Rules bar telling which stores, restaurants had tainted meat: 10,000 lbs. of recalled beef from the Washington slaughterhouse where the BSE-tainted cow was rendered may have been distributed to as many as nine California counties and has been tracked to the retailers who sold it to the public. The state has shared the information with county health officials but they’re not telling you if you may have been exposed to any. They will say, however, that eleven restaurants and a market ended up with the beef.

“We are prohibited from releasing information that companies would consider proprietary,” (a USDA spkoesperson) explained. “If you are concerned whether you may have purchased the product, you can call your retail store. They would know. .. . The only way to know for sure is to contact stores.”

The USDA stresses that it considers the recalled meat safe because none of it contains the brain and spinal cord tissue thought to be the locus of infection with prions, the transmissible agents that cause BSE and its human equivalent, vCJD (which, by my reading of the literature, is what the exact same disease is called when it has crossed to infect a human). Then why is it being recalled? The answer may lie in the fact that scientists dispute whether prions can be transmitted via blood as well. SF Chronicle

“For the last three years, President Bush’s policies have ransacked the environment, put our national security at risk, damaged our economy, and redistributed wealth from the middle class to the very wealthiest Americans. Yet thanks to a complacent media, the President has managed to hide behind a carefully constructed ‘compassionate’ image. As the 2004 election nears, it’s crucial that voters understand what President Bush’s policies really mean for our country. And to do that, we need creative new ads that clearly show what’s at stake.

That’s why we decided to launch Bush in 30 Seconds, an ad contest that’s intended to bring new talent and new messages into the world of mainstream political advertising. We’re looking for the ad that best explains what this President and his policies are really about — in only 30 seconds.”

I especially like “Desktop” and “What Are We Teaching Our Children?”

“Charity Navigator, America’s premiere independent charity evaluator, works to advance a more efficient and responsive philanthropic marketplace by evaluating the financial health of America’s largest charities.” [via rebecca blood]. I am sorry I didn’t get to post this before you did your year-end giving. It bears pointing out, though, that if you are interested in maximum philanthropic impact of your dollars you might want to go beyond the large charities to smaller niche organizations without the inevitable layers of bureaucratic overhead.

One man’s perspective on Dean from Melbourne (the null device): “The fact that a machine-man from the lesser of two evils is seen as an almost messianic figure (an American Gough Whitlam, as it were) is testament to how loathed the Bush administration is in the more liberal, cosmopolitan parts of America. Mind you, with the US political system, Dean is as good as it gets; last election around, the best Ralph Nader could do was to bleed votes away from the Lesser Evil towards the Greater…”