Farming Industrial Communism
How do U.S. food systems use communist principles to regulate, control, and crush small farmers?
There is often a distinction made between communism and crony capitalism, but these two systems use very similar authoritarian control measures. This plays out in all forms of government, but this post will analyze how these control mechanisms play out in food production.
Stalin and the Soviet Union overtook the farmland from peasants and forced them to work for the state. They were required to reach certain metrics of production, which were significantly higher than they were able to obtain before the communist government took control of food production. If the peasants didn’t meet their quotas, then they didn’t get to eat.
The Soviets were trying to catch up to the western countries with the industrial revolution, which required transitioning farm workers into industry workers in the cities. The remaining farmers had to carry a heavy load of providing enough sustenance to the military, the industry workers, and finally themselves.
The “kulaks'' were the so-called “wealthy” peasants that had a certain amount of farmland or any amount of livestock. Kulak was a pejorative term meant to paint the once independent farmers as the greedy individuals blocking Soviet communist prosperity. Some of them stood up to the government and refused to give over their food. They were sent away or killed for refusing to partake in the communist food production scheme.
The government mismanaged the food supply and created a famine, which they blamed on the kulaks. So the top down management system failed and it was a result of the kulaks who didn’t want to give up their land. Meanwhile, the unrealistic metrics created by the government and the authoritarian approach led to the starvation and death of millions.
So, how does this relate to capitalist systems when they are overtaken by cronies? Well, communism is defined as the government owning the means of production or sometimes referred to as the “public” owning the means of production. Capitalism is defined as having a free market which allows for more ingenuity and competition.
Monopolies within industry threaten the intended operational structure of the free market. When Amazon controls most of the online purchase market, they are able to dictate the terms sellers and manufacturers have to abide by. When Tyson, Cargill and others monopolize the meat industry, all ranchers become second hand employees to the corporate conglomerates.
The U.S. federal government has a number of agencies that are intended to protect the public from harms. These agencies include the FDA, CDC, USDA, FCA, and EPA, These agencies all have a well-known revolving door between the government regulatory positions and industry jobs. With this kind of relationship, the government is not a separate entity from the corporate producers they are intended to regulate. All of the agencies mentioned have used their regulatory power to assist the corporations at the expense of small farmers.
Furthermore, the regulatory structure and burden is used to weaponize the government against small producers for the benefit of the corporate conglomerates that essentially run the “crony capitalist” government. Here is a breakdown of how each federal agency assists the big food monopolies.
USDA
The department of agriculture can enact regulations upon farmers that are burdensome. The newest push is for RFID tags or EID tags. These are intended to be placed on every cow, goat, and sheep on commercial ranches. The stated benefit of doing so is to keep tabs on the potential spread of zoonotic diseases. The latest stated threat is bird flu or H5N1 that has been spreading between poultry and livestock.
The Soviet Union took control over the food supply for the benefit of the public so they could produce enough food for everyone while growing the country’s industrial prowess. The USDA wants to track all livestock for the benefit of the producer, because they will be able to track and prevent diseases earlier.
The stated intent gets the public on board with the proposal, but it opens the door for more regulatory control of the food system. After EID tags were approved in Ireland, the government suggested that they cull 200,000 livestock in order to meet carbon goals. Denmark has issued a carbon tax of $100 per cow that is expected to go into effect in 2030.
The primary regulatory methods of control come from the purported benefit to the greater public, just like under communist regimes. The threats of disease and climate change are the primary vectors to obtain support. The corporations say they care about reducing carbon emissions, but the real end goal is to regulate and price the small producers out of the market.
The USDA offered payments to farmers that are said to have a value of $28,000 per farm, which includes the cost for testing livestock for H5N1. Deborah Birx suggested every cow should be tested weekly for H5N1, otherwise the country will repeat the same mistakes it made during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Many might question how weekly testing of every cow would be harmful to the agricultural industry and the American economy. The PCR tests for COVID-19 were flawed and showed false positives. Dr. Birx has said she believes the cases of H5N1 in humans is higher because they have only tested those with symptoms.
The idea of asymptomatic infection combined with tests that return false positives will most certainly lead to an overreaction. How many farms will be shut down as a result and what impact will that have on the food supply and prices at the grocery store? The USDA funds are given to farms that volunteer to be part of the testing program.
The way that this can ramp up to pandemic proportions is if the farms volunteering start getting higher rates of infection followed by the CDC declaring the threat level has increased. Once the threat level increases, the cows and employees getting tested at farms may turn into a mandated protocol rather than a voluntary program.
The control of zoonotic diseases interconnects with the CDC, which is another way the federal agencies bypass accountability. The USDA can say they are enacting protocols on the basis of the CDC’s risk declaration. The CDC can say they are using the data provided by the USDA.
CDC
The CDC has data regarding raw milk dangers that they use to instill fear in the public. Raw milk producers are typically small farms and homesteads while the large dairy farms pasteurize the end product. The CDC is not forthcoming about the data that supports the claims of raw milk dangers, and the FDA also pushes this message to the public.
