PORKER
Well-known member
Thats Right, I'll trust my buddie down the road with his ScoringAg pork and chicken before buying Smithfield and Tyson Too. I would eat Canadian too if they got ScoringAg records on their meat products too!
Just for the sake of discussion
- Thread starter Soapweed
- Start date
Mike
Well-known member
Texan said:
What I'm saying is it shouldn't have to be made mandatory. It should be done without question, and should have been done when the logistic capability became possible.
It's not me and you that have something to hide. It's the folks that don't want USA beef differentiated from the imported. Guess who?
Soapweed
Well-known member
Mike said:
Our little local town had a grocery store when Peach Blossom and I hitched up in double harness back in 1979. We patronized it exclusively. There were times when we were in other towns, when it would have been much easier and more cost effective to buy our groceries there. I insisted that we only buy in our little local store. Other ranch folks did the same, but guess what, the store folded up anyway.
The next closest town, where our kids went to school, had just one grocery store. Once again, we patronized it almost exclusively, trying our best to keep it alive. Others did, too, but that store layed down and died, going the way of the dinosaur. Anymore, any particular loyalty to any one store has gone out the window. We have come to the conclusion that some things just naturally evolve. Cream rises to the top. We now buy food and other necessities at stores that have what we want. Sure, we could insist on buying only American-made products, and in many cases pay twice the price for half the quality. But what is the point? There are still no guarantees that these businesses will stay in business.
I am proud of our cattle, and stamp the Spearhead brand on every calf born on this outfit. When weaning time comes, there is always 2-3% of the calves that I wish weren't labeled quite so blantantly as being a product of our Spearhead Ranch. I try to sell these calves at the tail end of some sale, and hope like heck that the auctioneer doesn't make too big of a deal out of the fact that they are my cattle. :wink:
When true hunger sets in, people become not nearly so fussy about what they eat. The Donner Party, stranded up in the Sierras during that long ago hard winter, got so they weren't very fussy at all. They ended up eating each other. I'll bet some old mad cow would have looked like quite a banquet to them.
Texan said:
I agree.
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Anonymous
Guest
Soap- You are right- times are changing...To me its a sad day when I see cattleman/ranchers helping/promoting the beef industry to deceive, defraud, and flat out lie to consumers....Pretty well shows you where the world is going... 
The old ranchers that formed NCBA (NCA) did so to fight against Packer fraud/corruption...The ranchers and NCBA of today want to crawl into bed with it.... 
The old ranchers that formed NCBA (NCA) did so to fight against Packer fraud/corruption...The ranchers and NCBA of today want to crawl into bed with it....
Soapweed
Well-known member
Mike said:
A lot of ranchers tend to think of the Packers as "the bad guys". Without them, our "cattle" would not be worth much. My polled cattle wouldn't even make good roping stock, and no one would want them just for pets. Sure, there are three or four packers that do most of the business, but they got to where they are because they excelled at what they did.
The packers realize that it will take a lot more time, labor, and expense if beef all has to be kept track of and labeled as to country of origin. That will just make the product cost more to consumers who really don't care anyway. Beef isn't quite like gasoline. People don't have to have beef to go about their business. They will buy a cheaper meat if beef gets too expensive. Sure, we want to get the most out of it as possible, but there is no use making an unrecoverable expense like COOL. It will just make the end product more expensive. Someone has to pay this extra "tax". Either the consumer will have to pay more, which might price them out of the market of buying beef to eat, OR, the rancher has to take less money for his cattle. Eliminate COOL, and both the consumer and the rancher will win.
As far as monopolies go, I personally wish that the nation's phone service was still all in the Ma Bell monopoly. When the Belle Telephone Company was considered a monopoly and broken up, and many new phone companies started up, service went all to heck and rates went higher. Sometimes it is not all that great to get everything we wish for.
Mike
Well-known member
Soap, with all due respect, I think you have lost it now. Before Reagan broke the Bell System up we were paying .35 cents per minute (and more)for long distance calls and had no choice but to pay $10.00 per month and up rent on those telephones.
Now I pay .03 cents per minute for my long distance and can go to most any store and buy a phone for $29.95.
The service has never been better. Competition is the lifeblood of capitalism.
Not even the liberals themselves question the breaking up of the BELL system as being a good move for competition in the U.S.
You been drinking gin with MRJ?
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Anonymous
Guest
The cost to producers to label is a Packer/USDA/NCBA smokescreen...They are now providing our customers around the world with USA beef under any one of the many USDA BEV programs.... The ability to segregate/label is already there and being used...
