Texas to Track Raw Milk Drinkers!

Texas To Track Raw Milk Drinkers
By Granny Good Food

I'm a grandmother, slightly past a half-century old, been married 35 years to my sweetie from high school, graduated with highest honors from same, phi-beta kappa from college, had three tickets in nearly 40 years of driving, never been arrested, don't smoke, don't drink, (usually) don't cuss.

And for the first time in my life, I’m about to become a criminal.

I will have in my possession, as determined by the state of Texas, one of the most dangerous substances known to man. Could it be heroin? Moonshine? Genetically engineered food?

None of the above. It’s REAL milk. Raw, life-giving, straight from the cow. Not pasteurized, but chock-full of enzymes and probiotics, protein, B-vitamins, iodine, calcium, phosphorus, and brain-lovin' omega 3 fatty acids. Not homogenized, with several inches of luxurious cream floating on the top. Not laced with synthetic vitamin D, a Big-Pharma drug that is rendered from pig, sheep, and cow skins in vats of caustic solvents, a very protected and proprietary process. From pampered Jersey gals that stand in the warm sun, eat luscious green grass, are given no hormones, yielding their Superfood twice daily for the benefit of Texan moms and dads, boys and girls.

Until March 6, the Milk Group, an agency of the Texas Department of State Health Services, is taking public comment on the new rules for raw milk production, distribution, and consumption. [Note: this comment period has been extended until June] Let’s take a look at how they are planning on protecting us:

§217.13. …It shall be unlawful for any person, elsewhere than in a private home, to have in their possession any adulterated, misbranded, or ungraded milk.

§217.22….The milk producer shall offer for sale and distribute raw milk directly to the final consumer only at the point of production, i.e., at the farm…

And now, I hope all you freedom-loving, flag-waving, Remember-the-Alamo, red-blooded Americans are sitting down, for buried deep within Section 217.17(g), is this eleven-word, nuclear jackboot bomb, “The producer shall furnish a list of customers to the department.”

Damn!

If there exists a more anti-God, anti-liberty, anti-family, anti-business, anti-health, anti-ecology, anti-sustainable set of "rules," it will not easily be found. Not to mention mean-spirited, scientifically unfounded, and in-your-face evil.

It’s one (totalitarian) thing to be forced by law to drink my raw milk only at home, not at work or school, and to be compelled to drive personally –not send a friend—to a dairy to pickup every gallon of raw milk I buy. It’s quite another (Big Brother) issue when my name is going to be registered by the Milk Police!

My mind is dizzy with questions. Is there any other food that is tracked by who eats it? What kind of precedent is this setting? Will this include being fingerprinted also? If there is an ‘event’ with raw milk, will everyone on the list be rounded up and quarantined? Would they be forced to get some kind of medical treatment, i.e., vaccination? Has this ever been done in history before, to register people who want healthy, clean milk the way it has been consumed since cows and people got together? Is there a registry in the future for people who buy raw honey, organic vegetables, farm eggs, bulk grain, nutritional supplements? What if the registries for sex offenders and raw milk drinkers get mixed up? Will the government have probable cause to bug our phones and email if we were a registered gun owner AND a raw milk drinker? How far can this go? How far will we let it go?

This afternoon I spoke briefly with Jim at the Milk Group in Austin. Here’s a sampler of how it went, according to my notes:

GGF: Why are you requiring people to drive to the dairy personally, instead of obtaining raw milk in a carpool or through an agent?

Agent Jim: Customers need to see where their milk comes from, the condition of the dairy, whether it is clean.

GGF: Well, I kind of thought that was your job, to ensure the dairy is clean. But anyway, I buy bread from our local grocery store now and then. Are you saying I should buy directly from the bakery to see where it comes from, its condition, whether it’s clean?

Agent Jim: Customers need to see where their milk comes from, the condition of the dairy, whether it is clean.

GGF: But Jim, every time? Once I’ve seen the dairy, why do I have to go every week?

Agent Jim: Customers need to see where their milk comes from, the condition of the dairy, whether it is clean.

Pulease! Now for the Granny Good Food (extended) translation: “We are not going to outlaw raw milk outright because that would be overtly tyrannical. Instead, we are going to be sneaky and place so much red tape and so many hoops in your path in the name of ‘protecting’ you, that most of you will give up and drink our state-sanctioned, politically-correct milk. Yes, we realize that in this going-to-hell-in-a-hurry economy that money is getting tighter and you will have to work longer hours—that is, if you even have a job—to fund the Big Banks’ brazen BS and that driving an extra two or three hours a week just to get wholesome food for your families will add to the financial burden not only on you but on the farmer, because he will have to hire a full-time crew just to accommodate all the traffic at the farm if you do it our way. But eh, you can’t vote us out, and we get a paycheck whether or not you like what we do.”

Not only could Agent Jim not give me a good reason why I should have to drive to the dairy to buy every cotton-pickin’ gallon of raw milk I drink, but neither could he give me statistics on adverse incidents with raw milk. “We know raw milk contains pathogens that are harmful.”

Really? And how do you know that, sir? He admitted that there have been very few incidents with raw milk causing illness, but could not quote exact numbers. His main point was that most of the milk consumed in Texas is pasteurized, and that, in his opinion, accounted for the lack of illness.

I beg to differ. There are 23 dairies in Texas licensed to sell raw milk. Now I won’t go into details, but I know for certain that my family and about 200 of my friends drink raw milk daily. None of us have ever gotten sick because of tainted raw milk. Based on what I have observed in my small circle, I submit that there are thousands of people all over Texas drinking raw milk happily and healthfully. In fact, as a nutritional counselor, I have seen some dramatic turnarounds for the good when people switch to raw milk and forsake the processed, white cow liquid. Irritable Bowel Syndrome disappears. Lactose intolerance goes away. Allergies vanish. Nerves are calmer. Ear infections are fewer. Autistic children do much better.

And let me ride this Health Train just a little longer. Homogenized, pasteurized milk contributes to many chronic health problems: Heart disease, constipation, indigestion, cramps, bloating, diarrhea, skin rashes, acne, colic in infants, leukemia, infertility, cancer, increased tooth decay, poor growth in children, osteoporosis, diabetes, iron-deficiency anemia, and more. Yet, you will never see these tallied in with the arguments for politically-correct milk by those who attempt to criminalize raw milk.

Many years ago, I was a homeschooling mom, which was a radical --and in many states illegal--thing to do in the early 80's. With my children I read about the founding of our country and its covenant history (His Story). Back in those days ALL the milk was raw and all the food organic, and We the People apparently had much stronger anatomies back then; viz. more brains, backbone, and testosterone (maybe the former was causative of the latter?). At that time there were stamp taxes to quash, whiskey rebellions to lead, and tea to be dumped, and men and women just like us chose to stand against political oppression with their "lives, fortunes, and sacred honor" because they understood what would happen if they didn’t.

I thought, could I have done that? What is so important that I would be so committed? Then I looked at my four little scholars and realized I had already decided Number One on the list. Soon we studied church history and read biographies of men like Wycliffe and Tyndale, and I wrote down “Bible.” When they were older, we learned how statists disarm the people before enslaving them, and Number Three was added. Today, the list is at Four, and I’ll be damned if they will take my raw milk.