Dr.Ron Paul’s Truth Prescriptions
By Rand Clifford
23 May, 2007
Countercurrents.org
Another cheer for Congressman Ron Paul! Anyone frothing up hate-radio reptiles into virtually shedding their skins has to be doing something right. Dr. Paul is doing many things right, after breaking the political paradigm of parroting bullshit, by introducing truth. His latest truth blast was point-blank into the face of Rudy Giuliani at the South Carolina GOP Presidential Primary "debate", a place where it seems truth and meaning are anathema. Dr. Paul revealed American foreign policy as the root cause of hatred and terrorism against the United States. Giuliani must’ve felt like a quail-slaughtering partner of Cheney’s—though slippery politician that Giuliani is, heat in his feet raced up under his collar and he declared that he had never heard such a theory in his life! He even asked Paul to retract it; in the grips of honesty, Dr. Paul not only refused, but pointed out the CIA’s seasoned theory of blowback. Has Giuliani never imagined that if you punch someone in the face, they might punch you back? He parroted the pathetic illusion that our freedom and democracy is what drives terrorists bonkers, along with our freedom for women, and freedom of religion. If the GOPers don’t succeed in banning Dr. Paul and his tin-foil hat from future "debates", don’t be surprised to see marijuana cited as the reason for his lunacy.Dr. Paul is the chief sponsor of H.R. 1009, the "Industrial Hemp Farming Act of 2007". All nine original co-sponsors are Democrats, Representatives: Jim McDermott (WA), Tammy Baldwin (WI), Raul Grijalva (AZ), Pete Stark, George Miller and Lynn Woolsey (CA), Dennis Kucinich (OH), Barney Frank (MA), Maurice Hinchey (NY). Dr. Paul insists: "It is indefensible the United States government prevents American farmers from growing this crop. The prohibition subsidizes farmers in countries from Canada to Romania by eliminating American competition and encourages jobs in industries such as food, auto parts and clothing that utilize industrial hemp to be located oversea instead of in the United States. By passing the Industrial Hemp Farming Act the House of Representatives can help American farmers and reduce the trade deficit—all without spending a single taxpayer dollar."
Health Canada confirmed that 48,060 acres of hemp were grown in 2006, with farmers reporting it as one of the most profitable crops they can grow. In the U.S., the National Conference of State Legislatures have passed a pro-hemp resolution. The National Association of State Departments of Agriculture support commercial production of industrial hemp. Fifteen states so far have passed pro-hemp legislation. So why are American farmers still prohibited from growing the world’s most valuable and versatile natural resource? The reason is a classic example of how power in America works against The People.
February, 1938, Popular Mechanics magazine’s cover story was called New Billion-Dollar Crop. The article was about hemp, and the invention of a machine which they said, "solves a problem 6,000 years old." Called a decorticator, the machine removes the fiber-bearing cortex from the hemp stalk, greatly reducing the human labor involved. Imports of raw hemp and manufactured hemp products produced by "coolie and peasant labor" would be replaced with domestic hemp, providing thousands of new American jobs. The article’s huge error was in claiming that hemp would not compete with other American products. Such competition had already killed domestic hemp the year before the article was published, blindsiding our hemp industry with an illegal tax law ostensibly targeting "the killer weed from Mexico".
William Randolph Hearst and Pierre du Pont were the two power brokers most responsible. Hearst leveled cross-hairs on hemp after 1916, when the U.S. Department of Agriculture invented a process for making paper from hemp hurds—the pulp leftover after fiber stripping. Hearst owned vast timber acreage, and his paper manufacturing companies such as Kimberly Clark and St. Regis stood to loose billions in profits to superior and eco-friendly hemp paper. So with his chain of newspapers, Hearst declared war on hemp by first conjuring it into marijuana, killer weed from Mexico. Hearst’s lurid ooze of yellow journalism prodded marijuana hysteria into gullible Americans for twenty years—marijuana was the most dangerous drug ever vomited from Hell by Satan himself, the most pernicious threat to civilization imaginable! Du Pont’s role...by 1937 he not only had patents on the horribly-polluting sulfuric acid process for making paper from wood pulp, along with patents to make plastics from oil and coal, but DuPont’s array of petrochemical synthetic products including rayon, nylon and polyester were set to make billions, as long as competition from superior, natural hemp products could be eliminated.
