Is it OK to Cry Now?

I don't know about you but I seem to have some limits to my sanity or at least what my brain will accept as meaningful input. If there is too much insanity coming at me I tend to run in circles and scream obscenities. You're not gonna believe this one. Oh wait, of course you will:

The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease.

Not making this up! The Bush "administration" will fight to keep meatpackers from testing their animals for mad cow disease.

I am begging the universe for some rational explanation.

A beef producer in the western state of Kansas, Creekstone Farms Premium Beef, wants to test all of its cows.

This is good right? Everybody's gonna want their meat from Creekstone Farms! Free enterprise and all that. Give the people what they want?

Larger meat companies feared that move because, if Creekstone should test its meat and advertised it as safe, they might have to perform the expensive tests on their larger herds as well.

The Agriculture Department regulates the test and argued that widespread testing could lead to a false positive that would harm the meat industry.

I am confused...why would Bush and company want me to eat potentially poison beef?

I'm at a loss here. But thankfully, Rick Perlstein at .common sense is not:

First, observe the contempt for liberty. When E. coli conservatives say self-regulation is preferable to government, they're even lying about that. Second, observe the contempt for small business. When a small company want to - voluntarily! - hold its product to a higher standard, the government blocks it, in part because bigger companies have to be protected from the competition, in part because a theoretical threat to the bottom line (false positives) trumps protection against a deadly disease.

There's your conservatism, America: not extremism in defense of liberty. State socialism in defense of Mad Cow.

h/t to Kos