Whose Property?

Shankar Vedantam in the Post wrote about property yesterday and Tyler Cowen and Ross Hanson links to it. Research seems to show that those people who decorate their cars with bumper stickers, regardless of the sentiment, are more aggressive drivers than those milquetoasts like me who have an unadorned car (almost put a Gore sticker on in 2000, but didn't) and who just fume inside when someone cuts me off or tailgates or whatever.

The researchers' explanation is people have difference senses of "property"--our sense of possession of our bedroom is "private", whereas walking down a city street is "public". So the theory is people who decorate their cars consider them to be private, or privatish, and take more offense when their property is impinged on. (Reminds me of a cartoon I saw yesterday, although I can't get the punch line right: it was someone in a sort of vehicle, explaining to the bystander it wasn't their new SUV, it was their new house.)

I was struck by the sense of property idea. One thing I've noticed, living in a townhouse cluster where one's yard extends about 3-6 feet from the house and the rest is common, my sense of property doesn't match my neighbors, or rather, it took a good while for me to adjust. In the country our farm was a bit isolated, so anyone appearing on one's land was sort of automatically an intruder, suspicious, perhaps a hunter, perhaps a city person, definitely someone whose business you'd want to know. (Didn't want hunters mistaking cows for deer or city folks scaring the cows and cutting their milk production.) This might fit with the imperialistic image of farmers, who don't want anything except the land next to theirs. And, of course, reinforced by the need for fences. Anyhow, it's a different sense of property than I see in Reston. There's no property markers evident.

I thought of that yesterday, but got interrupted from posting it. Then this morning I got reminded of how we are just animals, after all. Petting our older cat, whose mother was feral and who still retains a bit of edge, everything was fine until she decided to jump into her cardboard box and bulge over its sides and I continued to pet her. Wrong! For her, when she's in a box or a paper bag, that's her property and she defends it, even when the hand approaching the box or bag harbors only good intentions.

Bottom line: Cats own property too.

The Most Unfortunate Wording I've Noticed Today

"There’s a fairly decent chance that we’re going to have a famine in hundreds of places all over the world, and hunger growing everywhere - including here - all for no reason whatsoever. "

Decent? decent? Please. (Note--while I read the blog I often don't agree with the author.)

Oh for the Days of Old--Destroyed FSA Office

The flooding has hit an FSA office in Bartholomew County, IN, according to this piece.

Reminds me of old times, coordinating with our Kansas City IT people on restoring files. (Not that we had more than 3 or 4 over 12 years or so, and not that I did much of any significance--it was mostly the IT types ("automation coordinator" was the title then) in the state office with help from KC. But it's the old, run to the pumps, instinct to help when disaster strikes.

(Given the changes in the IT environment and the unclear description in the piece, I can't even guess whether the office is in good or bad shape. I'd hope FSA isn't distracted from preparing for physical disasters by the emphasis on security of data from terrorists and hackers.)

Fly Boys and Cargo Humpers

Max Boot has an interesting op-ed in the NYTimes this morning. He notes the new AF chief of staff is neither a bomber pilot, in the mold of Hap Arnold and Curtis LeMay, or a fighter pilot, in the mold of the last 30 odd years, but a cargo man. He observes the differences it makes in how the Air Force works and runs, and what it buys (like two new fighter jets), mentioning the problems with pilotless drones and the A-10 Warthog (close support).

There were/are similar problems in the Navy--between the brown shoes and the black shoes--one set is the carrier types (who long ago vanquished the big gun battleship people) and the other is the submariners (Admiral Rickover's engineering heirs, like ex-President Jimmy Carter and Agweb's John Phipps).

"Culture" makes all the difference, whether it's in a big bureaucracy or a family setting--the Post has a piece on how hopeless engineers are in helping their kids do homework.

Technology and the Library of Congress Reading Room

For someone bookish living in the DC area I hate to admit my last visit to the Library of Congress reading room was 35 years ago (while researching CRT-based word processors, if you can believe it). It seems that the Internet, or our decline as a civilization, one or the other and take your choice, has resulted in a decline of readers actually physically using the reading room. See this piece from AHA.

It goes on to discuss other topics--how historians start their research (from the mountaintop, not from the path) and the dreaded "link rot"

(Every innovation has its downside, and link rot is one of the Web's)

Salmonella

There's criticism of our industrial food system because it allows salmonella in tomatoes. But the raw milk system allows salmonella in milk (see this MSNBC piece).

