Month: May 2014

by Jonah Shepp

James E. McWilliams considers the expenses that mandatory GMO labeling would likely impose on the food industry. “One change seems absolutely certain,” he writes, that the “food system’s foundation would tectonically shift to accommodate dual ingredient streams (if not multiple streams)”:

Understanding the economic threat of segregation requires understanding the ubiquity of GMOs in our food supply. Eighty-five percent of U.S. corn, 95 percent of U.S. sugar beets and canola, and 91 percent of U.S. soy are genetically modified. Up to 75 percent of the processed foods on the market contain genetically modified ingredients. A GMO label—again, assuming at least some change in consumer choice—means that food producers would have to cleave the food system’s supply chain to segregate and audit GMO and non-GMO ingredients.

This would require them to prevent cross-pollination between GMO and non-GMO crops, store GMO and non-GMO ingredients in different locations, establish exclusive cleaning and transportation systems for both commodities, and hire contractors to audit storage facilities, processing plants, and final food products. Surveying the potential compliance expenses based on a failed 2002 Oregon labeling initiative (Prop. 27), the Washington State report estimated that annual costs today would range from $150 million to $920 million. The administrative expenses of auditing alone could reach $1 million. And as for the legal expenses that would arise from suits over contamination: Let’s just say the vultures are already circling.

But what’s especially daunting is that these costs wouldn’t be fixed.

Recent Dish on the GMO labeling controversy here.

by Tracy R. Walsh

Florida’s second-largest school district is under fire for giving teachers of single-sex classes pedagogical tips along the lines of “Girls are not as good at abstract thinking, so they should learn with the help of real-life connections.” Amanda Marcotte rolls her eyes:

The complaint quotes directly from the District’s Single Gender Education Legal and Educational Rationale Brief, and includes such gems as, “Boys tend to prefer non-fiction over fiction. Boys like to read descriptions of real events or illustrated accounts of the way things work, like spaceships, bombs, or volcanoes.” What about girls? “Story problems are a good way to teach algebra to girls. Putting the question in story format makes it easier for girls to understand, and more interesting as well,” the district brief says, adding, “With boys, you can stimulate their interest by focusing on the properties of numbers per se.”

Proponents of single-sex education may claim to be all about maximizing children’s potential, but this ACLU complaint suggests the opposite – that the real result is stifling any children who dare buck gender stereotypes. A girl who wants to be a computer programmer, a girl who’s a budding athlete, a boy who wants to write poetry, or a young man who wants to be a psychologist are all entering a classroom that is hostile to their talents and ambitions. Even if the ACLU of Florida can’t get the schools to stop, hopefully they can educate parents about the dangers of these kinds of classrooms and encourage them to yank their kids out.

Dana Liebelson considers the broader issue of single-sex education:

Gender-based educational programs are not unique to Florida. The ACLU has filed complaints against school districts in other states, including West Virginia, Wisconsin, and Idaho. The National Association for Single Sex Public Education, which supports these kinds of programs, notes, “We understand that some girls would rather play football rather than play with Barbies,” and “girls in single-sex educational settings are more likely to take classes in math, science, and information technology.” Sherwin, from the ACLU, says she doesn’t see anything wrong with single-sex schools that don’t use different teaching methods for boys and girls. But she adds, “Whenever you make sex the most salient category for grouping children, it certainly sends a message about sex difference.”

I wish I could say this story surprised me, but health classes at my public high school were filled with sexual stereotyping. One hapless gym teacher explained to my sophomore class that women, as born gatherers, were “programmed” – I remember the word distinctly – to browse endlessly for shoes at the mall, while, men, as natural hunters, would shoot straight to the electronics store. (This being South Jersey, all analogies were mall analogies).

I hope today’s teachers are more enlightened than they were in the early aughts, but that school’s website still hosts materials like this:

A school doesn’t have to be single-sex to be sexist.

by Jonah Shepp

News that Iran’s foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif has been invited to Saudi Arabia is music to Paul Pillar’s ears. He attributes the emerging thaw between the two regional giants in large part to American leadership, though the usual suspects will deny it:

Rapprochement between Iran and its Arab neighbors is good for the neighbors as well as for Iranians, good for stability in the Persian Gulf, and good for U.S. interests in the region.

Secretary of State Kerry’s comments welcoming the Saudi move are doubly appropriate, given that the United States can claim some of the credit because of its role in currently negotiating an agreement with Iran to keep its nuclear program peaceful.  The Saudis’ invitation is very likely being made partly in anticipation of successful completion of those negotiations and the prospect of Iran and the United States taking a step toward a more normal relationship.  This is the sequence that should be expected: the superpower leads, and lesser allies follow.  It is the sequence that should have been obvious to anyone who hasn’t been trying to spin Arab reactions to the negotiations to cast doubts on where the negotiations are going.

To Juan Cole, this overture indicates that the Saudis are copping to the ugly reality in Syria:

Bashar al-Assad has for about a year been winning the Syria war, and the rebels may not seem a very attractive investment any more.

Moreover, the most effective fighting forces have declared themselves a branch of al-Qaeda. Saudi Arabia is deathly afraid of the latter. Riyadh recently discovered a terrorist plot in which the major group fighting in Syria (the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant) became a threat to their own Saudi backers. That episode may soured Riyadh on the most hawkish strategy in Syria. Indeed, you could imagine a Saudi-Iran alliance against al-Qaeda affiliates, now holding territory in northern Iraq and northern Syria.

But Lina Khatib expects Iran to throw Assad under the bus for the sake of better relations with Riyadh:

The dominant wisdom has been that Iran has thrown its full weight behind Assad and that it would not abandon this ally because Assad guarantees Iran’s strategic interests in the Levant. But Assad himself is less valuable to Iran than the much-coveted nuclear arms deal. Talks between the United States and Iran appear to be heading towards a settlement, while Saudi Arabia’s softened stance towards Iran means that Iran must give Saudi Arabia something in return for cordial relations, because Saudi Arabia remains the stronger regional player in the Gulf. Assad is likely to be the least costly compromise for Iran on both fronts.

Maybe if both countries give up on their unsavory clients, it will force a settlement of the conflict that allows the sane middle to come to the fore. I’m not too sanguine that any good immediate outcome is possible for Syria (or Lebanon) after three years of perpetual disaster, but getting these major regional players to talk about cleaning up the mess in their neighborhood is crucial to end the violence, which in turn is a necessary first step toward rebuilding the shattered Levant. And it would prove that a patient, as opposed to reactive, American foreign policy pays dividends. Obama won’t get much credit—least of all from the neocons, as Pillar rightly points out—because his hand in this isn’t visible enough, but that’s sort of the point, isn’t it?