http://www.democracynow.org/2014/2/21/silencing_the_scientist_tyrone_hayes_on
The first video I watched is about a scientist and professor at Berkeley named Tyrone Hayes. Simply put, he got on the wrong side of a powerful corporation named Syngenta and is basically being hunted, having his privacy invaded, discredited with false information and threatened violently by this company. This starting all over some research he did for Syngenta about a herbicide product used on corn with Hayes finding out that it had some serious health issues and side affects. Normally I would be leery of this, being that the scientist has no hard proof recorded down of Syngenta doing these things to him and his family, but if anyone has ever followed Syngenta, this would not be the first time they have gotten their hands dirty and it is well known they are not the most morally upstanding company by far. But it floors me that something like can happen, Hayes doing the right thing, and really no one willing to help him, the college, college lawyers, government, or other colleges have turned a blind eye to the situation or avoided it all together. Makes you wonder how much of this goes on behind closed doors, how many people are destroyed because of things like this? what kind of chemicals are they releasing on our food they don't want us to know about? It is a scary thing to wonder about. I am all for a "laissez faire" government, but this is one instance they need to step in and the people too, to stop this. Protect our right to information that affects us, protect the people that take the chance to warn us and to bring down these over grown corporations that are way to powerful to begin with from controlling this kind of stuff.
This second video is about the today's day and age lobbyist. Reason for choosing it is that it some what ties into the above video. The issue and problem of lobbyist in our government has always been a problem, you have these big powerful corporations and and people in private sectors that want things a certain way. What better way to get it then to pay someone that can give it to you. All together lobbyist should be excluded from our politics, I think it should be a crime to accept money in these situations. Especially when these same companies and people wont give us any answers, which is normal because they do not want us to know about the illegal and unmoral things they do and have planned. Obama halfway started a war against lobbyist, but after being elected he really didn't carry it much further, but for the time being it did force these lobbyist to change their game and strategy. But it did nothing to get ride of them like we thought it would. There really just has to be someone, or a group of people even that can get in there and take these large corporations and people down a few pegs. Much like Teddy Roosevelt did during his presidency. It created a lot of enemies sure, but I believe it was for the greater good of people and the country in the long scheme of things.
Jerrod Goertzen
Soc 122
MW 3:30 pm
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