By Wayne Lusvardi

In 2004, California voters voted for Proposition 71, the Stem Cell Research and Cures Act. It has ended up doing nothing but help wealthy and connected elites grab $3 billion of taxpayer’s money with no promised cancer or paralysis cures on the near horizon.

According to opinion polls, California voters are again about to pass an initiative, Proposition 37. The Mandatory Labeling of Genetically Engineered Food Initiative promises much but is unlikely to deliver much — except to trial lawyers. Meanwhile, special interests would be exempted, much as Obamacare granted waivers to 1,200 companies.

Prop. 37 would require the labeling of “genetically engineered” (GE) foods in California. This voter initiative has been “engineered” to appeal to:

* Those who are fearful of big corporations re-engineering the genetics of food;

* Those of more libertarian persuasion who believe that government’s role is to limit fraud by full disclosure of ingredients in products;

* Those who believe in pure air, water, and organic foods.

However, there is no such thing as “pure” plant food because plants make their own pesticidesto protect from insect infestation.  Such natural pesticides are what makes broccoli have anti-cancer and anti-oxidant properties.

Genetic changes have made such foods possible as Ruby Red grapefruit, tangerines, tangelos, clementines, Valencia oranges, boysenberries, strawberries, loganberries and wines such as Chardonnay, Cabernet Sauvignon, and Pinot Noir, all of which we consider natural.  All foods, even genetically engineered foods, are already reviewed and regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

But genetically cultured cheeses, fermenting agents in beer and wine, and growth hormones in milk would all be exempted from Prop. 37.  That is because these are foods that are popular and highly visible.  But food additives such as corn oil or soybean oil derived from genetically changed strains of plants would be subject to regulatory capture.

Gregory Conko of the Competitive Enterprise Institute and Henry I. Miller, physician and molecular biologist at Stanford’s Hoover Institution, reveals the true purposes behind Prop.  37:

“Why then are Proposition 37 supporters so adamant about singling out genetic engineering? It’s simple: Labeling only GE foods would stigmatize those products, raise the costs of making them, discourage the use of the technology and encourage money-seeking lawsuits for inconsequential violations. In fact, the initiative seems to have been drafted with these very goals in mind.  Ironically, Proposition 37 would also impose huge costs on producers who try to avoid GE. Those committed to using GE ingredients can slap a “Genetically Engineered” label on their products and be done. But producers who want to sell non-GE foods must bear the costs of tracing the source of every ingredient they use and getting sworn guarantees that they “are not knowingly or intentionally” engineered.” 

Let’s Put a Label on the Faces of Prop.  37

The biggest donors to the Prop. 37 campaign are Jim Wheaton, a trial lawyer who wrote the wording of the proposition, and Joseph Mercola a doctor and alternative health supplement salesman. Their  businesses would stand to profit if the law passed.

According to the California Attorney General’s Office Annual Summaries of Private Settlements (see summary at link), Wheaton assisted in writing previous ballot measures that have shaken down businesses for $500 million over the last 20 years.

One of the provisions of Prop.  37 would allow lawyers to sue small neighborhood grocers and family farmers if the wording used on food labels was not compliant.  No harm would have to be proved.

The FDA already has powers to recall products, seize products, stopping manufacturing by court order, and impose criminal fines and jail time.  What Prop.  37 does is let third-party lawyers in on the enforcement action to shake down businesses.

The No on Prop.  37 campaign reports Joseph Mercola is a health supplement and organic food businessman who has invested $1.1 million into supporting the ballot initiative. Mercola runs the “world’s No. 1 natural health website” and is opposed to vaccinations for children, according to the San Diego Union Tribune.

Opposition is coming from liberal newspapers, such as the Los Angeles Times, and conservative ones, such as the Victorville Press.

Are the polls correct that Prop. 37 is winning? It’s hard to say. The response rates to opinion polls has dropped from 36 percent in 1997 to 9 percent in 2012. So polls aren’t as accurate as they used to be.

Commentary

Sept. 19, 2012

By Laer Pearce

The warm, caring hands of government are poised to protect us once again.  Just like how California started protecting us in 1986 from chemicals it knew, in its wisdom, could cause cancer, birth defects and other reproductive harm, it may soon be protecting us from those nasty genetically engineered foods.

