I buy from my local farmer raw milk butter and other dairy products. These have had an enormously positive effect on my health. The local attacks, including raids, on farmers who sell directly to their clients is ugly and without any health justification. Legalizing and protecting these farmers is real health care reform because only true preventative health care will reduce the costs that Obama has been talking about during his campaign.

As Pete Kennedy, president of Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund says, "Raw milk is the gateway to small farms."  It brings consumers and farmers together, and builds a safe, local food supply.  I'm willing to pay more for quality sources from farmers that understand topsoil, land stewardship, and animal husbandry.

If you want to solve America's health crisis, you'll do everything in your power to provide America with nutrient-dense, wholesome, unprocessed foods.  Free our farmers to produce the food I want to eat.

For centuries mankind has consumed raw/fermented milk.  This product is essential for the well-being/health of the human body.  The last 50 years have seen an increase in the health related problems of people, and the rising cost of dealing with these medical issues.  The need for wholesome, unprocessed, nutrient dense foods are vital for the health of all.    Your help is needed in making this product available to the public.  Small farms are eco-friendly. Farms need to be helped to provide the nutrient we desire.  Obama raised the matter.  He needs to pioneer the way back to true nutrition and the health of all peoples.

If you wish to tackle health care, you will need to look at the food supply.  The reason for many of the diseases currently  ravaging the country are the ingredients in industrial food.  I lost 45 pounds without dieting.  I simply stopped eating processed and fast foods.  I eat as much as I want, but it comes from the farmers market and local meat and dairy vendors.  I drink whole raw milk, cream, butter, yogurt, eat grass-fed meats, and organic local fruits and vegetables.  My doctor says "I don't know what you are doing, but keep on doing it".

Please legalize the sale of raw milk. Processed foods and pharmacueticals are doing far more damage to our country than anything else. I have been drinking raw milk for a year now and so have my four grandchildren. We are all much healthier, with less bouts of illness, even when exposed at school.
With the progressive nature of the new President, whom I proudly voted for, I am hopeful that this issue will be looked into further and small farms will be able to sell their raw milk products legally across the country.

I buy my milk eggs meat and dairy locally and they are all raw and organic products.  The health of my family has improved so much that it is becoming a joke to go to the grocery store. 

I grew up on raw milk.  My family had a dairy herd of 1 and that was plenty for our family (and then some).  We often made home-made cheese curds and I always would sit down with a very tall glass of frothy, creamy raw milk.  I miss that.  Processed milk just doesn't taste the same and we really don't get the same benefits because many vitamins are destroyed in the processing.  Given a choice, I would much rather have the raw milk.  You can't make a good batch of cheese curds out of processed milk and that is one piece of my childhood I would like back.  Storebought are not the same.

It is the right of all Americans to be able to consume raw milk if that is what they want to do.

I would like raw milk and raw milk products legalized nationwide.  Raw milk from pasture-fed cows is very healthy.  I feel I should have the right to choose what type of food and drinks I want to consume.  For thousands of years people have consumed raw milk without any sickness or disease.  I would like to be able to purchase raw milk from a local dairy farmer. Raw milk is much healthier than pasturized milk

I wholeheartedly support the right to drink and produce raw milk! The best food security is knowing who raises your food.  The best way to solve the energy crisis is to stop trucking food thousands of miles, eat local, it's a whole new way of saying "buy American".

I would like to see more consumer protection in the areas of product labeling and medical disclosure for legal drugs.  I would also like to see natural foods like raw milk be more readily available for those who choose to purchase it.  It's MILK, not a chemical with harmful side effects for most humans.  There is no reason it should be illegal.

Raw milk should be a choice for Americans to choose to consume. I do however feel that the animals that the milk comes from need to be tested for zoonotic diseases like TB, brucellosis, cue fever and others. 

My family runs a small sustainable farm that practices organic methods.  We have dairy goats for our families supply of milk, yogurt and cheese. All raw .  Any surplus milk supplies local families.  Raw milk from a local farmer cuts down transportation/distribution costs and fuel.  It cuts down or eliminates excess packaging.  It is one thing people can consume that does not conatin high fructose corn syrup.  It has incredible health benefits and is delicious.  Supporting local farms and business keeps our local economies strong which directly affects our nation's economy.  Legalizing raw milk is a wondeful component to helping our nation in so many ways. 

We talk about about "free markets" to the point of obsession in this country, yet look at how much of our market is not free. We need to get rid of laws that hurt independent citizens who are looking to be self sufficient be it-energy, food, or financially. We the People have been sold out to pander to Corporate America and it must stop. People have been consuming milk and milk products, all free of homogenization and pasturization- for the sum of animal husbandry history, all without issue. It has only been in the last hundred or so years that we feel the need to alter what nature gives us. Let us make the decision to consume what we wish, rather than be forced to make due with hormone and chemically contaminated food.

