Raw milk champion faces legal set back

Michael Schmidt is a diary farmer who established a business that allowed patrons to partially own a cow so that they could have a source of raw milk. The distribution of raw milk is illegal in Ontario and so Mr. Schmidt was arrested and charged. At first he defended himself in court but his case was later taken up by the Canadian Constitution Federation, the same organization that helped Peter Jaworski and his family.

Yesterday Mr. Schmidt’s case suffered a set back:

Newmarket, ON: Dairy farmer Michael Schmidt suffered a setback in his campaign to legalize raw milk today when the decision of Justice Peter Tetley of the Ontario Court of Justice reversed a lower court decision and found Schmidt guilty on 15 of the 19 charges.

Schmidt had been acquitted of all charges by Justice of the Peace Paul Kowarsky in January, 2010. The Ontario government and the Grey Bruce Health Unit appealed that decision. Justice Tetley allowed their appeal on some, but not all charges.

All claims that the legislation violated the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms were dismissed.

The text of the decision has been posted on the website of the Canadian Constitution Foundation here.

Schmidt said: “This is just a temporary setback. We will continue to fight, both through the courts and through the legislature, for the rights of individuals to decide what they put into their bodies. The public supports us on this issue.

At this year’s Liberty Summer Seminar I had the opportunity to converse with Mr. Schmidt. He is an interesting and intelligent man to put it mildly and certainly the type who is willing to stand on principle. I have to say that I liked him.

But even if I didn’t like him, why the fuck can’t I buy raw milk if I wanted to?

Government grants are bad for art in Canada

Incentives matter, always. This includes the Canadian music industry. What incentives are created by an industry completely dominated by government grants?



Find out the answer by checking out this article written by my Volunteer colleague Peter Jaworski.



And support a new voluntary way of contributing to the art by taking a look at the crowd sourcing method of the always wonderful Lindy.

Don't privatize the CBC because it sucks?

Kate Taylor takes a moment to look at the arguments for what should be done with the soon to be 75 year old CBC. She dismisses proposals to privatize the CBC because it is such an inefficient money losing company that it couldn’t possibly survive in the market place. You know the market, that place where consumers not government officials decide what will be a successful product.



According to Ms. Taylor the consumers couldn’t possibly ever want what the CBC is selling and so they need the government to force consumers to pay for it with tax dollars. Her defense of a government owned broadcaster comes down to: we need to keep it because it sucks.



Ms. Taylor points out later that “Becoming Erica” is highly successful on iTunes. This may be so, I don’t really know. The only reason I’ve heard of the show is because I’ve seen posters for it on the side of busses. I have no idea what the show is about and I don’t know of anyone who watches it, but hey I just described about 90% of television.



Still if we are going to hold up one show as a success story I have to point something out. It is only one show and one show does not make a worthwhile network.



Ms. Taylor’s case for why the CBC is sanctified and must be protected is implied in her snide comment about other networks broadcasting American shows. Canadian programming must be protected and only the CBC can do that.



This ignores two truths:



1. The extent that CBC programming is dominated by British and, yes, American shows.

2. The fact that the other networks broadcast many successful Canadian shows, especially CTV.



I am not sure what essential Canadian culture is being protected by broadcasting Arrested Development throughout the day (does the CBC still do that?).



The reality is that the CBC is not inherently special, it is just crummy.