Not only is raw milk demonized as a dangerous bacterial cocktail, it is being listed as a cause for the spread of H5N1. In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the CDC can weaponize fear to turn the public against the farmers as many believe the messaging. That is the same thing the Soviet Union did with the kulaks.
For example, look at this Reddit forum about “fundies,” which is shorthand for fundamentalist Christians. Somehow, raw milk consumption has been lumped into a religious discussion so those that have issues with religious doctrine associate raw milk consumption with the same group. Meanwhile, they further jump to conclusions that raw milk consumers will spark the next pandemic without any evidence that it causes the spread of H5N1.
So, the spreading of irrational hatred to a group of people is fueled by the baseless statements of government agencies, which ultimately fills the bank accounts of the corporate executives that control the biggest farming operations in the country.
FCA
The Farm Credit Administration is part of a scandal exposed by lawyer/farmer Dustin Kittle. The intended purpose of the agency is to help small farmers get land so they can produce food for their communities. Domestic food production is an important aspect of sovereignty and freedom. The agency could have a positive impact for food producers if it worked as intended, but alas, it’s another captured agency within the crony capitalist government.
Kittle nearly had his two farms foreclosed despite never missing a payment. The agency was able to move his loan into distress because he was not providing enough additional collateral from his farm income. Traditional loans only require the collateral of the land and/or house, but farm credit loans ask for regular estimated payments of the farmer’s earnings. This goes into an account that is gatekeeper by the lenders while leveraging money from farmers who are trying to make ends meet.
This is very similar to the kulaks who had to meet their quotas before any food would be provided for themselves. Farm credit loans require the farmer to pay them a portion of their farm income in order to stay in good standing with the lender. That is in addition to the regular loan installment payment. Many of these farmers that Kittle represents are required to take extra jobs and struggle to get food on the table for their own families. It’s eerily similar to the Soviet kulaks.
EPA
The EPA is intended to discover contaminated land and water so they can protect the public from harm. The agency also has a secret backchannel where the chemical industry leaders can contact EPA managers directly to obtain support. A massive coverup has occurred for the train derailment by Norfolk Southern in East Palestine, OH. The agency allowed the corporation responsible for the disaster to hire their own contractors to do the testing.
The EPA quickly declared it was safe to move back into the town and also declared garden-fresh produce grown in the region was safe for human consumption. This is despite the independent testing results of Scott Smith that found extremely elevated levels of dangerous dioxins in garlic grown at a local farm.
Interestingly, the EPA allows the contamination of farm land by underregulating and also utilizes over-regulation to shut down small farmers. The EPA stated that biosolid fertilizers were safe for farmers to use on their acreage, but they had no limit on the amount of forever PFAS chemicals that could be in the fertilizer. This has caused an estimated 20 million acres of farmland to be contaminated. According to a former EPA lawyer, that number is likely a gross underestimate.
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Crony capitalists can wield their power in similar ways as communists. The overturning of the Chevron Doctrine by the Supreme Court is a huge step to removing unregulated power from the bureaucratic state. The FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb went from big pharma jobs to the head regulatory agency against vaccines. He was appointed by President Trump and promptly left the position to be on the Pfizer board. From that position, he leveraged his government connections to bully Twitter to censor speech that countered the positive messaging campaign regarding vaccines.
The FDA is also in charge of approving cell-cultured meats as well as the labels for these products. The FDA approval for GOOD Meat’s “cultured chicken cell material” that is harvested as a “cell mass or paste.” The approval states “We have no questions at this time regarding GOOD Meat’s conclusion that foods consisting of or containing cultured chicken cell material resulting from the production process defined in CCC 000001 are as safe as comparable foods produced by other methods. However, as you are aware, it is GOOD Meat’s continuing responsibility to ensure that foods it markets are safe, wholesome, and in compliance with all applicable legal and regulatory requirements, including those administered by FSIS. Should new production procedures, cell lines, or substances employed during production be used that could be relevant to the safety of the food, we strongly recommend that GOOD Meat consult with FDA to ensure that food resulting from any modified production process is in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations.”
The company did not do any safety testing on the product, but presented the manufacturing process and the FDA didn’t determine it would be any different than traditional meat products. Furthermore, it requests that GOOD Meat has the “responsibility” to ensure their food is safe. The agency “strongly recommends that GOOD Meat consult with FDA” if they change any procedures, cell lines, or substances.”
This is the honor system for corporations that are creating meat in a laboratory for human consumption. GMOs are another good example of concerns with consumption of informed consent. Now GMOs are required to be labeled on the product when purchased from a grocery store. They are not required to be labeled on a menu at a restaurant. Imagine if “cell-cultured” meat was to be served at a restaurant without a disclaimer. That is a possibility in the future with the nature of these regulatory agencies equating a laboratory food product to an agricultural animal product.