Sometimes agendas are clear and upfront, such as in well-run businesses.

Sometimes, though, they are vague or hidden. The matter of agendas becomes ever more important as regulatory, legislative, and media attention is focused increasingly intensively on raw milk’s growing popularity.

On the media side, there’s that Seattle Times article that Concerned Person and Bill Marler are waving around to promote their agendas (more on those in a bit).

The Seattle Times’ reporter’s agenda?  At first blush, it appears to be about the growing popularity of raw milk, and attendant debate about safety, but on further examination, the agenda is really that it’s impossible for raw dairies to produce safe raw milk. The evidence is a single dairy that has apparently had a previous problem with E.coli 0157:H7 in its milk, and continues to milk a cow that is spattering manure around. Hey, what’s anecdotal evidence among friends?

One problem is that when you have an agenda, you sometimes exaggerate. Thus, the reporter suggests early in the article that pathogens in raw milk are nearly inevitable:

“All cows, actually, all warm-blooded animals, have E. coli in their guts. Some strains of it are harmless. Others are not. They’re called Shiga toxin-producing E. coli, and ‘cows are the main source where these organisms live,’ said J. Kathryn MacDonald, a state epidemiologist.

“The Shiga toxin doesn’t hurt the cows, but it can make humans very, very sick as in kidney failure, coma, stroke, prolonged hospitalization. Even death.

“We get E. coli illness by swallowing the bug.”

After strongly suggesting that most cows inevitably transmit e.coli that could easily kill us via their milk, the reporter says, well, no, “Actually, by swallowing tiny bits of manure containing the bacteria.” Of course, by this time, many readers have stopped reading. When you have an agenda, you present the “facts” to support your agenda.

Same goes for the list accompanying the article of “Pathogens Linked with Raw Milk Dairies”. Of nine instances listed, four involve one dairy that has had listeria discovered in its milk. No illnesses are noted, because there were none. As there have been none in New York state in more than a dozen cases of listeria found in raw milk. No mention of this little piece of trivia, because it departs from the agenda.

Even aside from these highly misleading aspects of the article, I wonder why the Washington Department of Agriculture isn’t working with Dungeness Valley Creamery to improve its sanitation, what Lykke said following my March 18 post: “We need as scientists and food safety experts to step up to the plate and figure out how to work with raw dairymen/women to make raw milk safer and available for informed consumers, while at the same time keeping the standards scalable for raw milk producers to meet a common food quality/safety goal.” The reporter seems not to have inquired as to what the agency was doing to promote Lykke’s view. But I think I can answer the question: Its agenda is to convince raw dairies to use pasteurizers on their milk. If they won’t? Then they are fair game, not for instruction or education, but for castigation, like in the Seattle Times article.

As I said, Bill Marler and CP seem to take joy in waving the article around. “So, how do you justify this?” asks Marler following my previous post, prior to quoting from a graphic description of a Dungeness cow spewing manure on the dairy owner during milking. What is being justified? Yes, it seems as if the farmer isn’t practicing the best sanitation practices, but if so, who is justifying it? But remember, there’s an agenda here. A big part of the Marler agenda is that raw dairies don’t care about safety and illness and, see, Dungeness proves my point. Gotcha. Now, let’s keep raw dairies in the tightest possible strait-jacket—farm-only sales, lists of customers for the regulators to monitor, etc., etc. Talk about misusing anecdotal evidence.

Which leads me to the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP), and all the negotiations going on in Wisconsin over legislation to permit raw milk sales from Grade A dairies. I’m afraid agenda concerns have me souring on that legislation. Why? Because I’ve come to appreciate—despite my original wish to at least establish a precedent for legal raw milk in the state—that the agenda of DATCP, which will be overseeing any new law, is elimination of raw milk, period, end of discussion. DATCP has expressed its concerns about legalizing raw milk, and already begun demonstrating its agenda with the Scott Trautman inspection described in my March 18 post.  Any instance of possible milk contamination won’t be a learning moment, but rather further evidence permissive legislation can’t work. It’s like putting a fox—even a fox in a business suit—in charge of your chicken coop. The fox may say he’s come to accept his new role as impartial overseer, but in the end, the fox will be too tempted by all those chickens, and let instinct take over. It’s the same with DATCP.

As Lola Granola said following my previous post: “Under the proposed legislation, a grade A dairy now needs to keep records of its customers (subject to DATCP inspection, the very thing Max Kane is disputing); needs to have monthly milk testing at a STATE-approved lab (which may be different than where your processor sends your milk sample every month); this legislation gives DATCP the authority to create RULES regarding the raw milk permit…”

WI Raw Milk Consumer understands the matter of agenda: “DATCP is going to make life hell for the farms that continue to legally provide raw milk. I anticipate the farms that survive the fallout from this struggle will be the ones that sell raw milk via underground private ‘cow-share’ type arrangments, and never register their existence with the state.”

All you have to do is understand people’s real agenda, and you can predict behavior. The problem here is that raw dairies don’t have an agenda. They’re all over the place. They have to get themselves organized.

Michael Schmidt articulated the challenge well following my March 15 post: “It is clear that we can waste a lot of time and energy on discussing how we can conform to standards which could satisfy bureaucrats ,lawyers and insurance companies. In case you have not yet realized: this IS the next rights movement. Can it be squashed? Not if we put our illusions aside that if we conform long enough we will get what we want. NO… We better get our intentions sorted out. We will never ever win this battle on the basis of having the right to sell and make money. THIS IS ABOUT FUNDAMENTAL FREEDOM, which we do not have.”

I foresee a self-governing and self-policing national raw dairy association, perhaps with localized state groups. Raw milk is becoming too popular, and dairy farmers too vulnerable to arbitrary regulation, to do otherwise. To become a member, your dairy has to pass tough but realistic standards of the type Tim Wightman of the Farm-to-Consumer Foundation has begun to articulate. It has to be inspected periodically by member-engaged inspectors. It needs to sponsor education programs to help farmers stay current with safety and sanitation standards. Its seal of approval goes on every container of milk, so consumers can look for it as a sign of top-quality raw milk. If any member has a safety issue, it needs to be addressed and monitored—transparency is key. This is what I was getting at in my concerns a few weeks ago about the Raw Milk Association of Colorado’s handling of a possible campylobacter outbreak. It is establishing an important precedent.

My agenda is to find ways to guarantee our right to access the nutritionally-dense foods we want and need, all based on realistic and fairly enforced safety criteria.

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Coming soon, to a theater near you? It’s “Milk Men”, the story of Max Kane and his raw milk journey. Interesting trailer. Only problem: we don’t yet know how it ends.