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Friday, September 17, 2021
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the opinions of the authors but
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Opinion
Editor & Publisher
Managing Editor
Joe Beach
Carl Sampson
opinions@capitalpress.com | CapitalPress.com/opinion
Our View
New name needed for laboratory meat
T
he USDA has a tough job
ahead. It needs to come up
with a moniker for meat that
is grown in a laboratory. For want of
a better word, the agency is calling
it “cultured” meat, but it’s looking
for suggestions from the public for a
better name.
Unprompted, some of our Facebook
friends offered their own suggestions:
“Crap.”
“Yuck.”
“Disgusting.”
“Lab-raised meat” was another more
diplomatic suggestion.
Judging from these responses, find-
ing a new name will not be easy.
Lab meat didn’t even exist a few
years ago. It is produced by taking
muscle cells from a cow — or hog or
chicken — and placing them in a petri
dish or other container and feeding
them. As the cells multiply, they grow
in chains. Add some red coloring —
lab meat tends to be gray — and grind
it up and you have the makings of a
hamburger.
Other than donating a few mus-
cle cells, no animals are involved. The
cells are fed in much the same way
a scientist would grow a culture of
bacteria.
It took two years and nearly
$300,000 to produce the first lab
“burger,” according to Mark Post, a
Dutch scientist who led the effort. In
an interview, he estimated it would
take 10 more years to get lab meat to
market.
Other companies, including meat
processors Tyson and Cargill, have also
joined the quest to bring lab meat to
market. Some consultants believe that
by 2040 most of the meat consumed
will come from laboratories and not
ranches or farms.
We’ll see about that. You’ll note that
the one thing that doesn’t come up in
these conversations is the price con-
sumers will pay. Producers of plant-
based fake “meat” have already faced
some resistance to their prices.
That’s why USDA is trying to
come up with a name for the laborato-
ry-based meat. The new name needs to
clearly indicate to consumers and oth-
ers that this “meat” is entirely different
from typical beef, pork or chicken.
That’s where some other products
have stumbled, and confused consum-
ers in the process. For example, the
dust-up over calling beverages made
Our View
When the state faces
its own mandates
W
e have from the start advised those
Oregon State Police.
Several news outlets reported that Oregon
old enough and medically able to be
OSHA
received at least a dozen complaints that
vaccinated against the COVID-19
mask rules were not enforced on the grounds.
virus. We have also pressed employers to take
Photos posted on social media indicate wide-
reasonable steps to protect their employees, and
spread flouting of the governor’s rules.
that everyone take whatever steps they believe
“We are adding steps. Over the weekend, we
necessary to protect themselves.
talked
with Oregon OSHA, and they will be vis-
We are firmly in the anti-COVID camp.
iting the fair on their time frame,” Oregon State
We have been critical of many government
Fair spokesperson Dave Thompson told KOIN.
regulatory actions related to the
“They will be looking specifi-
pandemic, particularly those
cally at the vendors and staff and
borne of sweeping emergency
the people we do have some con-
executive orders that have
trol over and make sure they’re
escaped legislative review.
wearing masks. Vendors could be
Almost from the start, the
state governors imposed strict
fined thousands of dollars.”
rules on businesses and employ-
OSHA was sent to hold ven-
ers, and sent out regulators to
dors to the rules, but not to make
force compliance.
the fair enforce the rules on its
The state of Oregon found
patrons. Ejecting uncompliant
out recently how hard it is to
fairgoers would have been hard,
enforce its own mandates.
unpopular and not much fun.
After a one-year hiatus, the
Ag employers can empathize.
Oregon State Fair returned this
They have, in effect, been turned
year with the theme “Fun makes
into agents of the state. If they
a comeback.” Maybe a little
fail to comply with the rules, or
too much fun, at least for some
are thwarted by uncooperative
patrons.
Mask mandates also made a come- employees or customers, they
Late last month, Gov. Kate
back at this year’s Oregon State
can be heavily fined by the state.
Brown mandated that masks be Fair.
In an ideal world, the experi-
worn in public settings, indoors
ences
of
an
actual
agent
of the state with enforc-
and outdoors, at large gatherings such as the fair
ing state diktats would inform regulators to the
and the Pendleton Round-Up. The fair, a pub-
practical problems of compliance and ameliorate
lic corporation, is a government entity that oper-
their attitudes toward good faith efforts put forth
ates under the authority of state statute. The fair-
by the regulated.
grounds and the facilities located on the grounds
Alas, the world is far from ideal.
are owned by the state. The fair is patrolled by the
READERS’ VIEW
Carbon fees harm
economy
“Wink, wink. Nudge, nudge.” It
ain’t so.
A recent op-ed piece praising car-
bon fees and credits shows that the
author really does not believe what she
writes. At best, carbon fees “nudge”
producers, harming the economy
while having little or no effect on “cli-
mate change.”
This is politics at its worst, mere
show, positions unsupported by evi-
dence, which don’t begin to solve the
false problems they purport to address
while allowing advocates to display
“virtue” and look morally superior.
Her logic and evidence are likewise
defective. The new UN Report’s “code
red” assertions outrun and are contrary
to its evidence, which is that climate
change is less likely (than the last UN
Report).
Read, by a real expert, Steven Koo-
nin’s 2021 “Unsettled: What climate
science tells us, what it doesn’t, and
why it matters.”
Likewise, the writer’s insinuation
that climate change is causing extreme
weather events, is not supported by the
evidence, including the UN Report.
Three hot days in Oregon does not
prove climate change. One swallow
does not make a summer.
It is also economically illiterate to
suggest to assert that such policies will
be costless to poor and middle-class
Americans. Taxes and fees are inevita-
bly passed on to consumers.
