I’m not familiar with American labelling, but in the EU there are several labels that mean different things.

I’m not an expert, but roughly speaking PDO (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_designation_of_ori...) means that the entire process follows certain procedures, ingredients come from a particular area and production happens in certain areas (usually the same as the ingredients).

PGI (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_Geographical_Indic...) instead is looser.

For instance you may have PGI Tuscan oil that is produced with North African olives, while Lametia DOP (a PDO oil) must be produced near Lametia Terme and must use Carolea olives from the same area.

You can’t label your oil “Lametia DOP”, if you produce it near Milan or if you use different olives.

All this to say that for “product of USA” to make sense, it should not necessarily mean that in order to get that label all ingredients must come from the USA. You probably miss a PDO-like certification.

The EU just has so much more and better regulations on food labelling than the US.

Also, for meat, origin labelling is mandatory, but you usually see all three: "raised in", "butchered in", packaged in". If I understand the case in the article correctly, they're saying that if any of those three countries is the US, you can slap a "Product of the USA" on it and be done with it, which just wouldn't fly in the EU.

It would fly in the EU, if you branded your product accordingly. Maybe "Product of the USA" doesn't mean much legally. In the EU you can probably brand something as "Product of the EU", but you can't make wine in your basement and call it Prosecco, because "Prosecco" is a PDO wine/name and must be produced in Valdobbiadene and Conegliano using local grapes. Maybe somebody should register a brand and license it to producers that follow certain processes? Certainly there are private companies already doing that, but nobody cares.

To be honest, these protected denominations favour the producers more than the consumer. If you think about it, from the consumer's perspective, it doesn't really make sense to prevent somebody in Florence from producing Prosecco, if they follow the correct procedures and use the correct grapes. The same applies for meat origin labelling, why should I care if my steak comes from the UK? I would understand Argentina... I find way more relevant knowing the breed rather than the country of origin (What's this? Angus? Chianina? https://www.sainsburys.co.uk/gol-ui/product/steak/sainsburys...)

But I digress.

Calling food that is 90%+ made in another country a "Product of the USA" is just insulting and I think if there was no money involved in the judges' decision making they'd just call this what it is; deceptive trade practices.

The judge is likely interpreting a law that is worded to result in exactly this outcome.

Exactly. It's ridiculous to jump to the assumption that judges are being paid off when they correctly interpreted the law as written.

The law needs to be changed, of course. But that's not up to the judges.

> But that's not up to the judges.

Sure it is. English common law countries place heavy emphasis on precedent. If the judge had refused to take the law literally in this case and done the reasonable thing instead, chances are this precedent would be cited in any future lawsuits of this sort.

2 out of 3 judges are interpreting the law this way. This went all the way to an appeals court. There's a strong implication that there is quite a bit of room for the judges to maneuver.

The minority opinion judge said > if consumers are deceived by the label, “Product of the U.S.A.,” then that label violates both the FMIA and USDA regulations.

Unfortunately, whatever body you create to watch the body you create that watches the body you create will have people in it that will be the target of lobbing.

You need to some how break through the selection process to appoint people of integrity and put enough safeguards in place to prevent conflicts of interest.

Unfortunately, I don't know of a single time this design worked out in the past and created a working entity.

Corruption is the standard because it's the easiest path. This is true in other arenas like plaintext vs all the work of adding encryption or screen time vs exercising.

All the laws in the world won't fix a mindset or mental attitude.

The cases were dismissed. The court basically said this is something for USDA/Congress to take care of.

Agreed. I call these "Lorax problems" when there's nobody there to speak for the common interest. It generally takes a drastic public spectacle to muster the political wherewithal to make a law in these cases. It took DDT killing bald eagles for the feds to make the EPA and the Clean Water and Clean Air acts. It took an oil spill to hold oil, inc. accountable for (a fraction of) their pollution.

How's that "lobbying"? Isn't that just Big Meat paying for lawyers and winning a court-case? (Along with a brain-dead judge)

> How's that "lobbying"?

From the court’s decision:

<<But this new law generated several years of international-trade issues with Canada and Mexico, including two disputes before the World Trade Organization and more than $1 billion in retaliatory tariffs imposed against the United States. … … As a result, in 2015, Congress repealed the new country-of-origin requirements for beef products, essentially reinstating the pre-2008 status quo.>>

The court just used this “status quo” law formulas. But it’s not the result of just lobbying, right. It’s the result of a trade war.

> tobacco companies and junk food in schools

Bear with me, I think these are actually two examples of net good (potentially) done by lobbyists, where their (admittedly uncaring) business incentives end up standing up for what people want.

