With less than a week to go before California voters decide whether they want food that contains genetically engineered (GE) ingredients to be explicitly labeled as such, the board of the American Association for the Advance of Science (AAAS) has proclaimed from its prestigious perch that those who want Frankenfoods to be labeled are little more than emotional nuts who know nothing about science.

That the AAAS would enjoin this battle is hardly a surprise, given its longstanding ties to Monsanto and other companies with a direct interest in the outcome. But the group says that its real motivation for opposing mandatory labeling is because doing so would “mislead and falsely alarm consumers.”

“Our concern is that ideology not trump science here,” AAAS Chief Executive Alan Leshner told the LA Times. “We do regulation of foods to protect the public health.” Continue reading →