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- GMO and the Corporate Patenting of Living Organisms: Monsanto’s Patents on Life (Global Research, March 1, 2013):

Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court began hearing arguments in a seed patent infringement case that pits a small farmer from Indiana, 75-year old Vernon Hugh Bowman, against biotech goliath Monsanto. Reporters from the New York Times to the Sacramento Bee dissected the legal arguments. They speculated on the odds. They opined on the impact a Monsanto loss might have, not only on genetically modified crops, but on medical research and software.

What most of them didn’t report on is the absurdity – and the danger – of allowing companies to patent living organisms in the first place, and then use those patents to attempt to monopolize world seed and food production.

The case boils down to this. Monsanto sells its patented genetically engineered (GE) “Roundup Ready” soybean seeds to farmers under a contract that prohibits the farmers from saving the next-generation seeds and replanting them. Farmers like Mr. Bowman who buy Monsanto’s GE seeds are required to buy new seeds every year. For years, Mr. Bowman played by Monsanto’s rules. Then in 2007, he bought an unmarked mix of soybeans from a grain elevator and planted them. Some of the soybeans turned out to have been grown from Monsanto’s patented Roundup Ready soybean seeds. Monsanto sued Mr. Bowman, won, and the court ordered the farmer to pay the company $84,000. Mr. Bowman appealed, arguing that he unknowingly bought soybeans grown from Monsanto’s seeds, not the seeds themselves, and that therefore the law of “patent exhaustion” applies.

The press and public have fixated on the sticky legal details of the case, and the classic David vs. Goliath nature of the fight. But win or lose, Mr. Bowman’s predicament is part of a much bigger problem.

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Tags: Agriculture, DuPont, Economy, Environment, Food, Genetically Modified Organisms, Global News, GMO, Herbicides, Law, Monsanto, Roundup, Roundup Ready, Supreme Court, Syngenta, U.S.

- GMO fail: Monsanto foiled by feds, Supreme Court, and science (Grist, Feb 15, 2013):

It’s been a good week if you enjoy a little GMO schadenfreude. The FDA has reportedly bowed to public pressure to extend the comment period on its approval of genetically engineered salmon, and Illinois, Maryland, and Iowa are the latest states to buck GMOs by introducing labeling bills into state legislature.

Even the Supreme Court has an opportunity to take Monsanto down a peg. On Feb. 19, the court will hear arguments in a patent infringement case between an Indiana farmer and Monsanto (I covered it in detail here). If Monsanto prevails, it’ll move a few more paces towards agricultural monopoly; if it loses, the company will take a couple steps back. It’s encouraging that the Supreme Court chose to hear the case over the solicitor general’s urging to dismiss it, but Monsanto could have an inside man: As in other Monsanto-related cases, former Monsanto-lawyer-turned-Supreme-Court-Justice Clarence Thomas has no plans to recuse himself.

But GMOs took the biggest punch this week from academia: Tom Philpott highlights a USDA-funded study [PDF] by University of Wisconsin scientists who found that several types of GMO seeds (including Monsanto’s RoundUp Ready varieties) actually produce a lower yield than conventional seeds. Only one seed — a corn that produces its own pesticide to combat the corn borer — offers any significant yield benefit. In other words, planting most genetically modified seeds results in less harvest per acre than planting non-genetically modified seeds.

The researchers looked at 20 years of data from test plots in Wisconsin from 1990-2010, both on research plots and on plots in participating farmers’ fields. Philpott flags a key point from the study: Continue reading »

Tags: Agriculture, FDA, Food, Genetically Modified Organisms, Global News, GMO, Government, Health, Monsanto, Politics, Salmon, Science, Supreme Court, U.S., USDA

- Indiana soybean farmer sees Monsanto lawsuit reach US supreme court (Guardian, Feb 9, 2013):

Who controls the rights to the seeds planted in the ground? A 75-year-old farmer takes the agricultural giant to court to find out

As David versus Goliath battles go it is hard to imagine a more uneven fight than the one about to play out in front of the US supreme court between Vernon Hugh Bowman and Monsanto.

On the one side is Bowman, a single 75-year-old Indiana soybean farmer who is still tending the same acres of land as his father before him in rural south-western Indiana. On the other is a gigantic multibillion dollar agricultural business famed for its zealous protection of its commercial rights.

Not that Bowman sees it that way. “I really don’t consider it as David and Goliath. I don’t think of it in those terms. I think of it in terms of right and wrong,” Bowman told The Guardian in an interview.

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Tags: Agriculture, Environment, Genetically Modified Organisms, Global News, GMO, Government, Indiana, Law, Monsanto, Roundup, Roundup Ready, Society, soybeans, Supreme Court

- Must Watch Video: Is the NDAA Lawsuit Headed to the Supreme Court? (Liberty Blitzkrieg, Feb 7, 2013):

The NDAA lawsuit is one of the key topics I have written about over the past year or so.  For those of you that aren’t up to speed, one of the most popular posts I ever wrote was NDAA: The Most Important Lawsuit in American History that No One is Talking About.  Basically, Section 1021 of the NDAA allows for the indefinite detention of American citizens without charges or a trial.  Journalist Chris Hedges and several others sued Obama on the grounds of it being unconstitutional.  Judge Katherine Forrest agreed and issued an injunction on it.  This was immediately appealed by the Obama Administration to a higher court, which promptly issued a temporary stay on the injunction.

Yesterday, oral arguments began in front of this aforementioned higher court; the 2nd Circuit.  As Chris Hedges states in the interview below, if they win the case then it will likely be brought in front of the Supreme Court within weeks.  On the other hand, if the Obama Administration wins and the Supreme Court refuses to hear the appeal, Hedges states: “at that point we’ve just become a military dictatorship.”

To get a full update on the progress of the NDAA lawsuit make sure to watch this video.

YouTube

Tags: Barack Obama, Bush administration, Chris Hedges, Constitution, Dictatorship, Exxon, Fascism, George Bush, Global News, Goldman Sachs, Government, Law, Middle East, Military, NDAA, New World Order, Obama administration, Politics, Raytheon, Society, Supreme Court, U.S., War

- Pakistani Supreme Court orders arrest of prime minister in corruption case (CNN, Jan 15, 2013):

Islamabad — The Pakistani government came under attack from two angles Tuesday as the Supreme Court ordered the arrest of the country’s prime minister and a rowdy anti-government rally took place near the national parliament.

Even by the standards of Pakistan’s often turbulent politics, it was a stormy day that ratcheted tensions ahead of national elections later this year.

The Supreme Court, which has clashed repeatedly with Pakistan’s political leaders in recent years, issued the arrest order for Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf and a number of other officials over allegations of illegal payments for electricity generating projects when Ashraf was minister for water and power.

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Tags: Government, Pakistan, Politics, Society, Supreme Court

- Supreme Court rules cops can be filmed (RT, Nov 27, 2012):

Smile for the camera, coppers — the US Supreme Court has decided to let stand a lesser ruling that allows citizens in the state of Illinois to record police officers performing their official duties.

Up until just last year, an anti-eavesdropping legislation on the books across Illinois meant any person within the state could be imprisoned for as much as 15 years for recording a police officer without expressed consent. In August 2011, a federal appeals court struck down the law, but an Illinois prosecutor has asked the Supreme Court — unsuccessfully — to challenge that ruling.

On Monday, the top justices in the US said that they would not hear the case and will instead rely on last year’s ruling where a federal appeals court in Chicago agreed that the eavesdropping law, as written, “likely violates” the First Amendment.

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Tags: Constitution, First Amendment, Global News, Government, Law, Police, Politics, Society, Supreme Court, U.S.

- Supreme Court rejects plea to ban taping of police in Illinois (Chicago Tribune, Nov 26, 2012):

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear an appeal of a controversial Illinois law prohibiting people from recording police officers on the job.

By passing on the issue, the justices left in place a federal appeals court ruling that found that the state’s anti-eavesdropping law violates free-speech rights when used against people who audiotape police officers.
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Tags: ACLU, Global News, Government, Law, Police, Politics, Society, Supreme Court, U.S.

YouTube Added: 18.10.2012

Tags: Barack Obama, Constitution, Dictatorship, Dogs, Drugs, Fascism, Fourth Amendment, Global News, Government, Law, New World Order, Obama administration, Police, Police State, Politics, Privacy, Society, Supreme Court, U.S.

- Supreme Court Terminates Warrantless Electronic Spying Case (Wired, Oct 9, 2012):

The Supreme Court closed a 6-year-old chapter Tuesday in the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s bid to hold the nation’s telecoms liable for allegedly providing the National Security Agency with backdoors to eavesdrop, without warrants, on Americans’ electronic communications in violation of federal law.

The justices, without comment, declined to review a lower court’s December decision (.pdf) dismissing the EFF’s lawsuit challenging the NSA’s warrantless eavesdropping program. At the center of the dispute was 2008 congressional legislation retroactively immunizing the telcos from being sued for cooperating with the government in a program President George W. Bush adopted shortly after the September 2001 terror attacks.

After Bush signed the legislation and invoked its authority in 2008, a San Francisco federal judge tossed the case, and the EFF appealed. Among other things, the EFF claimed the legislation, which granted the president the discretion to invoke immunity, was an illegal abuse of power.

The New York Times first exposed the NSA’s warrantless wiretapping of international phone calls to and from Americans in 2005. A former AT&T technician named Mark Klein later produced internal company documents suggesting that the NSA was surveilling internet backbone traffic from a secret room at an AT&T switching center in San Francisco, and similar facilities around the country. Klein’s evidence formed the basis of the now-dismissed suit, Hepting v. AT&T. Continue reading »

Tags: Bush administration, George Bush, Global News, Government, Law, NSA, Politics, Society, Supreme Court, U.S., warrantless eavesdropping, warrantless wiretapping program

Don’t miss:

- Former Royal Navy Microwave Weapons Expert And UK Intelligence Services Agent Dr. Barrie Trower: Dangers And Lethality Of Microwave Technology (Video – 2:19:36)

More links on cancer causing mobile phones are down below.

A landmark court case has ruled there is a link between using a mobile phone and brain tumours, paving the way for a flood of legal actions.

Britain is one of only a few countries in Europe where customers still have to contact their existing mobile phone provider to tell them they are leaving, rather than phoning a new supplier and letting them sort out the paperwork.

- Mobile phones can cause brain tumours, court rules. (Telegraph, Oct 19, 2012):

Innocente Marcolini, 60, an Italian businessman, fell ill after using a handset at work for up to six hours every day for 12 years.

Now Italy’s Supreme Court in Rome has blamed his phone saying there is a “causal link” between his illness and phone use, the Sun has reported.

Mr Marcolini said: “This is significant for very many people. I wanted this problem to become public because many people still do not know the risks.

“I was on the phone, usually the mobile, for at least five or six hours every day at work.

“I wanted it recognised that there was a link between my illness and the use of mobile and cordless phones.

“Parents need to know their children are at risk of this illness.”

Continue reading »

Tags: Cancer, Cell Phone, EU, Europe, Global News, Italy, Mobile Phone, Supreme Court, Tumors