I Vahs Not Zhere.....

I grew up with Hogan's Heroes. Sgt. Schultz: "I see....No-zzzzingk!" Plausible deniability was part of my birthright.

Meanwhile.....Col. Klink (Werner Klemperer) was the son of Otto Klemperer, a friend of Mahler and a genuine genius who was one of the first Jewish emigrants from Germany after Hitler took over...

Anyway.....In the last few years we have all become jaded by the constant allegations of cheating from our premier athletes: baseball idiots, Lance Armstrong, Olympic stars, soccer stars.....

My favorite soccer-related faux-pas was when Didier Drogba ran afoul of the drug testers a few years back after a trip home to Cote d'Ivoire. He tested positive for marijuana...after visiting his grandma on holiday. "What am I supposed to do....not have Grandma's famous Christmas green cakes?"

The soccer bureaucrats let that one slide......

We are led to believe that Lance Armstrong has giant balls....well, one giant ball....so please ignore his over the top testosterone test. Fine.

They are all lying, right?

What if they weren't? Even the horrible abusive French serial rapist financier is being released today.

Last week five members of the Mexican National Soccer Team were suspended for blood levels of a steroid, performance-enhancing drug: clenbuterol.

This was days before the start of the Gold Cup....a competition amongst the various North American soccer countries. The winner of the Gold Cup plays in the Copa America....a competition for the title of the whole Western Hemisphere. The players banned were not numb-nuts.....they lost the starting goalkeeper and four other high end players.

No serious person denies that blood doping and performance enhancing drugs do not flood all through professional sports. Serious people also realize that high-end athletes have high-end trainers that walk them through the various chemical mine-fields that await. Sudafed? No way. Clenbuterol? GTFOH.

Clenbuterol is a steroid of such low class and low effect on human performance that no serious trainer would ever think to involve it in his athlete's "nutrition and training" program.

Clenbuterol works really well with beef and pork production. It amplifies lean muscle mass and is used in huge quantities in "modern" meat production.

By "modern" I mean: untested, unscrupulous, corporate, profit-driven meat production.

Right now our Tea Party Republicans are trying to gut the already limited inspection powers of the USDA and the FDA. Today, less than 1% of agricultural and meat products coming in to the US are even cursorily inspected. These clowns want to cut that.....supposedly because regulations and inspections are BAD FOR BUSINESS.

My friends and I (Passionfish, Mundaka, Bernardus, Tree Bones, etc) pride ourselves on the quality of our ingredients. Eating with us costs more than eating at Red Lobster....because we value our sources. If our competitors can buy dangerously cheap, crazy shit from China and Mexico for half our costs....we are at a huge disadvantage. All our suppliers are in America, and all our suppliers have valued workers who they try to pay real wages.....as do all of us.

I love the FDA and the USDA. They validate my hard work, and the hard work of my workers, and the hard work of my suppliers.

The Mexican soccer players are not stupid enough to take clenbuterol for physical advantage. There is better stuff that is still undetectable. These guys are millionaires.

The clenbuterol came from the food they ate. They ate pork or beef so saturated with clenbuterol that after they digested it....they flunked an anti-doping blood test!

This meat is now being imported into the US by way of NAFTA. Unless you are a professional athlete in a sport that tests for drugs....you will never know.

If you think I am kidding...check out this article from the last bastion of real journalism in the continental US....the LA Times.

Clenbuterol poisoning in China is so widespread that it is becoming a social issue. And Chinese pork and beef is everywhere in America....subject to less than a 1% inspection rate.

And you Tea Party motherfuckers want to CUT our food safeguards?

Government enforced standards help me in my business. They protect my workers' jobs, and protect my suppliers' workers jobs....

I love the Monterey County Health Department.....now the Environmental Something Something. Our inspector is Roger, son of Mario. Mario grew up on Cannery Row with Bert and Ted...The Factory, Neil DeVaugn's...Mario still does cameos at Los Laureles Lodge.

Roger is not some oppressive bureaucrat....he is our partner in food service. Roger comes by twice a year and checks out scene. He hated our compost pile, but grew to accept it. He still hates our salmon smoker.....but we agree to disagree. Roger makes sure that my operation bends to the letter and spirit of the law....and my customers can have confidence in our operation. I can fall back on Roger's opinion if questioned....

And most important to me....everyone else that Roger inspects is at least as sanitary and organized as I am. Anywhere I go that Roger inspects.....I can feel safe.

My permit from Monterey County costs about $700 per year. Two bucks a day.

I do not feel oppressed, and my customers do not feel overcharged because of government oversight.

But then again.....I don't buy Mexican or Chinese beef, pork....or anything.

Words fail.