He had Dick Gregory as a guest. For those who are not familiar with him, he is a Black activist/fruitarian/comedian. His book from the '70s was the first raw book I ever bought and I got it used in the mid-'80s! I knew nothing about raw foods for many years after that. He called himself a fruitarian and did lots of fasting, too. Anyway, he was talking to Thom today and was talking about how adulterated the food is these days. He's a bit of a conspiracy theorist (as am I) and was saying that virtually all cow's milk these days was from cloned cows, same for chickens (he said that Kentucky Fried Chicken had to changed to KFC because the chickens are not really chickens anymore--born w/o legs, etc.) and here was the kicker: he mentioned tomatoes. He said that you leave your house and travel around the world and the tomato would not be rotten when you returned! I have wondered myself what "they" did to tomatoes. They would rot in a weird way with some white stuff forming outside of the tomato. Gregory said that tomatoes are spliced with the genes of fish in order to withstand water. He says that when we consume them, WE retain water! All of this horrifies me. Does anyone have any info on tomatoes these days? It's usually the tomatoes-on-the-vine types.

The tomato part is true; I heard that at a lecture by an architect/chemical company co-owner in the late 90s when those tomatoes were first being tested retail. It is not clear how many of them are still on the market. Mr. Gregory is not correct about livestock, unless he is considering RBH therapy as genetic modification. But that could just be semantics. Most soy, corn, and wheat are GMO. The thing about it is, and I am vehemently opposed to anything but natural, traditional hybridization of crops, GMO did not start out as a means to poison people and destroy agriculture as we know it. It started out as a solution to growing/shipping problems. That Frankentomato is spliced with salmon genes, and in some instances pork, because this gives the tomato a more "appealing" evenly robust red color, and the cellular tissue greater tensility for rough, long distance traveling. Smart marketing ideas--who doesn't prefer a bright colored, "meaty" tomato?--implemented in an evil, evil way.

Oh, we are in deep sh!t when our veggies are no longer vegetarian. That lumpy clay in the backyard is looking more and more appealing for growing my own every day...

"(he said that Kentucky Fried Chicken had to changed to KFC because the chickens are not really chickens anymore--born w/o legs, etc.)"


Aren't there still drumsticks in the 'ole 10 gal. bucket at KFC,lol? Where do they come from?

Tam; "It is not clear how many of them are still on the market."
What do you mean by that? That it was an experiment & that they scrapped the idea after awhile?

I have heard this same thing several years ago, not just with tomatoes but other fruits/vegs. as well...

@Tamukha: But the confusion I have is that the ginormous cherry tomatoes I buy or the on-the-vine ones state that they are grown without pesticides. I took that to mean that they were almost organic. I never really thought about the GMOs. The thing that I can't figure out is what happened to the regular tomatoes I used to buy each season, called "homegrown" for their imperfect shapes (vs. the eerily symetric ones I usually find these days)? It was like, a few years ago the typical tomatoes I would buy were terrible, even when in season. And now it seems like the market is flooded with these GMOs. If they have the salmon gene in them, does that mean that they are not really vegetarian?

Thank goodness I made the decision to do my first garden this year. I have lots of tomato plants out and they are all heirloom so now fish infused maters for me...this year at least.

Banana who, thanks for the info. I have to hurry and plant heirloom tomatoes (I bought some seeds, but I haven't planted them yet, the weather was bad, and I was a bit lazy). I will plant them now, even if it is a little late.
The way it is going, soon nothing in the stores will have any value. Even the "organic" label does not guaranty anything - one needs to know the grower. It is sad, but it is the reality.

Thanks, news are not good, but at least it helps with making the right decision.

That part on the tomato was freaking me out. I eat alot of non-organic tomatoes.

According to the 60 Minutes transcript below. The tomatoes in the store don't have the fish gene unless they've gone ahead with the insidious plan after the story aired.

"The tomatoes were grown but never sold."
[www.organicconsumers.org]

The white is fungus on the tomato. The tomatoes will mold if too old. This is similar to apples molding when they are going bad.

This post has gotten me thinking that I need to buy/stock up on heirloom seeds but even they can get contaminated. Sorry to say.

[www.geneticengineering.net]

"According to the 60 Minutes transcript below. The tomatoes in the store don't have the fish gene unless they've gone ahead with the insidious plan after the story aired.

