Justifiable outrage today at the Peanut Corporation of America and an executive that knowingly shipped tainted products which to date are linked to several deaths .He pleaded the fifth and refused to taste his own companies products.
Congress has showed some real backbone tackling this.Get the nuts out of the way first .Maybe former Bush administration officials will be next. It looks that dealing with the past deeds of the former Bush administration will have to wait though as President Obama expressed at his news conference more a desire to move forward, and to not be diverted by backward-looking investigation.But Sen.Patrick Leahy has proposed something short of prosecution "We could develop and authorize a person or group of people universally recognized as fair minded, and without axes to grind. Their straightforward mission would be to find the truth. People would be invited to come forward and share their knowledge and experiences, not for purposes of constructing criminal indictments, but to assemble the facts" Someday perhaps but for now congress can handle peanuts and the executive looks forward.
Congress has showed some real backbone tackling this.Get the nuts out of the way first .Maybe former Bush administration officials will be next. It looks that dealing with the past deeds of the former Bush administration will have to wait though as President Obama expressed at his news conference more a desire to move forward, and to not be diverted by backward-looking investigation.But Sen.Patrick Leahy has proposed something short of prosecution "We could develop and authorize a person or group of people universally recognized as fair minded, and without axes to grind. Their straightforward mission would be to find the truth. People would be invited to come forward and share their knowledge and experiences, not for purposes of constructing criminal indictments, but to assemble the facts" Someday perhaps but for now congress can handle peanuts and the executive looks forward.
Executives for Peanut Corporation of America refused to testify before a Congressional panel today. Rep. Greg Walden, R-Oregon, asked owner Stewart Parnell if he would be willing to eat his own products.
"This container is full of products that less than a month ago, people were consuming thinking it was fine to eat," asked Walden while holding up a container of Peanut Corporation products. "And one of the things I'm going to do today is ask Mr. Parnell from Peanut Corporation of America if he'd like to open this and sample some of the products that he didn't think were a problem to send out to the rest of us to eat."
Parnell refused to testify, invoking his right not to incriminate himself.
The Congressional Panel also reviewed emails showing Parnell urged workers to ship peanut products even after test results indicated salmonella contamination. The emails suggested that Parnell was more concerned about sales revenue.
"The company e-mails obtained by a House committee show Peanut Corp. of America owner Stewart Parnell ordered the shipments tainted with the bacteria because he was worried about lost sales,"AP
P.B. facts :
2.4 billion pound are consumed in the U.S. each year. About 50% is consumed as peanut butter.
March is National Peanut Month, a time to celebrate
Two peanut farmers have been elected President of the United States: Thomas Jefferson and Jimmy Carter.
Keen
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