This Could Be The Beginning Of End (Of Factory Farm Animal Suffering)

To state the obvious; I usually do not write about politics. I am a not registered democrat nor a republican (nor a wild west libertarian). Being naturally cautious about human nature, I never trust sapiens, leave alone their groups. 

What I trust are individuals who have values, passionate about always doing the right thing, understand their cosmic insignificance, and transcend beyond their self-centered life. One such person is Senator Cory Brooker of NJ. He understands animal suffering and became a vegan. He is the only person who stands and speaks for animals in the senate (with skin in the game sans virtue signaling). 

In December 2019 he (and Elizabeth Warren) introduced The Farm System Reform Act of 2019 bill. This bill focuses on closing down all factory farms in the US by 2040. Here's a sample of how specific and detailed the bill is: 

LARGE CONCENTRATED ANIMAL FEEDING OPERATION; LARGE CAFO.—The term “large concentrated animal feeding operation” or “large CAFO” means an AFO at which are present not less than

(A) 700 mature dairy cows, milked or dry;

(B) 1,000 veal calves;

(C) 1,000 cattle (including heifers, steers, bulls, cows, and calves) other than mature dairy cows or veal calves;

(D) 2,500 swine, each weighing not less than 55 pounds;

(E) 10,000 swine, each weighing not more than 55 pounds;

(F) 500 horses;

(G) 10,000 sheep or lambs;

(H) 55,000 turkeys;

(I) in the case of an AFO that uses a liquid manure handling system—

(i) 30,000 laying hens or broilers; or

(ii) 5,000 ducks; or

(J) in the case of an AFO that uses a system other than a liquid manure handling system—

(i) 125,000 chickens (other than laying hens);

(ii) 82,000 laying hens; or

(iii) 30,000 ducks.

Cory Brooker's website summarizes this bill as follows: 

• The Farm System Reform Act of 2019 would:

Place an immediate moratorium on new and expanding large CAFOs, and phase out by 2040 the largest CAFOs as defined by the Environmental Protection Agency

Hold corporate integrators responsible for pollution and other harm caused by CAFOs

Provide a voluntary buyout for farmers who want to transition out of operating a CAFO

Strengthen the Packers and Stockyards Act to protect family farmers and ranchers, including:

Prohibit the use of unfair tournament or ranking systems for paying contract growers

Protect livestock and poultry farmers from retaliation

Create market transparency and protect farmers and ranchers from predatory purchasing practices

Restore mandatory country-of-origin labeling requirements for beef and pork and expand to dairy products

Prohibit the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) from labeling foreign imported meat products as “Product of USA”

This is extraordinary given most countries in the world including India followed the insane meat-eating practice of Americans. These countries for the first time in the history of their civilization mindlessly created factory farms in the last two decades. 

Yesterday Democrats won the senate race in Georgia. Now Biden and his team have once in a lifetime opportunity to pass this bill.  

I am not naive. Most democrats don't care about animals. But if they have any understanding of the implications of animal sufferings which covers a broad range of problems from climate change to pandemics, they will do whatever they have in their power to pass the bill. 

If they have the audacity to pass this bill, history will remember them for generations to come. 

This century will be remembered as the century when the world's most powerful country took a small step towards implementing the first words of wisdom from Buddha (after his meditative state under the famous fig tree): 

Right speech, right action, and right occupation follow from right purpose. They mean living in harmony with the unity of life: speaking kindly, living not just for oneself but for the welfare of all. Do not earn your livelihood at the expense of life or connive at or support those who do harm to other creatures, such as butchers, soldiers makers of poison and weapons. All creatures love life; all creatures fear pain. Therefore treat all creatures as yourself, for the dharma of a human being is not to harm but to help. 

- The Dhammapada by Eknath Easwaran 

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