Losing my cool.

My poor husband. For the past hour, he's sat on the floor and listened to me sighing, groaning, cursing and pounding my fist.

The good news for David is I'm not mad at him.

I'm losing my cool because of an article I read last week. I've tried to put it out of mind, but that just hasn't worked. And, by now, I'm quite sure my husband and best friend are really getting tired of hearing me talk about it.

But, it's something that must be talked about.

An article published in the August 31 issue of TIME Magazine, called "Getting Real About the High Price of Cheap Food" (you can find it at this link: http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1917458,00.html?xid=rss-top-aol), has many farmers and members of the agriculture industry up in arms - and rightly so.

This piece - in the very first paragraph, no less - serves up every incorrect stereotype about the modern agriculture industry on one giant silver platter.

But, that's not what bothers me most.

I'm no expert on crop or beef production, but growing up in the agriculture industry, I feel as though I probably know more than most (I say this because, unlike most consumers, I know the hamburger I ate tonight came from a beef cow and not the refrigerated section at the supermarket). And, even though I don't work in the beef, pork and grains production industries on a daily basis, I can see that there are gross misrepresentations in this article (in fact, there are more than five - count 'em, five - factual errors in this piece).

These factual errors have organizations, farmers and members in the agriculture industry in a twist. And, they're troubling to me, too.

For me, the worst aspects of this article don't lie in the slams, jabs and kicks aimed at the industry that feeds the world. Instead, it lies in the writing itself.

As a writer myself - and someone who has earned a degree in journalism - I find it extremely troubling that this article actually made it to the pages of TIME.

It bothers me because the author didn't do his research (I'm not going to go into the factual problems with the article here, but I'll be sure to include them in my letter to editor of TIME -I'll also be sure to include the references so they know that I didn't pull my information out of left field).

It bothers me because the author didn't take the time to report both sides of the story. In the entire nine page article, he included only ONE quote from a member of the agriculture industry (even though the National Beef Board was only too happy to provide half a dozen sources for interviews and research papers to back up their positive information about agriculture). It's easy to write a scathing article when you don't take the time to present the counter opinion to your readers.

Finally, perhaps the thing I find most disturbing, is the fact after he wrote this article with no research or counter opinions, the managing editors at TIME cleverly disguised this piece as hard news and presented it to the country as their feature story.

I may be younger than the average writer for TIME, and I may have less experience, but even I can tell you that (only a year ago when I was completing my journalism degree) my professors taught me the importance of unbiased, fair reporting. In fact, I'm quite positive that my advanced reporting and editing professors would lose faith in the entire profession after reading this article.

However, there is one good thing to come from this article (but, let me tell you, it by no means outweighs the many kicks, punches and stabs this article landed): the writer aimed his outlandish claims at more than one industry. Hopefully, this can serve as the uniting force the agriculture industry has needed for far too long.

In the 24 short years that I have been deeply involved in the agriculture industry, I have watched time and time again as one sector of the industry after another is stomped on by the government or special interest groups trying to serve their own needs.

Each time the agriculture industry logs another loss on the scoreboard, it is mortally wounded - and so is our ability to produce and market the safest and most cost-effective food source on the planet. And each time, the agriculture industry stands by and waits for the problem to disappear.

The fact that this article - and all of it's misrepresentations - was published in TIME Magazine is a blow in itself. However, the added blows to the beef, pork and crop production industries made this piece doubly painful.

That's why I'm so pleased to see the mobilization and action on the part of many of the membership organizations associated with these commodities. With the National Corn Growers Association, Cattle Network, Brownfield and many state farm bureaus providing coverage of the story, issuing statements and letters to the editor already, I can only hope that many in the agriculture industry follow suit.

As members of the agriculture industry, we understand the blessings given to us and the lessons learned. Despite the information in the article, we know that we care for our animals and our land - many times, better than we care for ourselves. And, in effect, we also care for our planet - and the people that live on it.

When we all make a stand, we can tell our agriculture story - and we can tell the correct one.