It's always easy in retrospect to whine.

Snort. No doubt. Or to try and tie every thread to Iraq. Twice.

FDA recommends that retailers, restaurateurs, and food service operators offer only fresh and fresh cut red Roma, red plum, and round red tomatoes and food products made from these tomatoes for sale or service from the sources listed above.

a standard of care has been evidenced and any restaurant choosing to ignore the standard is almost certainly going to be found liable for any subsequent injuries.

...gives me a strong suspicion that inflicting hundreds of millions of dollars of damage on tomato growers isn't the best response.

Yes, if, we can clearly identify an action that should not have been done. For example, if the FDA had issued a ban, we can debate whether or not the cost of the ban was worth the benefit.

But in this case, the FDA only issued warnings/recommendations, etc. So, we are left just debating the wording of the FDA bulletins. They look relatively non-alarmist to me, but I have no idea how the average person would interpret them. (For what it's worth, I basically ignored them.)

So what is the alternative? Should the FDA never issue any information until it is absolutely certain? Or should it set-up some kind of advisory board to debate the wording of bulletins before release? Heck, maybe such a board already exists.

Frankly, this strikes me as a kind of "institutions are not perfect" kind of complaint. Yes, there can be a lot of hysteria over things like GMOs. Yeah, people tend to overreact. Yeah, the vaccine scare is stupid. Yeah, the breast implant scare was also stupid. Etc. But expecting all government issued bulletins to be tuned pitch-perfect seems to be rather idealistic.

1. There's not enough information to do cost-benefit analysis. Right. But the fact that, in a nation of 300 million people, so few people were so mildly affected, combined with the fact that it probably wasn't due to tomatoes, gives me a strong suspicion that inflicting hundreds of millions of dollars of damage on tomato growers isn't the best response.

2. A few people suggest that I'm being too cavalier with other people's lives. That's not really the issue. I wouldn't pay $700,000 or a million to avoid having a bad case of diarrhea myself. So why should I expect someone else to pay that cost, particularly if it's not going to prevent me from having the bad case of diarrhea in the first place?

Not sure what you're getting at. But if it bothers you, one should simply ignore it. ;)

Yes, but ignoring comments pretty much kills a conversation. I'd just like a few more solid points, and a little less feel-good philosophy. I generally agree with you on matters of substance, it's just your style that irks me.

Not sure what you're getting at. But if it bothers you, one should simply ignore it. ;)

As to making the FDA warning more low key, yeah, that sounds good, but that is pretty subjective. The actual warning seems to be here. Is it alarmist? Heck if I know, and, furthermore, there is no real way for any of us to know unless we are presented with all the evidence that the FDA based the warning on.

you're getting the kind of government you're willing to pay for

if you don't like mutants, stop growing them in toxic waste

there ain't no such thing as a free lunch

Can you include a few more platitudes in your next post?

I don't see how that could have possibly changed your legal argument of jeopardy. Also, this has to be viewed in the light of the last big issue in which the entire response was *heavily* criticized as too little, too late.

I think you're getting the kind of government you're willing to pay for. Not enough troops on the ground means that the overworked, trigger happy ones that are there are going to be constantly erring on the conservative side, for their own protection.

Again, if you don't like mutants, stop growing them in toxic waste. Fund the agency and you'll stop wasting people's time and money in other areas.

However, there ain't no such thing as a free lunch.

What would those on the right expect to have happened here? Nothing? No alert? What?

A lower key alert, perhaps? The problem is that government, in its perfectly understandable need to "do something," tends to overreact and overstate the certainty of its information. Something to the effect that "salmonella is on this rise and here are some steps you can take to minimize your risks" would have been far preferable in this case than "Tomatoes can kill you! Don't eat tomatoes!"

So, let's get this straight. What would those on the right expect to have happened here? Nothing? No alert? What?

CDC Warning: Your food may or may not contain salmonella, eat at your own risk.

Whining and complaining is one thing. I'd like some constructive criticism. It's always easy in retrospect to whine. The issue is what to do in the future. Any advice? Any recommendations? A recommendation to decrease the powers of the FDA? What?

Seems to me that the "cost/benefit" cannot possibly be judged on a single case by case basis. Rather, it's a statistical argument that can only be made over the aggregate. I see no arguments regarding that. Am I missing some?

Yea, I can't see James actually addressing this point. Where's the "cost"? I mean, was there any pressure by the Government on this that they can point to?

The FDA issued an Alert, which meant that, absent a recall, sellers would have been liable to massive lawsuits if someone got sick. The FDA alert, while presumably based on the best info available, turned out to be a false alarm.