What, a herd of cattle were poisoned by cyanide in Texas?? The culprit had to be a genetically-modified form of Bermuda grass! Stupid scientists are out to kill us all with their right-wing, corporation-y greed.
Only if you get your science from CBS. Or Sierra Club. Or gullible commenters here on Science 2.0.
The Tifton 85 grass was indeed 'producing' cyanide - cyanide is a naturally occurring plant poison - it just isn't genetically-modified grass. It's instead the "genetic modification" done for thousands of years before scientists could precisely control genes; a hybrid. A regular ol' hybrid used for decades that the anti-science fringe thinks is 'natural'.
The latest GM scare journalism was certainly brought to the big stage by CBS but mostly spread by anti-GM bloggers who didn't bother to do even the simplest fact-checking.
Not everyone fell for it. Grist got the science right.
Deborah Blum defends science from the anti-science fringe at Knight Science Journalism Tracker.
