Hightower Lowdown

Monsanto and other U.S. manufacturers of genetically altered crops literally have come a cropper in trying to sell their Frankenfoods in Europe, where they've been banned, and in our country, where a growing consumer rebellion has spooked retailers and processors from buying these genetically contaminated foods.

So, Monsanto and the rest are now trying to peddle their tampered foodstuffs to the world's poor. Particularly disgusting is their shameful claim that they're doing this out of humanitarian concern. The lab techs, they say, can splice foreign genes into rice to juice up its vitamin A content, thus improving the health of millions of Third World children.

Kit Bond, the senator from Monsanto, even put $30 million of our tax dollars into a foreign-aid spending bill to buy Monsanto's Frankenrice for distribution to the poor, piously saying that the funds will "liberate millions from the tyranny of hunger."

Hogwash. Genetic food-tampering is about putting millions into the coffers of Monsanto. These products have not been proven safe for use by us—so why should the world's poor be Monsanto's guinea pigs?