Personally, I think the food system is rather like the transportation system. Commercial airliners are the safest way to travel: very regulated, very industrial, very centralized, very much scrutinized. Your private car is one of the most unsafe ways to travel (bicycles are worse): not very regulated, very decentralized.

So too for the food system--the centralized, industrialized food system is regulated (perhaps not quite as much as it should be) and very safe. But when someone screws up, the consequences are very visible, just as when an airline pilot screws up and the safeguards don't work. The decentralized system means the consequences of a screwup are limited, and not very visible.

I believe in Murphy's law--if humans are involved, someone will screw up. So keeping human involvement to a minimum in a system will result in a safer system. Mostly true.

Comparative Advantages in the Home

NYTimes magazine has an article on equality in parenting. Interesting, particularly the bit about the negotiations in same-sex marriages with kids. I've always wondered though if any economist has applied the "comparative advantage" theory of international trade to parenting. (The idea is that, all other things equal, two countries who trade with each other will end up specializing in the product/service which they're best at (even though their best may be worse than the other).

How Bush Ticks Off the Europeans

Remember when Bill Clinton shut down a LAX runway to get a haircut. Bush shuts down an airport with his aerial caravan, apparently causing cancellations of multiple flights. See Jim Manxi here. Or the direct link here.

Warning: this sort of thing is liable to be distorted and next year we'll find President Mcbama doing the same.

Dane County Trials and Tribulations

Ann Althouse is back in Wisconsin, so her pictures are short on NYC skylines and city streets and long on flowers. And she's interested in the conflict between the long time rural residents and the newcomers in Dane County, as described here.

(It's the same sort of thing that's occurred in Loudun County, VA and other nearby areas. Different strokes for different folks as we used to say. I've sympathy for both sides. I don't like change, I value history, and I like control--so I'd resent outsiders who want to impose their values. I'm also skeptical of those who search for a suburban dream house, most likely oversized, with a big yard and would prefer farms to suburbia. On the other hand, I don't have that much sympathy for NIMBY's who move in and either complain about smells or those who come after.

Sarkozy Has Tight Security

Interesting contrast in the security arrangements for President Sarkozy of France, as shown in this post by Mr. Beauregard. (Two cars? And two smallish cars? Are you kidding me? Amazing.)

George Will, Man of the Century

The nineteenth century, that is.

From his column today, using "numbers" for each paragraph, the last:

2016.Assuming, not rashly, that Barack Obama wins, 2016 is the next time Hillary Clinton, who will then be 68, can seek the Democratic nomination. By then, the median age of the electorate will be 47, so for many millions of voters, Bill Clinton's tenure will seem only slightly less distant than Grover Cleveland's, the last Democratic presidency that did not make sensible citizens wince.

Dedicated Teachers

This was taken from our local freecycle site:

My classroom desperately needs a makeover. I'm hoping to find 2 to 6
gallons of colorful indoor wall paint. I can mix and match any colors
that would make a suitable learning environment--soft, neutral tones
or bright and bold! I can arrange a convenient pickup time. My
students next year will thank you!

Funniest Mistake I Read Yesterday

From a NY Times article on the rising popularity of gardening:

Last year she kept a small garden. This year it has tripled in size into a five-by-seven-foot plot because, Ms. Gartin said, “The cost of everything is going up and I was looking to lose a few pounds, too; so it’s a win-win situation all around.”

What We May Assume--Women's Lib

Here's an interesting story, via someone I should recognize but missed, on women's lib, arguing that the advent of bicycles changed things and liberated women. It mentions riding sidesaddle. Now one could assume that the Victorian Age constraints on women were focused on the Anglo-saxon world, given Queen Victoria reigned over the British Empire and we concede that much of American popular culture followed the Brits. (Anyhow, that's the way my mind would work.)

But, separately there's an article in the NYTimes on Mexican rodeos ("a charreada") in the U.S. as Mexicans incorporate some of their traditions in their U.S. life. One of the features is a parade of women in petticoats riding sidesaddle. Whether Hispanic culture was as Victorian as U.S. was I don't know.

Straw in the Wind--Biofuels?

From Agweb:

A 45-million-gallon biodiesel plant near Evansville, Wis. was planned to open this fall. But, plans have changed.

North Prairie Productions, LLC has discontinued the construction of their biodiesel project. The reason: high commodity prices.

According to information published by the North Prairie Productions’ Board of Directors on their Web site, the rising costs of the commodities needed to produce biodiesel eroded their profit margin in producing the fuel.

