....