"The tomatoes were grown but never sold."
[www.organicconsumers.org] "

Thanks, life101, that's what I recall about that imfamous tomato experiment as well --

"Certain rumors and horror stories mention square tomatoes or tomatoes that glow in the dark, but, in particular, skeptics have focused on research conducted by DNA Plant Technology, a company that developed an experimental, genetically engineered tomato in 1991. The tomato included a modified gene from a breed of arctic flounder that, it was hoped, would allow the tomatoes to be more resistant to frost and cold storage. Activists decried these so-called "fish tomatoes," protesting their entry into our food supply. But the experiment ultimately did not prove successful, and the pursuit of a cold-resistant tomato was abandoned. No one has ever purchased a tomato or tomato-based product with fish genes." [www.pbs.org]

There was a GM tomato on the market in the US from 94-97 (flavr savr) but it didn't have fish genes and was a commercial bust. Worldwide, there are no GM tomatoes on the market at this time, from what I gather. [en.wikipedia.org]

I am familiar with that Wiki entry, and I've talked with scientists that deem it, well, fishy. I do recall being told in food science class in cooking school that certain parts of the country were testing markets for the Flavr-Sav[TM] tomato and I specifically remember that it was mentioned that flounder gene splicing proved a bust, but that salmon proved more successful; anyone who works with fish knows which is, um, more durable. This was discussed at the same time as the quasi engineering process of converting anaemic colored farmed salmon to a more "natural looking" red hued salmon by adding dessicated prawn shells to their feed. In other words, it was a general lecture on the manipulation of food for marketing purposes.

I am not a conspiracy theorist. But I am a good capitalist. No agricorp is going to put that much capital into developing a GMO specimen and not do whatever they can to maximize a return on the R & D. I suspect this is the object of this new GMO-concealing Codex campaign in the U. S. It isn't to benefit GMO producers abroad--it is unlikely that the EU will ever get aboard GMOs wholeheartedly with their less industrialized agriculture tradition. It is to open the domestic market to GMOs being grown abroad by American agribusinesses. That is, should this regulation pass, and be dinged over to the FDA and USDA for implementation, this market would then be open to the Frankenfoods Monsanto and Syngenta et al are already growing in South America, the Middle East and South Asia and which have not flooded food production methods here. Yet.

The flounder gene splicing experiments with tomatoes went nowhere, not even able to produce the disired effect in the lab, that of cold tolerance.

Salmon gene splicing is not relevant to tomatoes.

Salmon gene splicing experiments are being done on salmon, the latest being a farmed salmon that supposedly grows twice as fast as they do now.

The Wiki article links to Seeds of Deception author Jeffrey M. Smith's site with extensive information on "Exposing Industry and Government Lies about Safety of the Genetically Engineered Foods You're Eating". Silent Spring author, Frances Moore Lappe, wrote the foreward in my copy.

[www.seedsofdeception.com]

There's a GM database that gives the history and status of GM tomatoes --

"Cultivation

"EU - None

"USA - In 1998 approximately 200.000 hectares were under cultivation; this has been suspended since 2002. The first gene-modified tomatoes, FlavrSavr, did not fulfil the producers' expectations and is no longer cultivated today.

"Other countries - In China, virus-resistant tomatoes are expected to be cultivated. However, there is no reliable information on this."

[www.gmo-compass.org]

Thanks loeve--I keep forgetting to get that "Seeds of Deception" book. I think Rachel Carson wrote "Silent Spring," but I'm glad to see Frances Moore Lappe is still fighting the good fight.

Oh, thanks Tamukha, you're right it was Rachel Carson who wrote Silent Spring. I wonder what Carson would have to say about Roundup Ready GM plants that are the sole survivors after the herbicide is applied. There goes plant diversity and with it insects and song birds.

I read a while back that Francis Moore Lappe came out with a revised version of Diet for a Small Planet a generation after the original.

loeve,

I imagine poor Rachel Carson's head would explode were she alive to this day.

@Rab: Please let us know how it goes. I was reading a book on growing heirlooms and from what they said, they are more challenging to grow. I have never grown anything except sprouts in my kitchen, but I encourage everyone who has the opportunity to grow heirloom and organic produce!

Life101: That's interesting what you say about the white fungus because it seemed to me that it was a recent phenomenom. What I recall is that the rot would begin inside and was the typical black kind of icky rot. The white stuff I have seen seemed almost apart from the actual tomato, as if "they" had designed the rot to not affect the tomato so perhaps retailers could scrape it off? Ew!

Tamukha Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> loeve,
>
> I imagine poor Rachel Carson's head would explode
> were she alive to this day.

In 1962 when Silent Spring came out Rachel Carson took a lot of heat from the pesticide industry, their scientists and probably many in agriculture and government. It didn't take long though for public opinion to swing in her favor and she was ultimately heaped with recognition for her work though her death of breast cancer in 64 meant much of it was posthumous. I like what one of Carson's early bosses said after writing a piece on nature, that it was "too good" for the original intent, meaning it deserved a wider audience.