Unclean, Unclean!!!!!

I picture it from something like a Monty Python movie. Characters swarming the streets chanting, "Unclean, unclean!!!!!!"

So how do you feel about the beef you eat? Apparently, folks in South Korea are so opposed to eating beef imported from the United States that they are ready to impeach their president over the concern. President Lee Myung-bak has been challenged to eat U.S. beef in front of a television audience in an effort to allay concerns. So far, he hasn't agreed. From one of the news articles:

A Washington-based NGO ― Public Citizen ― has found, via requests to the USDA, that at least 131 slaughterhouses in 34 U.S. states had violated the rules on the removal of specified risk material (SRM) between 2004 and 2005.

The civic group said, ``A common situation described in these noncompliance records is when over and under 30 month aged cattle are processed simultaneously, without adequate rinsing or sanitation of equipment.''

Yikes. Not sure if I'd want to import the stuff either.

Oh, wait. I live here....

Which brings to mind a video I watched last week. Fast Food Nation is a fictionalized account of the non-fiction book by Eric Schlosser. It really forces you to consider the question, "Where does my food come from?" The movie depicts everything from the extreme hardships of illegal immigrants who work in the blood bath of meat processing plants to the corrupt fast food marketers who will do anything--including risking lives--to make the big bucks. Warning: at the end of the movie I literally felt sick.