As corn prices set records because of the bad weather, we may see more of this. Ethanol has prospered, I think, not only because of the subsidies but because oil prices have soared. If corn prices stay high and oil recedes, ethanol might have problems. [Warning: one of many subjects about which I know nothing.]

Public Servants Publically Identified?

David Kopel at Volokh.com raises the question. As I've said before, I don't see a reason to keep this data private.

Test for All--Tobacco Program-Less

Here's an MSNBC article on tobacco farming now the government program has ended. Tobacco farmers are doing well. I've seen this mentioned before, last year, I think. An excerpt and some observations:

On the ideas of the anti-tobacco people before the program was killed:

“The hope would be that by eliminating the quotas there would be fewer farmers then engaged in growing this crop,” Mulvey said.

In fact, there are fewer farmers since the end of the program. But there is more tobacco being grown. And companies are investing in growers like Rod Keugel to a degree not seen in the past. PhilipMorris USA picked up the tab for some of his equipment and a tobacco barn. Critics say the manufacturers value these relationships even more for the political benefits than the tobacco."

I think the experience confirms the idea the program worked--that is, it kept people farming tobacco who wouldn't be farming tobacco in the absence of the program. (lWhether that's good or bad is another question.)

The program also kept new entrants out of the industry. That's an unanticipated consequence of other farm programs--particularly those which raise the price of farm land, thereby making it more difficult for newcomers to enter.

From the excerpt there's a hint of a move towards contract farming, moving away from the old auction barn ("sold Phillip Morris")?

Cuban Agriculture

Some, most recently Tom Philpott, have praised the Cuban agriculture system, its urban farming and organic agriculture. One thing to remember is Cuba is not self-sufficient, as this article indicates. It doesn't say what food is imported, but this article says:

Cuba has been importing food like rice and chicken from the United States since 2000, when cash-only food sales were permitted as a exception to the US trade embargo, turning Cuba's ideological foe into its top foreign supplier.

Cuba's food import agency, Alimport, this week signed new contracts worth $60 million with a delegation from the US state of Nebraska, to import mainly wheat, pork and soy beans.

I don't have a comprehensive picture of Cuban agriculture/food supply.

Stephen Dubner on Ice Cream and Locally Grown Food

When Freakonomics meets Michael Pollan, the comments fly. The subject is, should everyone grow their own food? Stephen Dubner says, "no". The post attracts many more commenters than they usually get.

Most Thought Provoking Line I Read Today

""It's hard to live here," says Meldin Morales. "The one thing I like about here is the work. . . . Day after day after day: work.""

This is from an article by David Montgomery in today's Wash Post about the "chain emigration" from Ipala, Guatemala to Langley Park, MD. One emigrant found work there years ago, and his relatives, friends and neighbors have followed in his footsteps. It's the sort of emigration I believe some of my ancestors engaged in back in the nineteenth, certainly it's the sort of internal migration that seems to have lead my ancestors to move from York, PA to Geneva, NY.

Presumably Mr. Morales doesn't mean just "work", but work that pays well ($10 an hour, mostly something to do with building or repairing homes). I wonder how many natives would say the thing they like best about America is the work?

A Life in Agriculture--What's the Future

Erin writes of her childhood, and her children, at "Raising Country Kids". While she has memories of her past, written better than I ever could, it seems even in Montana modernity has struck:

"Times are different now. It seems that kids are so overscheduled in the summer that they can hardly call summertime a vacation. My children are ages ten, seven, five, and two, and still we spend nine weeks of the summer in organized activities of some sort. I realize now that I will have to be cautious to ensure that my children do not perpetuate the problem of young people becoming disengaged from agriculture. After all, they won’t learn to love it unless they experience it, and summer is a perfect time to do just that."

I don't know. I really don't. "Engaged in agriculture" can mean ranching or farming--that presumably would give her children (and grandchildren) what she values. But when there's only one ranch or farm to inherit, it's hard for everyone to continue in agriculture. And why does she value it. Was it the unscheduled dreamy summers, full of work and time to read and dream? If her kids have nine weeks of organized activities, what would her grandkids have? As life gets more and more competitive, will parents have to preserve their children's options or, as with the Amish, limit their options (i.e., no school after 8th grade).

And why the organized activities? In Montana one might say (at least in my imagination--I've no idea of the truth)--it's the only way to socialize because travel is so far and, particularly these days, so costly so you have to have organized activities, you can't just try "dropping in" on people as we used to do in my day. And the pressure is on--with so few neighbors, you have to be neighborly and you can't say, well, X is not going to play T-ball this year. And you want X to play T-ball because he/she needs the socializing. "Being neighborly" is a euphemism for conformity (as viewed by a secular liberal) or for being a Christian good person (as viewed by someone else).

