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Canadian ranchers see politics in beef ruling Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/11043829.htmhttp://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/world/11043829.htm
Posted on Thu, Mar. 03, 2005
Canadian ranchers see politics in ruling
BETH DUFF-BROWN
Associated Press
TORONTO - Some ranchers in Western Canada believe the decision by a U.S. federal judge to block indefinitely the resumption of their cattle crossing into the United States is another example of American protectionism as well as botched politics by their own leaders.
Their anger was compounded Thursday when the U.S. Senate voted to overturn the Bush administration's decision to lift a ban next Monday. The ban was imposed on Canadian cattle nearly two years ago because of fears over mad cow disease.
Danny Rosehill of the Olds Auction Mart in Calgary said U.S. District Judge Richard Cebull's ruling Wednesday was not only biased in favor of cattlemen in Montana, but indicative of the increasingly testy relations between the world's largest trading partners.
Canada declined to join the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and then, last week, Prime Minister Paul Martin announced Ottawa would opt out of Washington's proposed continental missile shield. The White House was so peeved that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice canceled a trip to Ottawa.
"Why would the United States want to play ball with us? They come to us with hat in hand, asking for support on the war, and we say no," Rosehill said in a telephone interview from Calgary. "They come to us with hat in hand on this missile thing, and we say no."
Rosehill speaks for many Albertans in the western province, Canada's most conservative. Its leader, Premier Ralph Klein, was one of the few Canadian leaders to pledge support of the U.S. war in Iraq and often plays apologist for his traditionally liberal nation.
Canadian ranchers have been devastated by the ban on beef, in effect since May 2003 after an Albertan-born cow in Washington state was found ill with bovine spongiform encephalopathy, or BSE. Humans who eat BSE-contaminated tissue can contract a degenerative, fatal brain disorder.
The Canadian cattle industry has lost about $5.6 billion since then.
A pound of steer dropped from 88 cents in May 2003 to 22 cents after the ban. In the last few weeks, it has inched back up to 73 cents, according to the Canadian Cattlemen's Association, in anticipation of the border's opening up again.
The R-CALF United Stockgrowers of America, based in Billings, Mont., argued before Cebull that the USDA plan to reintroduce Canadian beef would pose a risk to consumers and U.S. cattle producers. The group asked the judge to block the reopening until its lawsuit was heard, and he complied.
John Masswohl, spokesman for the Canadian Cattlemen's Association, said the court ruling and subsequent Senate vote has nothing to do with health, missiles or the Iraqi war.
"None of this is about food safety or animal health or anything to do with disease," he said. "It's all about the money."
He said the Senators who voted in favor of the bill on Thursday mainly represent big beef-producing states such as North Dakota, Montana and Wyoming.
Rosehill and Masswohl both said Canadian cattlemen need to look East for new markets and curb their dependence on Americans to buy and chow down their beef. Canada sends 60 percent of its livestock to the United States, followed by Japan, South Korea and Mexico.
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