Dave Williams wrote:
> Right. Only an idiot would walk in January in Des Moines to start
> with. And where would they go, that was within walking distance? Only
> poor people live in town; everyone who can, lives in the suburbs. And
> if you were walking anyway, you'd be fending off the endless supply of
> pumps, hookers, dope dealers, panhandlers, and plain old freaks, and
> you'd look like the Pied Piper with his entourage before you made it
> very far.
Your statement would be funny if it weren't so frequently used as an
excuse to justify sprawl and the ensuring need to drive long distances to
work, shop and entertain ourselves. Have you actually ever talked to "pimps,
hookers, dope dealers, panhandlers" and "plain old freaks"? What about
"poor people"? What are you afraid of?
There's an underlying "classism" in your statement that eventually
extends to people in other parts of the world, and it gets ugly in a hurry!
People who ascribe to this attitude believe that somehow they ARE better than
the "pimps, hookers, dope dealers, panhandlers, poor people" and "plain old
freaks" they can easily avoid by moving away or driving two ton steel boxes
through the neighborhoods where such human detritus lives. How convenient!
In international terms, it's just as convenient to drop a few bombs and
overthrow a government or two in order to deal with the "inconvenience" at a
distance.
> That's right. While those foreigners are trudging through the
> freezeing rain, Americans are riding in their climate-controlled
> environments with their satellite radios, flip-down DVD players, CD
> players, and so forth. Because we built a country and an infrastructure
> that lets even ordinary schmucks live pretty darned good by comparison
> with a lot of other places.
See what I mean? All of a sudden, we're "better than everybody else".
All of a sudden, we have a "right" to the rest of the world's resources.
We're smarter than they are. Even "ordinary schmucks" live really well,
compared to the rest of the world. (But you failed to include the pimps,
hookers, drug dealers, etc.) There's some truth to that statement, but the
causes of our apparent success are far more complex than I imagine you care
to investigate.
>
> American agriculture is the most efficient in the world.
People in this forum will laugh at you for writing such nonsense. Why
don't you show evidence that American agriculture produces more energy in
food than exists in the fossil fuel required to prepare the land, fertilize,
irrigate and harvest the crops? (I won't even go into all the fuel burned to
move the resultant food to your neighborhood grocery store. . .) Compare the
difference to older, more traditional methods and you will be surprised, if
you actually bother doing the math.
Educate yourself here:
http://www.journeytoforever.org/farm_library.html
> Period.
You correctly placed one of those at the end of your last statement.
>
> It's so efficient, farmers have oversupplied their markets until prices
> have dropped so much many of them are on the verge of going broke, but
> that's another story.
Take away all of the subsidies necessary to sustain the current practices
and the U.S. farm economy will fall flat on its face. You're wrong about
this--it's all the SAME story. Food is certainly cheap. Food is cheap
because it's subsidized by cheap fuel and tax dollars. Further, for all our
vaunted productivity (most of which goes to feed swine, cattle and poultry)
we are IMPORTING food. Here's what the USDA has to say about it:
"May 6, 2002
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) estimates that imports
represented about 9 percent of
the total quantity of foods consumed in the late 1990s, up from 7.4
percent in 1995. Despite the fact
that the share of food from imports is relatively low in the United
States (compared with 60 percent
in Japan), the fastest growing U.S. imports include red meats, seafood,
beer and wine.
The United States imported 2.2 billion pounds of fresh and frozen fish
and seafood in 2000 as well
as 2 billion pounds of beef and veal. In contrast, chicken and turkey
imports were virtually nil.
U.S. imports of sugar have declined substantially, while
fruit-and-vegetable imports have risen substantially. Fresh-fruit and
-vegetable imports have gained in their share of consumption. Substantial
gains have occurred for processed fruit- and -vegetable products as well."
If we're so efficient as farmers, why are we importing food?
Here's an interesting PDF from "The Hartford Insurance": (They are not
exactly a weeping, left wing organization.)
http://sb.thehartford.com/reduce_risk/loss_library/Food_Safety/Food%20Processing--Ensuring_the_Safety_of_Imported_Food.pdf
> Food is so cheap, most American families don't
> even bother to budget for it; it's just an incidental expentiture.
> Yeah, lots of Americans are fat. Because we're so rich, we can afford
> to feed out pets better than some countries can feed their own citizenry.
Do you listen to yourself? Are you normally so arrogant, or is this just
something you put on when you're feeling a little defensive? America is a
great country. Because of that, we can afford to examine ourselves and
address our problems, and obesity is a serious problem. Boasting about how
fat we are solves nothing. We will pay for our overindulgence down the road
in spiraling health care costs and lost productivity.
> Plain old marketing. You have to remember that the cost of the
> macaroni is probably much less than the cost of the box, shipping,
> labor, and marketing overhead required to get the package on the shelf.
Finally, you've put your finger on a real issue! We ARE being marketed
to death, literally!
>
> Our government isn't quite as rapacious as theirs. They should vote
> the bastards out, go conquer someone, and reap the benefits of cheap gas.
Easily said, as long as the "conquered" don't include people you love.
Didn't I say that this attitude of yours will get ugly?
> It's a terrible thing to be poor, isn't it?
>
What would YOU know about it?
> Public transit? That's where I can take a subway that gets me to work
> half an hour late every day, standing clinging to a pole while a hundred
> people cough germs into my face? Or is that the bus, where I try to
> find a seat nobody has urinated in? And either are so far from where I
> live, that I have to fire up the car and drive to the station?
There you go again! Have you actually sat in a seat that someone has
urinated on? (Ok, aside from the toilet!) What are you afraid of?
robert luis rabello
"The Edge of Justice"
Adventure for Your Mind
http://www.1stbooks.com/bookview/9782
Biofuel at Journey to Forever:
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html
Biofuels list archives:
http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
Please do NOT send Unsubscribe messages to the list address.
To unsubscribe, send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Yahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/biofuel/
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
