“I know the Legislature is doing a bill to try to protect our meat,” Florida governor Ron DeSantis recently told a college campus audience . “You need meat, OK? And we’re going to have meat in Florida. Like, we’re not going to have fake meat. Like, that doesn’t work.”

Florida’s legislature is one of several considering bans on the sale of “cultured” or “lab-grown” meat. State legislator Danny Alvarez (R), the bill’s sponsor, pretends that it’s about food safety: “As of today, the unknowns are so great …. There are no long-term studies.”

That’s at least more coherent than DeSantis’s weird “protecting meat” language, but it’s still incorrect. There is one conclusive long-term study. It’s called “the history of humankind.”

For as long as there have been humans, humans have eaten meat.

And for as long as humans have eaten meat, humans have tried to improve the quality of that meat and get more efficient at producing it. Domestication of animals instead of just eating wild game. Cross-breeding to produce animals that give us more, or better, meat. Different methods of feeding and fattening. Use of antibiotics.

Cultured meat is the next step in that long chain of “improvements.” It produces meat with less need for large herds, big feed lots and pastures, vast quantities of grass and grain, costly transportation of large animals from farm to slaughterhouse to market, etc.

The jury is still out on whether cultured meat will prove commercially viable, becoming  available at attractive prices and in attractive forms. But whether it does or not, it’s meat. Not “fake” meat. Meat.

For the most part, politicians advocating for a ban are honest about their motives, if you listen closely.

It’s not about “protecting meat,” whatever that’s even supposed to mean.

It’s also not about “protecting consumers” from … well, something. Consumers who like meat can only benefit from more choices that, if things work out, will be cheaper both at point of sale and in terms of economic impact (for example, a bunch of land becoming available for uses other than grazing would likely mean lower housing prices).

It’s about protecting one of the most politically powerful and heavily subsidized (but I repeat myself) American industries.

That industry loves to be called “farming,” but the better name for it these days is “Big Agriculture.”

At one time, most Americans worked in farming. These days, about one in one hundred do. Today’s “farms” are highly concentrated factories operated by wealthy multinational corporations, not by stoic peasants in overalls, holding pitchforks or driving tractors, like my grandfather before me and me in my childhood.

Multinational corporations and powerful lobbies don’t use politicians to protect consumers. They use politicians to protect themselves from competition at the EXPENSE of consumers.

So now you know who Ron DeSantis and Danny Alvarez really work for, and that it’s not you.

The “solution” to the “problem” of cultured meat is to buy it if you want it and not buy it if you don’t want it.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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On March 25, the United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 2728 , regarding the ongoing war in Gaza, by a vote of 14-0. The United States abstained rather than — as it usually does when the Israeli regime dislikes a resolution — using its “permanent member” veto.

The meat of the resolution “[d]emands an immediate ceasefire for the month of Ramadan respected by all parties leading to a lasting sustainable ceasefire, and also demands the immediate and unconditional release of all hostages, as well as ensuring humanitarian access to address their medical and other humanitarian needs, and further demands that the parties comply with their obligations under international law in relation to all persons they detain.”

I have several questions about the resolution, including whether “all hostages” includes the thousands of Palestinian Arabs held by the Israeli regime, often for years, often without charge or trial. They’re not usually referred to as “hostages” by Israel or its allied regimes, but since they’re occasionally traded off for Israeli captives, they’re “hostages” by definition.

A second question: Why just until the end of Ramadan  (April 8)? If the UN Security Council wants an end to the fighting, why not demand a PERMANENT end to the fighting?

But here’s the big question:

Now that the UN Security Council has issued its demands, how are UN  member states, especially the US, going to enforce those demands?

UN Security Council resolutions are binding on all UN member states.

If this resolution means anything at all, the initial response SHOULD be for all UN member states to immediately declare and enforce a ban on the sale or delivery of arms to the belligerent parties.

Yet White House National Security Communications Advisor John Kirby insisted at a press briefing that “we are still providing tools and capabilities, weapons systems so that Israel can defend itself …. no change by this nonbinding resolution on what Israel can or cannot do in terms of defending itself.”

The resolution is not “nonbinding.” The Security Council HAS ordered a ceasefire, the the US regime IS bound by that order, and Kirby’s opinion that murdering tens of thousands of civilians and subjecting hundreds of thousands to starvation, etc. constitutes Israel “defending itself” doesn’t magically change so much as a comma in that resolution or an atom of that obligation.

While it’s a given that some other regimes are also going to flout a system of international law they loudly invoke when they find it convenient,  the regimes that do take their obligations seriously should start freezing US assets and sanctioning US regime figures until such time as the US regime decides to bring its actions into compliance with the “rules-based international order” it so piously claims to lead and personify.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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“Robert F. Kennedy Jr.,” Politico reports, “is in talks to run on the Libertarian Party presidential ticket — a move that could translate his popularity into becoming a near-guaranteed choice on ballots in all 50 states.”

Kennedy also plans to announce his choice of running mate, likely tech lawyer Nicole Shanahan, on March 26. Presidential and vice-presidential candidates can spend unlimited money on their own campaigns and Shanahan’s a multi-billionaire, meaning that a  Kennedy/Shanahan ticket could go toe to toe with Joe Biden and Donald Trump when it comes to campaign finances.

However, I see some major problems with the idea of a Kennedy/Shanahan as a Libertarian Party presidential ticket.

First, a disclaimer: I’ve been involved with the Libertarian Party since 1996.  In 2022, when what I deemed a Republican “infiltrate and neuter” operation (my opinion) operating as a PAC/caucus “took over” (their own words) the party’s management, I withdrew from involvement. I am, however, back, and will attend the party’s national convention in Washington, DC over Memorial Day weekend. I hope and expect that actual libertarians will regain control.

Problem One: Kennedy is not a Libertarian. I don’t intend that as an insult. Some of his policy positions do align with the party’s, others don’t, and some completely contradict the party’s platform. Political parties should nominate candidates who support their platforms and policy positions. Candidates who don’t support a party’s platform and policy positions should run as independents or seek the nominations of parties they’re more representative of.

Problem Two: Being “in talks” to run on the Libertarian Party’s ticket is a meaningless claim. Unlike the major parties, the Libertarian Party has “unbound” delegates. More than a thousand of them. They vote as they choose, not as they’re required to by e.g. primary election results. If Kennedy wants the nomination, he’ll have to have some great “talks” with those delegates. And since most of them are already selected, he’ll have to do so AT the convention.

Problem Three:  Getting the Libertarian Party’s presidential nomination is far from becoming “a near-guaranteed choice on ballots in all 50 states.” The party HAS managed to get 50-state ballot access before. But not always … and at present, after two years of destruction at the hands of the aforementioned the party is a shell of what it formerly was. Fifty state ballot access isn’t impossible, but it’s not “near-guaranteed.”

RFK, Jr. is a poor fit for the Libertarian Party’s objectives, and the party really doesn’t have as much to offer him as the Politico article implies.

Which is not to say he shouldn’t run for president. That’s his call. But he should run in his own lane instead of trying to get the Libertarian Party to run itself off the road for him.

Thomas L. Knapp (Twitter: @thomaslknapp) is director and senior news analyst at the William Lloyd Garrison Center for Libertarian Advocacy Journalism (thegarrisoncenter.org). He lives and works in north central Florida.

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