If people have the right to consume chemical/antibiotic laden food from any number of countries including our own, then people should also have the right to eshew that food and drink raw milk. Everything has a risk and the smart consumer weighs the risk and makes his or her own decision. Of course, with raw milk the best thing to do is to meet the farmer and get to know the cows and the milking parlor. Some convention dairy farms are knee deep in diarrhea from feeding fermented silage and corn. I bought milk from the bulk tank of a conventional dairy farmer once and it molded, a penicillin mold, in 5 days. The raw milk I buy from grass fed milking Devons never molds, even after a year (I did an experiment). Legalize raw milk. It will do the nation good.

I agree with the above comments. When I was young we always had fresh raw milk to drink. The stuff in the store tastes nothing like REAL milk.

I now have a few dairy goats and am able to drink raw milk again, as well as grow my own vegetables and raise my own meat. My health has improved so much since I have been eating naturally...

I think that the consumer is bright enough to decide for him/herself whether the products s/he buys are the best available. Small farmers not only feed their own families on the fruits of their labors, they rely on the consumer being favorably impressed by their quality and becoming regular clients. This is true marketplace economics. A good farmer who raises his crops and animals carefully with all due care is a treasure we are getting close to losing in this day of Big Ag

Of course people should be able to purchase or sell raw milk/dairy if they want. The public just needs to be informed of the products they are purchasing. They put warning labels on cigarettes, but we are still free to purchase them. Milk---illegal??That's just absurd. I sold raw goat milk for years, and it was often to folks that said their child couldn't have cow's milk or their child was sickly ,but mostly it was to people who were making a choice to be healthier by eliminating as many additives and chemicals from their diet as possible.

As an adult I should have the right to choose the foods I want without big business telling me what I can and cannot buy. Pure food is so important to me, and this includes raw whole milk.  There is an assumed risk when I buy from a local farmer and its a risk I have a right to make.

And have you notcied the serious food issues in the news are from corporate farms, who are not concerned about people but profits?

Its so sad and for me a sin, that local small organic farms are not encouraged by elected officials.  Thankfully we have a local organic co-op.

Raw milk (and raw almonds) should be legal. 

Supposedly the rationale for restricting the sale of raw milk is safety, despite the fact that there are few proven instances of people becoming sick from raw milk. 

But if safety and health is the reason, why do we permit the sale of cigarettes or alcohol.  There is a large body of evidence that proves that both do considerable harm to the body and to unborn fetuses.   Apparently it is sufficient to warn consumers of these products of the potential danger, rather than prohibit their sale.

No, it's clear that real reason behind making raw milk illegal is moneyed interests.  These interests don't want any competition from producers of real food and benefit from the sale of junk immitation food products and pharmaceutical drugs. 

Real food that promotes health should be legally available and producers and consumers should be able talk about the benefits of these foods without fearing persecution by the FDA. 

Raw milk saved my health. I was deathly ill. I learned the hard way that only real food promotes health. Doctors said I had a mysterious neurological disease, but now my teeth are strong again, my muscles are strong and I look healthier and more vibrant than ever. Large factory farming is killing us and our small farmers.

It is a Myth that smaller farms cannot sustain enough food. REAL FOOD from sustainable methods is more nutrient dense and complex due to a varied ecosystem, more satisfying, and goes farther. Large Monoculture farms are counterproductive. Colleges are teaching courses on sustainable farming and how big corporate farming methods ruin the planet and the lives of people all over the world.

Link on high tech sustainable farming methods
http://www.acresusa.com/magazines/magazine.htm

Link on Raw Milk:
http://westonaprice.org/farming/splendor.html

If anybody reads the documents thoroughly, and then studies the research thoroughly (the only reason they want you to think understanding these things is rocket science is because of the money they spent on the college degrees - any moron can translate the details), it is obvious that the government knows NOTHING about nutrition, real food, health or even business.

Thanks all for posting the links above - I always forget to do that.

Anyway - ALL of the sites above reference their articles and opinions, many with clickable links to the studies.

Read up, and then tell someone you care about!!

Yeah raw milk!!!

For years I thought I was lactose intolerant. Any consumption of milk products brought on severe discomfort. Even with "conventional" treatments I had no success except to abstain completely.  A year ago I began drinking raw milk and have had no problems. In fact I am able to digest other non-raw dairy products without discomfort as long as i have kept raw milk in my diet. Do you believe I should be considered a criminal for this? 

If they take this simple humble right away whats next? Freedom of speech? If it had not been for raw milk when I was a infant, I would have died. So come on america lets take back a few rights!!! Let start with being able to buy raw milk!!!!