Industrial hemp is not marijuana, having such low amounts of the THC which puts the high in marijuana. Nevertheless, in 1937, Congress passed the prohibitive and illegal (taxes are meant raise revenue, not prohibit behaviors) Marijuana Tax Act. The entire Congressional process was almost as lurid as ooze from Hearst’s yellow journalism—in fact, "testimony" was dominated by Hearst’s very own marijuana hysteria. Andrew Mellon, owner of Mellon Bank, one of only two banks DuPont has ever used for financing, was Secretary of the Treasury under Herbert Hoover. He appointed his nephew-in-law Harry Anslinger to head the new Federal Bureau of Narcotics. In all vulgarity, Anslinger read before Congress such gems from Hearst’s newspapers as about marijuana being the most violence-causing drug in the history of mankind; about how the evil monster Frankenstein would surely drop dead of fright if he encountered the monster marijuana; about "big-lipped coloreds" luring white women with jazz music and marijuana, often resulting in pregnancy.... Jack Herer’s seminal masterpiece The Emperor Wears No Clothes is an excellent source for learning about hemp and the marijuana conspiracy. Also, an Internet search for "hemp" will reveal a wealth of excellent websites.
And now, seventy years after one of Congress’ most egregious acts of robbing The People to protect profits of the most powerful, Ron Paul has introduced hope in the form of truth. Global warming is an unprecedented threat to the biosphere, with our measly five percent of global population emitting over a quarter of the gases responsible. As nature’s premiere solar energy machine, hemp is one of our greatest allies in curbing global warming, gulping carbon dioxide and exhaling oxygen while producing so many useful products that an accurate count will have to wait until American farmers with modern technology are married to hemp.
As Dr. Paul’s hemp bill gains momentum...as truth gains momentum, the value of hemp will be clearly revealed by the lobby power thrust against it. Cotton uses almost half of the agricultural chemicals poisoning the biosphere, while being one of the most soil-depleting of all crops. With hemp restored to American farmers, demand for cotton will minimize since hemp is superior to cotton in most every way. Look for the cotton industry, and the petrochemical industry to lobby hard against the new hemp bill, along with Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) in an effort to protect their ethanol-from-corn super boondoggle; biomass fuel from hemp would end the food-versus-fuel controversy as hemp provides food and fuel far beyond anything corn. Hempseed is absolutely a finest food available, with the best and most usable essential fatty acid profile this side of salmon. And as nature’s premiere source of vegetable protein...watch for the soy industry to fight hemp farming. Forest products industries will certainly focus their legendary Congressional influence against hemp, since not only paper, but almost every other forest product could be replaced with superior hemp products. Hemp hurds are 77% highest-quality cellulose, ideal for not only acid-free paper, but everything from plastics to cellophane, to.... The list goes on and on.
A massive campaign of lies and propaganda took from farmers and The People our most valuable crop; only a new campaign of truth might get it back. A massive campaign of lies and propaganda—especially over the last six years—have sunk esteem for America around the world. We have invaded, occupied and essentially destroyed a country just to control their energy resources—just the beginning if neocons continue to dominate foreign policy. Hatred and terrorism focused at America will never be mitigated with more lies and propaganda and murder and destruction. Truth is and always has been our only real hope. Emergence of Ron Paul so bravely standing up for truth could not have come at a more crucial time, though it seems neither of our industrial parties have room for any more than token truth. Perhaps the best we could hope for is that the GOP becomes intolerable for Dr. Paul—or even kicks him out, and he becomes an Independent. In our current governmental architecture of Liberal versus Conservative, Left versus Wrong, Lies versus Lies, only an Independent can run on the truth we need.
Rand Clifford is a novelist and essayist living in Spokane, Washington, with his wife Mary Ann, and their Chesapeake Bay retriever, Mink.His novels CASTLING and TIMING are published by StarChief Press: http://www.starchiefpress.com
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