Tobacco and junk food are big targets for the "protect us from ourselves" crowd who think they should dictate values to other people. Just because they aren't good for you, government shouldn't be telling people what to do. Luckily (and I mean this, it's essentially a coincidence) the incentives of tobacco companies and soft drink manufacturers or whatever align with giving people what they want, so ordinary people who would otherwise get pushed around by controlling political types (for their own good) get an unexpected ally.

I've seen this with covid too, few stand up for people who just want to do their own thing and not get pushed around by people who want to impose their values of maximizing for health (pretending to) at the expense of all else. The only groups with the clout to stand up to health officials mad with power end up being lobbyists for companies that are losing money hand over fist, and the interests align.

I'm not saying it's utopian, but for better or worse, they end up providing a much needed countervailing force against what might otherwise be a march to some technocratic hell hole where people can't make their own choices because someone knows better.

> Tobacco and junk food are big targets for the "protect us from ourselves" crowd who think they should dictate values to other people. Just because they aren't good for you, government shouldn't be telling people what to do

Schools should absofuckinglutely not be serving, nor even making available, junk food to kids on any kind of regular basis. This isn't the government raiding your cupboards and throwing out things they don't like.

In a lot of cases, the relationship between a product and a consumer is abusive. Take heroin for example. There is a huge (black) market for heroin. People "want" it, and will become addicted to it, and "want" it even more. The monetary value of a product is not a measure of how much good it does.

The problem problem with your argument is that you're saying it's perfectly ok for businesses to manipulate their products to make them addictive, the public with marketing, the schools with kickbacks, and the politicians with lobbyists.

But when big government rears it's ugly head and tries to do any sort of regulation for the greater good, it's automatically bad and imposing on my freedoms and choice.

You're advocating for a world where people have the perception of freedom while being oblivious to the fact that they're actually being manipulated for profit. But that's ok as long as it's Facebook, Coke, Philip Morris and Nestle and not big bad government.

I'm summarizing the status quo, in which there are governments and other advocacy groups as well. My point is not that those should go away, it's that under the current system, there are cases where lobbyists (or corporate interests generally) can provide pushback that prevents runaway regulation and nanny-state-ism. If there were just profit seeking companies, and no opposing forces, that could be bad too, and maybe cause the kind of things you're talking about.

On any given issue, some people care more about it, and some people care less about it. Special groups in general are not a bad thing.

> If there were just profit seeking companies, and no opposing forces, that could be bad too, and maybe cause the kind of things you're talking about.

That's exactly what the problem is. On many issues, there are no opposing forces to the special interest groups. These arise when for example when an industry causes a small issue for a large population. It's difficult to organize and litigate in such cases.

Edit: I think we're mostly in agreement. I think what is needed is, like GP suggested, a rational way to balance the incentives for the special interests and the public good. Our current system relies on mustering large public support to make legal changes for the public good, but that's not scalable, and doesn't tend to rational, balanced thinking.

I do not think things are as black and white as you think and its a blurry line, there are so many other factors to consider than just "government shouldn't tell me what to do" - such as how addictive the substance is, what demography of the people is the regulation going to target e.g. children etc. If you ask me if a person should be able to choose if they want to smoke, I'd say yes; and if you ask me if there should be regulation around marketing tobacco products targeting kids or if there should be regulation to prevent selling/consuming cigarettes in schools/colleges or in public transport, I would also say yes. Different people draw the line differently, with what products should be regulated and how stringent should the regulation be, and we keep trying to find the best compromise and not deal with absolutes.

The problem I have with these groups/people that "end up standing up for what people want" as you phrase it, is that while such groups generally stand up for the causes they like its also generally the same people that also carve out their own list of exceptions that they think the government should intervene on. So, in essence, what's the difference between them and the "protect us from ourselves" crowd as you phrase it.

> Tobacco and junk food are big targets for the "protect us from ourselves" crowd who think they should dictate values to other people.

It is insane that a minor is allowed to buy or consume junk food in an institution (a school) that’s supposed to look after them. Food served in schools should be selected by a professional, such as a dietician. It should not be possible for a child to eat hamburgers or jacket potatoes or fries, first of all because we should not poison them and second because part of their education should include teaching them how to eat properly.

I can't tell if this is serious, you are calling it insane that a minor should be allowed to eat hamburgers and fries at school? If you are serious, I'd say this supports my argument that we need to counterbalance these extreme views, and that coincidentally, industry lobby ends up being on the other side, and helping normal people who think it's ok to enjoy a burger sometimes

I’m dead serious, school menus in Italy are (at least in theory) monitored by the ministry of health, to ensure they are healthy and well balanced. Children don’t buy food at school, they are served a meal from a fixed menu (which may change for religious or health reasons). I’ll leave to you to determine which county has better eating habits.

The notion that a 7 year old can buy fries or may think it’s normal to buy fries (rather than it being an exceptional thing that happens no more than once a week under the supervision of an adult) is as stupid as thinking that they should be allowed to buy and consume beer.