I vote and support the idea of raw milk!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The raw milk debate is yet another issue where the government is overstepping itself. Our family has been using raw goat and raw cow milk for decades, and we rarely see a doctor. If raw milk is so dangerous, Mr. Obama, then why aren't we seeing thousands of Amish and Mennonites lined up at the ER every day? I'm one of those who cannot drink/eat the processed dairy products. My throat swells up and itches. The raw milk does not do this to me - something they are adding or doing to the milk in the stores is giving me an allergic reaction. We know several people with severe digestive issues who have to use keiffer and other fermented dairy products from RAW milk in order to keep their digestive tracts working correctly. We also know several people who are alive today because there was raw goat milk available for them when they were sickly infants.

Family dairies are also a victim of the crack down on raw milk. In our state of Arkansas, our family dairies used to produce more mik than we could use in our state. Now we have to have milk trucked in from California !! because our Arkansas family dairies are going under at an alarming rate and we no longer have enough milk for our state. Very few are still in business. If they were to be allowed to sell raw milk to the local people who want it, they would not be in this financial situation. They would be making a fair profit and staying in business. For every one of these going under, our county and our state are losing tax revenue *and* losing a valuable asset for keeping our community economically strong. The answer is NOT bigger dairies. Our locally owned family dairies have healthy, happy cows out on roomy pastures like they should be, not all crammed up in lots that are full of manure and mud - some so bad that cows have to have their tails docked so they are not swishing that junk all over themselves and their udders.

Mr. Obama, it is my choice to use raw milk and milk products - the government has NO BUSINESS telling me that I cannot! Please do what needs to be done to correct this. Thank you.

Lots of wonderful comments before mine, so I just want to add a vote of confidence:  we are a large family (nine kids, four at home now) that have seen great health improvements once we stopped buying dairy (and meat and eggs . . .) at the grocery store and insted turned to farmers we know for our food.  Raw milk has been a component in a health revolution in our lives, one we wish for everyone in this country!

Please keep the communication lines open between your voters and yourself. Please help farmers and consumers to connect with each other the same way. By ensuring raw milk is available through farm to consumers trade, you'll ensure sustainable farming and improved health nation wide.

Raw, nutricious milk should be readily available to those who wish to purchase it.

(Lots of wonderful comments before mine, so I just want to add a vote of confidence:  we are a large family (nine kids, four at home now) that have seen great health improvements once we stopped buying dairy (and meat and eggs . . .) at the grocery store and insted turned to farmers we know for our food.  Raw milk has been a component in a health revolution in our lives, one we wish for everyone in this country!)

That's my mom! Raw Milk! Raw Millk! Raw Milk! Raw Milk!

Since I started drinking raw milk, I have seen my allergies all but disapear, my acne clear up and my overall health benefit.  I even upped my intake during my last pregnancy and -thank God - my morning sickness went away.  It is a GREAT probiotic, tastes great and is really what "does a body good!"

Now, I am no expert, but it seems to me that the way to help out not only our economy but the deteriating health of the people of this country (especially our kiddos) is to go back to our roots - and that is farming the ol' fashioned way - or I guess what they are calling sustainable.  You would create more local jobs, produce food locally, and see the health of the local citizens increase.  With that - I think the productivity of the country would also increase for when people eat traditional foods (such as raw/real milk) - for lack of a better way of saying it - they plain think better as well as feel better.  You feel more vibrant, less tired, better able to cope daily without the use of some concoction of drugs with tons of side effects.  Bottom line - with people like this, we would once again have the best workforce in the world.  Social problems would decrease (because people would not just be fed but their brains would be well nourished and their guts would work properly). 
To learn more from the experts about traditional foods and their  benefits (yes, even medicinal) see:

www.westonaprice.org

And as so many have said on this post: we can chose to kill ourselves with cigarettes and alcohol and legalized drugs...let us choose to live a better life with raw milk!

This is an appeal to our new leadership.  Please read the links on raw milk, listen to the thousands of people who have found good health through avoiding processed dairy and other foods.  Make raw milk available in all states.

If you really want to change the health care start by changing what is allowed to be put in our food, the processing, the artificial ingredients, the bad fats, the hormones and antibiotics, etc.  The health of our nation is now in your hands and you have the opportunity to bring about change by improving our health, not through more drugs, but by changing what food corporations are allowed to do to our foods.  Let's eat healthy and you'll start to see less illness which will drop the need for more medical care.

It is time now to allow people free access to the most nourishing foods available on earth, as nature intended.

People need to do more than just post comments on raw milk sites.  How many people here, have and will contact their elected local, county, state, federal elected officials and demand the right to buy raw milk?  Talk is good, but there comes a time to step out and take real action to get things changed. 

Also want to suggest that wherever possible you go in with others and invest in a milk cow from a local owner and get milk from them for free.  This way you are not only supporting a local farmer, but getting fresh organic milk.

Trust me, here in California if everyone who wants or buys organic foods were to contact their state assmbly person and state senator and demand the right to obtain raw milk, something would be done.  I imagine if an elected official got ten letters monthly on the subject they would realize we are NOT going away!!