High Gas and Rural Life

The NY Times has an article on the impact that high gas prices have on rural areas. The focus isn't on agriculture, but on those who have to commute long distances. The data is tied to median incomes, and the percent of income represented by gas, so the poorest counties are the hardest hit. Here's a graphic, just in case the article doesn't link to it. Essentially lower New England through the Mid-West is less affected, the cotton South, NM, WY, MT are most affected (up to 15 percent of income on gas).

Lawns and the Environment

Tom Philpott at Grist points out a NASA study on lawns. It seems that we were environmentally correct when I was growing up. Never watered the lawn, never fertilized, left the grass clippings on the lawn; so the bottom line is that our lawn was a carbon sink. Flash forward and we could have gotten paid under a cap and trade policy for carbon. Best of all, from the environmental standpoint, for many years the lawn was mowed using a hand mower. I can still feel the blisters on the inside of my thumbs and in the my palms which I got every year the first time I mowed. Because there were no emissions, we were absolutely correct. (This contrasts with the rest of the country, where you need to water and fertilize, at least according to the author, and with now, when everyone uses power mowers.)

That's one difference between the Amish and the "greens". The Amish, at least some groups, will permit standalone gasoline engines to drive horse-drawn balers or milking machines. A true-blue green would never permit a gasoline engine to cross onto their property. ()

CRP's Future

Here's an article outlining the tradeoffs faced by the Conservation Reserve Program in an economy very different than that of the early 1980's, when it was pushed into law.

Implementing the Farm Bill

The High Plains Journal carries an interesting article on FSA's implementation of the farm bill. (I wish she'd noted the payment limitation changes take effect in 2009 crop year. Cynic that I am, that's plenty of time for the lawyers to figure out how to change legal structures to maximize benefits. No need to bug the FSA offices this summer.)

We Really Must Get Organized

That's what I say to my wife, almost every day. And she quotes Tonto back at me: "what's this 'we'"?

But now, via John Phipps, comes this site, where I can spend my time instead of really organizing myself. As in answering "yes" to most of the 21 questions to test whether I'm chronically disorganized. Growing old has one advantage, it gives one an alibi for one's forgetfulness and disorganization.

Friday Cat Blogging

Here's our two cats getting about as close as they ever do--watching something, probably a bird or squirrel, outside the window. They remind me of bureaucrats in different agencies, very protective of turf, quick to take offense, but sometimes willing to share space, particularly if there's some common focus.



Note the badly patched screen--Ginny, the cat on the left, still believes she's an outdoor cat and refuses to listen to our warnings about Mr. Fox.

Web 2..0 in Government

Government executive has an interesting article on the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies in the federal government. Some excerpts:

But the zeal of some early adopters of such tools concerns him. "The bloggers worry less about the mission than about getting more bloggers. Intellipedia is more interested in getting more users than in contributing to the mission," Wertheimer said. "We're not yet nudging the early adopters to tinker with the iPhone to see how the adversary will use it to subvert the intelligence community."

Wertheimer also said many analysts still are skeptical about new technology and Web 2.0. Analysts distrust technology staffs, believing they deliver only tools and toys rather than greater capability. His answer to the problem, of course, is collaboration. "We need courses [that include] both of them," he said. "We need to integrate tools. . . . Neurons need to talk to other neurons."

In addition, fear and distrust are impediments on the agency level, he said, noting that ODNI's efforts to convince agencies to share information and people often founder on the ambiguous legislative authority with which the office was created. Each agency is content to discuss other agencies' problems with ODNI officials, but unwilling to examine its own problems, he said. And few willingly follow actions recommended by the director's office for fear that cooperation will lead to more requests for change. "There isn't a sense of common purpose," Wertheimer added.

I don't know how one overcomes such obstacles. One way might be to blow up the existing organizations and start from scratch, but that doesn't work in the government. I think it was Steve Coll, whose book "The Bin Ladens" I just finished (strongly recommend), who commented in passing that the FBI seemed very good in collecting facts but horrible in accumulating them in one place and analyzing them, while the CIA was the opposite, good at analysis but bad at collection. That sort of reflects the cultures of the organizations.

