This is nothing more than business as usual from the Republicans: States' rights when the states are weak, federal power used to override the states when they show they aren't weak.

and businesses are to be protected from evil regulators at all levels of government.

Darn Corzine for appointing Menendez to the Senate. He should have appointed...

Should have appointed...

Hmm.

A non-disgraced, non-corrupt (missed the boat on that one, Corzie), non-idiot New Jersey politician.

And while I'm wishing for that, I'd like a pony please. With wings.

why?

His name is Roy Blunt Jr, R-Mo.

I hate my district sometimes.

Don't let them get away with thinking they have a mandate.

Perhaps this next election we can get a new and better model...

(1) to screw minorities.

(2) to screw everyone else.

Method (1) is pretty well known -- the 'right' of states to deny full rights to all its citizens.

Method (2) is to claim that states' rights are violated whenever federal law is used to regulate the behaviour of business and to completely ignore states' rights when state law regulates business more stringently than federal law.

D

Yes! They are! Because, see, food is shipped across state lines, and it's darn burdensome to have to have one set of rules in Mississippi and another in California. It's much easier to force everyone to the lowest common denominator.

The point of this is pre-emption: to forbid states from making stronger regulations than the Federal government deems necessary. It's all about streamlining things for the food industry and freeing them from pesky state regulations.

Because it's much, much easier to buy off one Representative or Senator than to have to buy off a whole bunch of legislators in fifty states.

(Just because conservatives aren't REALLY in favor of states' rights doesn't mean I'm not really opposed to them.)

For the "Rational, universal" laws to replace laws being stripped from the books, don't they have to cover the same territory?

80% of the food safety laws would *go away*. That is vastly different from being replaced.

Trust me. I work in the office for a bakery. You don't want to have any kind of allergy or other food-related health issue if all that goes away. It's hard enough with all those regulations firmly in place (Here in Canada) to get allergen information and a complete breakdown of ingredients.

And what kinds of procedures are they targeting for such standardization? Why birth control and women's health, of course.

Quoting a press release

The Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization and Affordability Act (HIMMAA), introduced by Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) would allow insurance companies to ignore nearly all state laws that require insurance coverage for certain treatments or conditions, such as laws that require them to include contraceptives in their prescription plans.
"We need to move forward, not backward in expanding access to quality health care, including birth control," said Planned Parenthood Federation of America President Cecile Richards. "Congress should work to protect patients, not undermine them."
This federal legislation would raze hundreds of state laws that ensure patients can get the medical care they need and would
• not allow women to designate their ob/gyns as primary care providers
• not allow women to seek care directly from their ob/gyns, but would force them to be screened by their primary care doctors first
• dismantle coverage for contraception
• dismantle coverage for annual cervical cancer exams
• not allow women to stay with the same doctor throughout a pregnancy, if that doctor was dropped from the insurance provider
For years, many insurance plans covered prescription drugs, but refused to cover birth control pills and other prescription contraceptives for women. In the past decade lawmakers in 23 states have remedied this inequity and enacted contraceptive coverage laws. Under HIMMAA women will lose contraceptive-equity protections currently guaranteed by state law.

Unfortunately kosher certification doesn't call out wheat starch or eggs or other ingredients that are kosher and pareve... the stricter ones do note dairy ingredients, meat and meat byproducts, etc. Jell-O gets a kosher certification from some non-strict authorities because of the amount of processing involved... the odors that used to come from the Jell-O factory in Woburn that's just west of I-93 and south of the Montvale Avenue exit, indicated quite clearly that what went into that factory, was not "edible".... bones and hooves of animals, with rotting meat on them. The odor used to be really really really vile.

The level of processing involved, was not sufficient to prevent Jell-O from being poisonous to Jay Haldeman, who had developed severe allergic reactions to eating meat and meat by-products, however.

===============

I wonder if there is any way to sue Republicraps or their fund contributors for wrongful death for the deaths of women and girls from botched illegal abortions? [For that matter, for wrongful death from people who die from food poisoning/allergic reactions to unlabelled food ingredients..] (There is at least one person now in jail for a long long time for killing a fetus, a couple who couldn't obtain a legal abortion, tried cruder methods at home, one or both convicted of "murdering" a fetus.... strange that the Biblical literalist sorts who are always using the Bible as their Moral Authority, don't follow the only parts of it that talk about abortion.... ).

Quoting a Nixon-era bumper sticker:

"Don't blame me, I'm from Massachusetts."

Do I have to?