Raw milk should be legal.  The interstate shipment of bulk raw milk is an entirely different issue.  Milk pooling would prevent traceability in the event of any disease outbreak.

Madfarmer

Without addressing the root cause of the problem, there will never be a solution to the health care crisis in the US.  WE need  to examine the root causes of the diverse set of problems posed.  Many health care issues are the result of poor nutrition.  ADD and ADHD have been shown to be the result of a lack of Omega Three Fatty Acids.  
I also have direct contact with the issue.  A friend of mine had an skin disorder, that after going to 5 dermatologists without success, took flax seed oil on my recommendation.  Within a week his condition cleared up.  This has led me to the belief that in order to address the health care crisis in our country, we need to address the food production system, otherwise we will simply be treating symptoms of a broader problems.

If we were to return to a pastoral based agriculture system, then we would return much of the nutrients that are no longer in our foods.  If one examines the nutritional values of our foods, you will see a decline in values over the past 50+ years.  
Legalizing raw milk sales, allowing the interstate distribution of locally inspected meat, would allow small farmers to compete with the agricultural giants that dominate the landscape.  This would revitalize our rural communities, creating jobs, greater food security, improving health care (before there is a need).  
The issue of legalizing direct milk sales does not even scratch the surface.  The issue needs to be looked at the whole accomplished.  Recreating the local community will, go beyond improving health care, it will work towards a sustainable future.

I quit drinking milk years ago when I found out the harm done by processed milk, i.e. that which is approved by our government. 

Raw milk should be legal, regardless of the dairy animal of choice. We should have the right to homestead and raise our own food, including having fresh/raw milk, home raised meat, etc.

It should also be legal to sell raw milk and buy raw milk.For us, raw/fresh milk is a health issue! Our goat milk is able to be digested successfully. There are many many people who also could benefit health wise from fresh milk and especially goat milk.

It should be everyone's right to purchase one of nature's most wholesome foods - raw milk - if they so choose, and farmer's should have the right to sell it without fear of prosecution.

I buy my milk, cream, butter, yogurt, eggs and all of my meats and poultry from the farm.  My mental and physical health have improved since eating these wonderful foods.
Everyone should have the right to chose the foods they eat.

I too grew up on raw milk and so miss the benefits of the milk and making my own butter out of the cream.  It should be the peoples choice as to what they want to consume and in what form.  Please remove the regulations on milk, eggs and other home farmed products so the people have a choice again!  My Grandma would be proud!

I would love to see the world have a choice to legally drink fresh milk and see the benefits for themselves! We should be able to support our local farmers and drink fresh milk if we choose!

As an American, I enjoy as one of my freedoms, what to consume. I can choose to consume Coca Cola and McDonald's and I can choose to consume raw milk. I also know that not all my fellow country-mates are able to make that choice, which seems absolutely appalling. Keep free trade alive, and let the consumer choose what to buy and not to buy.

My mom was raised on a dairy and never drank pasteurized milk until she was an adult, out on her own. I now raise dairy goats, and have tried the milk both ways. I prefer the taste and crispness of the unpasteurized milk. I also am part of a large group of individuals (goat folks) that would love to provide raw milk to those who need it.. IE: Babies unable to breast feed and whose stomaches can't tolerate formula.. People who are lactose intolerant.. Etc.
The state in which I live does not allow small farms to sell goats milk unless they qualify as a Grade A Dairy.. Oregon, however, is allowed to sell milk for human consumption as long as they have under 10 goats..
The idea that milk must be pasteurized in order to be safe ((when the proper precautions are taken!!)) is ridiculous. Pasteurization was born from unsanitary dairy conditions.

PS - You are unable to contract ecoli from goats milk.

What a great idea--let's legalize raw milk, raw almonds and let people make informed choices. Yes!

BTW, let's make tobacco illegal--studies are now showing that it is related to nearly all forms of cancer!!!

My family and I switched to raw goats milk 3 years ago, we raise our own little herd so we can do this for ourselves.  I would love to see it become legal so everyone can drink raw milk to their hearts content.. It is so much better for you and your health and everyone has a right to decide what to put into their bodies.

I love goats milk!

I wholeheartedly agree with this idea.  It is high time farmers were free to sell their products.  There is no reason whatsoever with advancements in cooling and testing technology that clean, raw milk could not be safely sold on a large scale.  The issue is not one of safety, but one of greed.  Remove the greedy in charge and people could experience more liberty and the freedom to choose in food as well as health care.  

Can anyone post exactly what or if any legislation is coming up on state or federal levels concerning raw milk?

We all deserve access to fresh, wholesome, local foods including sustainably produced, clean, healthy raw milk.  Please give consumers the choice to purchase this excellent product and support our local responsible farmers without fear or government interference or retribution.  Thank you.