Government, to enforce them, inev-
itably grows and grows (and costs).
Indeed, as government grows, the
administrative state imposes undemo-
cratically ever more regulations, disin-
centives and costs.
Sadly, the writer is correct on
one thing: much of this madness
is bipartisan. Moderns lack respect
for the golden goose of free market
capitalism.
The Capital Press, issue after issue,
case after case, shows the animus of
the administrative state against produc-
ers: farmers, ranchers, miners, energy
producers. The federal and state gov-
ernments and agencies are engaged
in warfare (lawfare) against produc-
ers. Ever-accumulating regulations kill
business, especially farmers on short
margins.
Unfortunately, uninformed vot-
ers elect, as in Portland, utopian pol-
iticians who believe that food comes
from supermarkets, and energy from
plugs, who don’t recognize that the
energy revolution has transformed the
world, and saved billions from pov-
erty, starvation, war and slavery.
While still enjoying the benefits,
they want to shut down farms, ranches,
extractive industries and remove/
prohibit dams, pipelines, transmis-
sion lines, refineries and all sources of
energy (oil, gas, nuclear, hydro, coal).
A major American problem is the
cancerous growth of the administra-
tive state, of “experts” who rule in
place of the people and their repre-
sentatives, who tyrannically combine
(against which Montesquieu warned)
the three powers (legislative, execu-
tive, judiciary). Their “solutions” to
“climate change” are “watermelon”
solutions (green on the outside, red
on the inside), which increasingly
socialize and harm America and the
West, while allowing China, India
and other countries “their turn to
pollute.”
Alan L. Gallagher
Canby, Ore.
from soybeans or nuts “milk” could
have been avoided if those companies
had given some thought to a new name
and not appropriated the dairy indus-
try’s standard-bearer.
We’ve got an idea. Instead of trying
to parade this new product as a facsim-
ile of real beef, why not come up with
an entirely new name?
How about Labster?
Or LaBurger?
Or unBurger?
Or the Substance Formerly Known
as Meat?
Whatever the good people at USDA
decide, the new name should not
include beef, pork or chicken. They
come from an entirely different place,
and it’s not a laboratory.
The fight for
Oregon’s future is
here — please join us!
his last week, the
Oregon Legislature
released their propos-
als for redistricting in the
state, and the stakes have
never been higher. This
redistricting process follows
on the heels of the 2020
census and will be com-
pleted in a special session
later this month.
While Oregon agricul-
ture has strong friends in
the Legislature on both
sides of the aisle, the past
several years of rule under
the Democrat super major-
ity has taken its toll on
our farm and ranch fam-
ilies. Without the proper
checks in the system, doz-
ens of policies have passed
that have increased costs for
Oregon’s producers, with
policies that benefit produc-
ers becoming increasingly
more rare in Salem. As a
non-partisan organization,
the Oregon Farm Bureau
works with both parties in
Salem to achieve the best
policy outcomes we can for
Oregon producers.
The 2021 redistricting
process has the potential to
make that job exponentially
harder. Rural voices were
already diluted in the 2010
redistricting process. We
cannot afford to allow par-
tisanship to further reduce
our voice in the Legislature.
Countless farm and ranch
families are barely hanging
on. Adopting new districts
that will disenfranchise farm-
ers and ranchers and further
encourage policies that only
harm rural communities will
be the last straw for many ag
and rural families.
Each party has released
its own proposals for redis-
tricting. To put it plainly, the
proposals put forward by the
Democrat majority represent
gerrymandering by every
metric. Across the state, the
Democrat proposal seeks to
cement their super major-
ity by ensuring that many
rural parts of the state are
likely to be represented by
urban Democrats, diluting
the voice of rural Oregon in
shaping policy.
The Legislature is under
a court-ordered deadline to
complete redistricting by
Sept. 27, or the task will fall
to Secretary of State Shemia
Fagan. The 2020 census data
has shown Oregon is entitled
to a 6th Congressional seat,
and Oregon’s House and
T
GUEST
VIEW
Angela
Bailey
Senate boundaries will also
need to be adjusted as Ore-
gon’s population has shifted.
The stakes have never been
higher.
Oregonians across the
state expect maps to be
drawn fairly and in a com-
pact manner, with communi-
ties of common interest like
school districts and neigh-
borhoods left intact. We
must ensure that farm and
ranch families are kept in
districts where their voices
are collectively strong and
represented, not more dis-
persed by drawing them into
districts with higher popu-
lation density and different
needs and perspectives.
The Oregon Farm Bureau
was part of a broad coali-
tion to run a ballot measure
last year to ensure the Ore-
gon had a truly independent
redistricting commission.
With COVID restrictions,
that measure did not make
it on the ballot, but we will
continue to push for mean-
ingful reform of Oregon’s
redistricting process.
In the meantime, we need
rural Oregon to show up
and make your voice heard!
There is still a chance to
influence the process, and
a strong turnout will both
show the Legislature that
rural Oregon is not going
to be disenfranchised with-
out a fight and increase the
chances of successfully
fighting indefensible bound-
aries in court. There are
hearings taking place over
the next two weeks, and you
can write in before Sept. 21.
Who represents you in
Salem has never been more
important for the future of
agriculture in Oregon. If
you do anything this week,
please find a way to make
your voice heard and stand
up for the rights of rural
Oregon. Visit OregonFB.
org/advocacy to take action
on redistricting today!
Angela Bailey is pres-
ident of the Oregon Farm
Bureau and a fourth-gen-
eration farmer operating
a nursery in Gresham that
specializes in Japanese
maples.
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