"Do Nothing Joe"

"Do Nothing Joe" Knollenberg is certainly living up to his nickname these days.

Looking back at his record over the first quarter of this year we can see that he hasn't done anything useful!!!

One could argue that given concerns over Knollenberg's competency, maybe it is better that he doesn't do much. Like his friend George Bush, Knollenberg is always on the wrong side of the issue anyway.

But there are times when leadership is important. And Joe provides no leadership whatsoever.

One such area has to do with our trade policies.

Knollenberg Supports Trade Agreements That Threaten Our Jobs & Our Health
We've reported before that Joe Knollenberg supports what he calls "free trade" with countries like China. He fails to recognize that there is no such thing as free trade. There is always a cost.

The cost to us in Michigan has been jobs. We have seen our high paying jobs -- both blue collar manufacturing jobs and the associated white collar engineering jobs get shipped overseas. And Knollenberg supports the federal policies that allow that to continue.

And we can now see another example of how Knollenberg's "Free Trade" agreements cause us harm -- look at the poisoned pet food problem that we are experiencing.

That poison has been traced back to a manufacturing plant in China that sold wheat gluten to the food manufacturers.

Not only is this tragic because it means many of us have been unknowingly poisoning our dogs and cats, but today DelMonte announced that the wheat gluten they used in their recalled foods was labeled as "human grade". That means that it may well have been used in human food products.


Another disturbing aspect of this crisis is that FDA's activities seem limited to posting information on their website and maybe helping with some forensic evaluations of the pet food.

Isn't this the sort of thing the FDA should be protecting us from in the first place? Why aren't they? Of course Joe Knollenberg has shown NO LEADERSHIP on the issue of FDA's failure to protect public health and welfare from bad drugs or bad food.

Is Knollenberg incompetent
or has he just been paid off
by lobbyists
to not do anything that could
cost their industry's money?