Paul Krugman's op-ed piece in the NYTimes today is interesting. It's behind the firewall, unfortunately.
http://select.nytimes.com/...
(requires membership)
Now, those who blame globalization do have a point. U.S. officials can’t inspect overseas food-processing plants without the permission of foreign governments — and since the Food and Drug Administration has limited funds and manpower, it can inspect only a small percentage of imports. This leaves American consumers effectively dependent on the quality of foreign food-safety enforcement. And that’s not a healthy place to be, especially when it comes to imports from China, where the state of food safety is roughly what it was in this country before the Progressive movement.
The Washington Post, reviewing F.D.A. documents, found that last month the agency detained shipments from China that included dried apples treated with carcinogenic chemicals and seafood "coated with putrefying bacteria." You can be sure that a lot of similarly unsafe and disgusting food ends up in American stomachs.
Krugman goes on to explain the tainted logic of Friedmaniacs who insist that all governmental regulations are bad.
Upton Sinclair, Theodore Roosevelt - and, indeed, Charles Dickens - lived in vain if we accept the anti-government catcalls of the right wing.
It would be helpful, as Krugman points out, if the Bush regime were not busy destroying the usefulness of the FDA. Who knew that eating salad, peanut butter, or a chicken-salad sandwich would be life-threatening?