Burley Tobacco Growers Co-op

 Al Cross at the Rural Blog notes the Burley co-op is going out of business.  From the website:

• A partial settlement has been reached that would result in dissolving the Co-op and paying between $2000 and $6000 each (estimated) to certain tobacco growers in Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, or Missouri that are members of a settlement class certified by the Court.
• The settlement class is made up of those individuals or businesses that were a landowner, operator, landlord, tenant, or sharecropper growing burley tobacco in Kentucky, West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, or Missouri during at least one of the 2015–2020 crop years.

I don't know the story behind this--apparently there was a class-action suit claiming it didn't serve any purpose these days.

The co-op movement was strong in agriculture in the last century, both on the producer side and the supply side. The tobacco, peanut, and cotton co-ops were precursors and enablers of the New Deal farm programs.

[Updated:  Wendell Berry's brother on its history.]

Our Short Memories

I've seen several articles comparing the difficulties faced by Biden/Harris in 2021 to the problems facing FDR in 1933 or Lincoln in 1861.  The problems Obama/Biden faced in 2009 are usually ignored, or dismissed.  I think this reflects our short memories, as well as the success of the administration.  

 I recognize the economy is worse today than in 2009, but it's worse because of the pandemic. The assumption now is when we fix the pandemic by vaccinated the country the economy will revive. (I think the assumption is wrong--the pandemic will have caused changes in society and the economy which will be revealed as our health gets back to normal.)  In 2009 we knew the economy had systemic problems which needed fixing.  We also "knew" a big stimulus would lead to inflation, which seems to have been disproved.

Meanwhile Trump boasts of not getting the country into a new war, which is true enough. Obama faced two wars--the dying one in Iraq and the endless one in Afghanistan. 

I think our memory of the euphoria of electing a black president clouds a realistic perception--the division in the country which was revealed by the rise of the Tea Party movement (and Occupy Wall Street on the left) was there on January 20, 2009, even if we did not realize it until later.

The Attitude of the Right

Powerline blog is the most right of the news/opinion source I follow.  Paul Mirengoff is usually, not always, the most sensible of the four writers on the blog.  

I'm disappointed by his post today, basically saying the right should presume that the president is always wrong.  I had hoped, because he seemed the one most open to the idea that Biden won fairly, he would be a bit more open to Biden's appeal for unity.

I remember Herblock, a Post cartoonist who always drew Richard Nixon with a heavy five o'clock shadow from the 1940's through the 1968 campaign, when Nixon was inaugurated in 1969 drew a Nixon with no shadow, and the caption reading "this barbershop gives one free shave". 

Have We Seen the Peak?

 It's possible the pandemic has peaked in the US with the graph of new infections flattening, possibly starting a decline, which would then be followed by a similar change in hospitalizations and deaths.  

The conjunction of 400,000 deaths, the Biden inauguration, and the peak would be significant.

Big Dairy

Two interesting pieces on big dairy--we've come a long way since dad consulted with the artificial inseminator over which bull to use for the one of our 12 cows which was in heat.

• how a big US dairy is dwarfed by a bigger one--can you believe 6 figures?
• and occasion to ponder how we got from that to this cow in 70 years.

Changing Perspectives Yield Changing Judgments

West Virginia seems to be doing well with vaccinations.  Lawrence Wright in the New Yorker has a long article on the Plague Year, in which he relays Birx's favorable judgment on Jim Justice, the wealthy governor of the state.

The 4 years of Trump's term have changed my perspective on many people.  Some who have gained:

George Will

Bill Kristol

Mitt Romney

Kevin Williamson

You'll note the common thread running through the names. 

Bloomberg on Vertical Farming

 Here's a skeptical article from Bloomberg on the economics of vertical farming.

The issue is mostly the cost of energy usage--if you have cheap energy and efficient lights (LED) you can grow leaf vegetables and herbs, charge a premium price, and break even.  That's state of the art today. What happens tomorrow?

Interesting--as I write this I realize I've not been an enthusiast about vertical farming, but I have about sources of renewable energy.  My theory has been that the learning curve for innovations in solar panels and battery storage will work to drive the cost down below carbon-based fuels.  That seems a tad inconsistent with my lack of faith in the same factors in vertical farming.

Maybe I'll be around long enough to see what the results are.

Why Do We Need?

 

As a UK man living in a mostly gun-less society answer me this America. Why do civilians need guns like this? pic.twitter.com/O2tB65pTB3

— Paul Samuel (@PaulSteveSamuel) January 16, 2021

That tweet, and the associated thread, got me to asking this question:  Why do Americans need guns, and pickup trucks, and McMansions, and lawns, and...?

Mostly IMHO it's a matter of signaling to ourselves and to others our status and self-image.  

The Consultant Security Blanket

 As technology and society grow more complicated, the easy out for managers of an organization is to offload their uncertainties and angst to a consultant.  At the very least it kicks the problem down the road.  Sometimes more time is all that's needed to gain some clarity, perhaps even to have the problem solve itself.  Sometimes more time enables the organization to learn to deal with the new.  Sometimes the troublemakers who are raising cain about an issue have grown up, gone out, or gone to the grave, and some other issues are being raised by other troublemakers. 

A Test of Masks and Social Distancing: House of Representatives

 The NYTimes had a graphic on the Representatives and Senators who contracted covid-19 virus.  I was interested because at the Powerline blog one or more of the bloggers had expressed skepticism over the efficacy of face masks and social distancing in combating the disease. I think enough time has passed for a fair evaluation.  I also think the members of Congress are roughly similar so a comparison by party is valid.  The outcome: 44 Republicans and 17 Democrats have contracted the disease.

I don't know whether that's statistically significant, but it impresses me.