To me it is again sad that USDA can set up a program to provide Buku Egypt with verified USA beef, but refuses to do it for the US customer- who has been the loyal customer thru all the years....I think some are so blinded by the promise of Asian riches from exporting that they forget the beef/cattle industry's were not built on Japan or Korea or China-- they were built on the American consumer, which now is so loyal that they think they can lie to, deceive, throw a bone from anywhere to, and get away with it.....
To me it is again sad that USDA can set up a program to provide Buku Egypt with verified USA beef, but refuses to do it for the US customer- who has been the loyal customer thru all the years....I think some are so blinded by the promise of Asian riches from exporting that they forget the beef/cattle industry's were not built on Japan or Korea or China-- they were built on the American consumer, which now is so loyal that they think they can lie to, deceive, throw a bone from anywhere to, and get away with it.....
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Anonymous
Guest
If we are going to promote US beef, let's promote branded US beef, not some generic US commodity beef label to appease import blamers.
I find it absolutely amazing that some in our industry still refer to COOL as if it was source verification. Ironically, "M"COOL prohibited source verification ("M"ID).
Some slanted polls may show that consumers want Country of Origin labeling (assumed as source verification) if it doesn't cost them any more money but "M"COOL has nothing to do with SOURCE VERIFICATION. Those consumers who want COOL assume that they are getting source verification.
As has been shown by Texan, those same polls showed that consumers place country of origin at the bottom of their priority list.
"M"COOL, as written, exempted 75% of the imported beef that enters this country through the food service exemption. That leaves a measely 5% of the total US beef consumption labeled as imported under this flawed law creating a NOVELTY ITEM out of foreign beef. Consumers who believe most US consumers will prefer US product will have a hard time explaining the success of New Zealand lamb at the retail level.
Then to top that off, those who claimed that consumers should have the right to know where their beef comes from, didn't want the traceback system necessary to enforce it. LOL! As it is currently written, "M"COOL is unenforceable because it prohibited mandatory ID which was the only way to enforce M"COOL.
"Don't consumers have a right to know where their beef comes from........don't burden me with traceback".
THE ULTIMATE IN IMPORT BLAMING HYPOCRISY brought to you by the R-CULT followers.
John Kerry: "First I voted for it, then I voted against it".
"M"COOL, as currently written, is an absolute joke. For someone to blindly defend it as having any value speaks volumes.
How ironic that those who claim that "packers don't care about food safety" and "USDA doesn't care about food safety" assume that our beef is the safest in the world and want to differentiate it from Canada. LOL! Can't have it both ways.
I can see it now, a consumer walks up to the beef counter and says, "I'm not sure I want to buy any US BEEF because I heard this Bill Bullard fellow, who supposedly represents cattle producers, telling us that "USDA doesn't care about food safety". He said, "the packers don't care about food safety, all they care about is making money". Then he said that "Canadian beef is contaminated and high risk due to the fact that Canada had bse in their native herd" ......didn't we just have a case of BSE in our native herd"??? Why should I buy US BEEF? I think I'll buy chicken or pork".
With friends like Bill Bullard telling consumers that "USDA doesn't care about food safety" and R-CULT claiming that "having bse in your native herd means your beef is contaminated and high risk", who needs enemies?
Consumers want product differentiation in the form of source verification, not some generic "US BEEF" label on 95% of the beef which means absolutely nothing to the US consumer.
How ironic that in the era of product differentiation and source verification, the Derry Brownfield supporters of our industry bring us an unenforceable labeling law that exempts 75% of the imported beef. LOL!
With this type of emotionally driven empty legislation running our industry, this industry will continue to divide further between progressive producers and regressive blamers.
Interesting that someone noticed those bullet holes in the pictured skull. You can always tell these "so called cowBOYs" who are in the "cattle industry" from the "cattleMEN" who are in the "beef industry" because those who don't know anything about the "beef industry" shoot cattle between the eyes rather than in the center of the brain which is an imaginary "X" between the opposite ear and opposite eye. That's why these advocates of the "cattle industry" have to shoot these critters multiple times, as pictured.
If you didn't learn anything at all from this thread, at least realize that when you shoot an old cow, you draw an imaginary "X" from the opposite ear to the opposite eye to shoot them in the center of the brain as opposed to "BETWEEN THE EYES" which hits them in the nasal cavity below the brain. Always shoot them when their head is down and not when they are looking at you which can deflect the bullet. One shot with a .22 rimfire in the center of the skull will drop them like a sledge. I've never had to shoot one twice.