In 1986, it was Proposition 65, the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act. I began to understand how sleazy that proposition was when I got a frantic call from a homebuilder client just a couple months after it passed.

“I’m going to have to put warning signs on all my new model homes or I’ll get sued,” he moaned. “What’s it going to do to sales if people have to walk by a cancer warning to go into one of my models?”

I told him not to worry because his competitors would have to post similar signs.  But I was curious why a model home would need a Prop. 65 warning.  After all, a brand new home is hardly a toxic sump of the sort the Yes on Prop. 65 ads had frightened Californians about.

“Well, for starters,” he said, “estrogen and testosterone are both on the Prop. 65 list of known carcinogens, so unless something other than men and women is going through my models, I’m going to have to post the signs.”

That was when I realized California had become what I’ve come to call “Crazifornia,” a state that has become a state of disaster. And it will be even more of a disaster if Proposition 37 passes this November.

Prop. 37

Prop. 37, we learn from its campaign website, “is a common-sense November ballot measure that will help consumers make informed choices about the food they eat.” That sounds reasonable.  If my donut is laced with DDT or my orange was doused in Agent Orange, I want to know about it before I take a bite.  Who could possibly have a problem with that?

Certainly not Jim Wheaton (pictured above), the Berkeley-educated lawyer who wrote Prop. 37. That would be the same Jim Wheaton who heads up the Environmental Law Foundation, a Bay Area litigation mill that has made $3 million in settlements and legal fees off Prop. 65 lawsuits.  Oh, and he’s the same Jim Wheaton who wrote much of Prop. 65 in the first place.

Prop. 37 is a genetically engineered clone of Prop. 65. To create it, Wheaton simply grafted an anti-genetically engineered food gene onto Prop. 65’s DNA. If you’re worried about genetically engineered foods running rampant and destroying ecosystems, you should see what a genetically engineered proposition can do to California’s already reeling business sector.

More bureaucrats

Like Prop. 65, Prop. 37 would create a panel of experts, hand selected by Wheaton and his environmentalist and trial attorney collegues, that would decide what food ingredients and compounds at what concentrations constitute risk in California’s eyes. As a starting point, California’s regulations will be about twice as tough as ones that are already hurting farmers and food processors in Europe.

And as occurs with Prop. 65, each year attorneys from litigation mills and their environmentalist expert witnesses will petition this panel to have more compounds added to the list.  Industry will push back, but most of the compounds will make it onto the list.

Then, similar to Prop. 65, state functionaries will look for violators who have missed the latest round of updates. They will monitor tens of thousands of food labels at grocery stores, retail outlets, farms and food processors, burning through tax dollars to produce the citations that are the raw materials for one of California’s biggest products: anti-business litigation.

The Prop. 65 litigation mills worked this formula so well with Prop. 65 that, between 1989 and 2011, companies have paid attorneys like Wheaton nearly half a billion dollars in legal fees and settlements to settle nearly 20,000 lawsuits.  That’s apprently not enough, so the trial attorneys are hopeful they’ll open a big new market with Prop. 37.

At the top of this column, I alluded to DDT in my donuts and Agent Orange in my oranges.  Surely the Yes on 37 campaign wouldn’t stoop so low as to dredge up dangerous chemicals that have long since been banned, right? Think again.

“You’ve heard the false corporate health claims before,” says a pro-37 ad.  “DDT is ‘safe.’ Agent Orange is ‘harmless.’ Now they say genetically engineered food is safe.”

Of course, food manufacturers, retailers and farmers are lining up against Prop. 37, but as with the earlier Yes on 65 campaign, Yes on 37 is simply painting them as greedy corporations that don’t mind killing off customers, as long as they make an extra buck or two.

In 1986, 63 percent of California voters bought the lie. With polls showing 51 percent of likely voters planning to vote for Prop. 37 and just 16 percent planning to vote against it, there’s little evidence the voters have wised up to Wheaton’s game.

Laer Pearce is the author of “Crazifornia: Tales from the Tarnished State.” Portions of this column are excerpted from the book.