People who raise livestock wouldn’t think of eating sick and dying cows, but our kids did in the public schools. And the company that sold it to the school programs is now desperately trying to backpedal and make it only an issue of animal cruelty instead of what it is, a clearly for profit criminal act which placed kids at risk, for their personal profit.

Most ranchers are not sadists, just realists who recognize that all animals cannot be saved.
Those that can’t because of illness or injury are not shipped to slaughter houses if they cannot stand they are disposed of humanly and cleanly.

A downer cow is a live cow that cannot walk. This state can be caused by disease or injury. In nearly all cases it is considered by most farmers to be both humane and cost-effective to slaughter the animal when it becomes a downer, rather than keeping it alive and unhealthy.

Downer cows, that couldn’t be helped, were killed. On the ranch this was done with a bullet in the brain and a trip up the mountain in a front end loader to the bone yard. Where the natural scavengers like coyotes, and wolves and eagles would clean their bones.

I just happened to read this quote from a chicago tribune story. The quote is from Steve Mendell of California-based Westland/Hallmark Meat Packing Co.

I stopped and carefully reread this.
What a crock, this guy is blowing smoke up your pantsleeves if you believe this.

“Mendell also said that if a downer cow got into the meat-processing system, post-mortem inspections would have detected and removed any part of the cow harmful to humans.”

Now I have butchered lots of cow carcasses, and the only thing that I can think of that would show, would be if the cow had actual abscesses in the flesh, or had been down so long that the hide (thus the flesh) had rotted

There is not to my knowledge a neon sign that says “This bit is safe, but this one isn’t”.
This guy is patently blowing a smokescreen to cover his buttocks.

Trackposted to Rosemary’s Thoughts, Right Truth, Shadowscope, Cao’s Blog, Leaning Straight Up, Conservative Cat, The World According to Carl, Blue Star Chronicles, Pirate’s Cove, thanks to Linkfest Haven Deluxe.

Tags: downer-cow, food, kids, schools

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