Texan, you are a breath of fresh air on a site that is usually dominated by industry blamers.
~SH~
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Anonymous
Guest
Old Timer you are so full of it. Any US consumer can currently buy source verified branded beef and so can you at your local locker plant. They don't need your stupid generic US BEEF labeling law to exempt 75% of the beef imported into this country.
"M"COOL prohibited the very traceback systems that you are promoting when they prohibited "M"ID so don't try to pretend that "M"COOL is source verification when the two have nothing in common.
You "M"COOL advocates wanted a simple system like the school lunch program to segregate imported beef but you're not even smart enough to realize that Canadian born cattle can qualify for the school lunch program if they were fed in the US.
ALL FOAM AND NO BEER!!!!!!!!
When you "M"COOL proponents argue that the costs of "M"COOL will be low, THAT'S BECAUSE YOU PROHIBITED "M"ID. With "M"ID, the costs would be higher. Without a source verification system to enforce "M"COOL, "M"COOL is absolutely worthless. You try to argue it both ways. If you change the law so it's enforceable, then you will have added expense of traceback. If the law stays as it is written, it won't cost much because there will be no traceback to enforce it making it worthless.
That's what you get when you have emotionally driven industry blamers like you making laws that affect the rest of us.
~SH~
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Anonymous
Guest
Why would I lobby for a government mandate when the free enterprise system is already providing source verification Conman?
You are the one who thinks we need more government intervention into our lives, you lobby to change "M"COOL so we have the added costs of segregating US beef for BALL PARK HOT DOGS and DOMINOS PIZZA. If you want to add an unnecessary expense to our industry, you lobby to fix this flawed law. WE DON'T NEED IT as far as I'm concerned.
~SH~
You are the one who thinks we need more government intervention into our lives, you lobby to change "M"COOL so we have the added costs of segregating US beef for BALL PARK HOT DOGS and DOMINOS PIZZA. If you want to add an unnecessary expense to our industry, you lobby to fix this flawed law. WE DON'T NEED IT as far as I'm concerned.
~SH~
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Anonymous
Guest
So are you suggesting that the salebarns shoud disclose the prices paid for all cattle, who bought them, and how they performed in the feedlots?
Oh, you were talking about YOUR DEFINITION of transparency weren't you?
Our markets are transparent. You are not an advocate of the free market, you want the government to determine who can own cattle and how they will be bought and sold. Damn hypocrite.
~SH~
Sandhusker
Well-known member
The government decides who can own certain stocks - how and when they can buy sell, etc... The government decides on who can own so many futures contracts. All of this is done for the greater good of a fair and efficient marketplace. You need to get out of your little Kadoka nest and see how the rest of the world runs.
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Anonymous
Guest
Comparing the stock market to cattle transactions is just one more "ILLUSION" you try to create oh lover of government mandates.
~SH~
~SH~
Sandhusker
Well-known member
~SH~ said:
They're both national markets, SH. Your lack of business accumen is showing again.
~SH~ said:
More information is always better for the markets. It prevents people from misusing information to their own ends and subvertint the free markets.
If you would like to discuss each of the items you bring up in detail, maybe you could start another topic on it.
Soapweed
Well-known member
Mike said:
Maybe it is different in more populated areas, but out here we on the end of the whip and get to suffer the whiplash. Our cell service is next to nothing. It is a rare call that we don't have to redial and try again. If you talk over a half a minute, it is guaranteed to cut off. The local tower is still analog, so if I forget to change phone batteries at noon, the battery is dead by three o'clock in the afternoon, even if I haven't even used the phone.
When Belle Telephone was the only one, it was nice to be able to make a call and have everything work. A person could always find a pay phone in some town, and make a phone call. Getting a phone number from Information was always free. I don't know how many times I'd call the operator from a pay phone, put a call through and charge it to my home phone. After the break-up, you couldn't do that anymore. Now you can hardly find a pay phone. The whole world revolves around cell phones, but ours don't work.
Sure, technology has come a long ways since then, but service has suffered. When ol' Mother Belle was in charge, things worked.
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Anonymous
Guest
Cattle transactions are not comparable to stock transactions. They are not conducted in the same manner. The reason you have so much free time is showing again.
~SH~
Soapweed
Well-known member
You know, SH, we have had a fairly lively discussion on this thread. We are not all agreeing, but everyone has disagreed with civility and respect until you got on. You are a decent fine fellow in real life. Why can't you be that kind of a person on the bull session? :???: