Tuesday, June 08, 2010

Historical Ironies--Wallace and King Corn

Tom Philpott has a post at Grist on "King Corn" stating the food movement's usual case against " the companies that dominate the global agrichemical, seed, and grain trades: Archer Daniels Midland, Cargill, Monsanto, Syngenta, BASF, Dow AgroSciences, Bayer CropSciences, and Dupont’s Pioneer agrichemical/seed business."

The food movement is generally seen as a movement on the left. But ironically, the Pioneer seed business started with the Wallaces of Iowa, notably Henry Wallace, the Secretary of Ag and later Vice President for FDR and the Progressive Party's candidate for President in 1948.  He was a good progressive, meaning he had faith in the ability of human reason to transform the world, just as his hybrid seed corn

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