Loaded Mouth brings you the beef

Interested in purchasing locally produced, non-factory farm meats? The Meatrix has a database you can enter your zip code into and it will tell you where to shop.

Lambert over at corrente brings us some scary information:

Mr. Stauber said an F.D.A. memorandum in 1997 predicted that if a single case of encephalopathy was found in the United States and a total ban on all feeding of animal protein to animals was immediately enacted, it was still possible that as many as 299,000 infected cows would be found over the next 11 years.

Grrrrreat.

Anyone who has read Fast Food Nation knows that the beef industry couldn't give a shit about the safety of slaughter houses in America. Much like other industries whose (mis)actions could cause irreparable harm to countless Americans, the beef giants fight any attempt at regulation from the government. They will only listen to their buyers. Which is why when McDonald's, America's largest purchaser of beef, demanded better safety standards for the slaughter hosues, the beef industry couldn't move fast enough.