D-Day Message

One of the first adult books I read was Dwight David Eisenhower's "Crusade in Europe"--I recommend it. Often as D-Day comes around we in the U.S. get reminded of his decisions--the drama of delaying D-Day for weather reasons and his writing a message saying the landing was a failure and his fault. That's good and fine.

What we don't remember is the ground commander was the Brit we oldsters love to hate (particularly in "Patton")--Monty. And so I'd never seen the message Monty sent to the troops, which Dirk Beauregard posts here.

Bureaucrat of the Day--Secretary Gates

DOD Secretary Gates has fired the Secretary of the Air Force and the Chief of Staff. The problem was security of nuclear weapons, which had been screwed up twice. But in the background was Gates' problems with the AF on unmanned drones--apparently the flyboys haven't been as enthusiastic about them as everyone else. (Sort of hurts the self-image of a flyboy to be flying from behind a desk. Can you imagine Sen. McCain or Pres. Bush being enthusiastic drone flyers?)

Gates gets a nod for firing big shots for poor performance, something that rarely happens, even in the private sector.

FSA Bureaucrats at Work

The farm bill has been enacted and those busy beavers at the South Building have issued a series of notices providing early info on its effects.

Notice PL-173 says, which I missed in the law, but which makes sense, that the new payment limitation regs will apply for the 2009 crop year. I don't anticipate following these changes in detail--I've already lost my memory of what's what and spending any portion of my remaining time on earth trying to absorb payment rules doesn't make sense.

Notice DCP-187 covers the direct payment program. The 10-acre base limit will be interesting. Is that going to be significant enough for people to try to evade it. Because you don't have to plant to get payments, the definition of cropland may become more important. That's the sort of thing I enjoyed, trying to figure out the implications and to stay abreast of the schemes and wiles of the people trying to outwit you (i.e., the lawyers).

How Much Do You Love Your Kids?

Considering today's gas prices, is it worth driving 140 miles to watch a T-ball game?

Someone (in the media) really needs to sign Erin up to write/photograph for them.

Signs of Hope for Locavores

Having put down locavores, it's time to toss them a bone of hope. Michelle Slatalla, one of my favorite columnists in the NY Times, has this article. If the future is California, we'll find the Internet becomes the intermediary in matching organic/local food growers with those customers who are willing to pay extra. Apparently there are already several operations going in her area.

Someone Anderson (senior moment) has written of the "long tail"--the idea that the Internet makes it possible for Netflix to have an incredible inventory of DVD's which they find people willing and able to rent. Even though the plurality of rentals are the most current and popular things, the distribution curve has a very long tail. The same thing may occur with food. Most people won't like the service Slatalla describes, but some will, just as most people don't rent "Kelly's Heroes", but a few will. (Snuck in my favorite movie.)

"Peter Rabbit Must Die" Says the Times

It's an interesting piece (a bit fluffy) on how people deal with those creatures which eat their gardens.

It brought back memories of my mother and her campaign against the woodchucks. I never quite figured it out--yes, they did raid her garden but she tried to gas those in our hayfields as well. It may have been memories from childhood of a horse breaking his leg in one of their holes.

Woodchucks, for those who have never killed one, burrow (particularly in gravelly soil such as we had) and make two kinds of entrances. One has all the excavated soil, it's sort of a front porch from which the woodchuck can raise up on his rear and survey the surrounding landscape for possible predators. While a woodchuck has teeth that can give a dog a nasty bite, they're basically easy prey if cornered away from their burrow. But the other hole is just a hole, very much hidden, and that's the sort of thing that's dangerous, particularly for a horse walking through grass.

It's a reminder, though, of the cross-currents that run through the organic/locavore movement, as is this piece in Slate entitled: "There Will Be Chicken Blood, The gritty truth about urban farming". To the extent that vegetarians are a part of the movement, there's a conflict with the battle to protect the fruits of one's labors. Life is not simple, but I suppose people know that already.

Pollan on the Farm Bill--Can't Beat Something with Nothing

Michael Pollan writes at EWG on what went wrong with the farm bill. His basic answer is: his camp didn't have a constructive proposal for replacing the current system. And proponents of the current system did a good job of "logrolling", also known as co-opting people by throwing them a bone.

I suspect that's about right, although I'd add another factor: the opponents made a lot of noise, but never showed a good, big organization. You get the attention of politicians by whacking them with grassroots support, not posts on blogs, etc., or even best sellers.

Finally, the history of farm legislation is that changes occur incrementally--the institution of the Conservation Reserve Program in the 85 bill and Freedom to Farm's direct payments were, in my opinion, the two biggest changes we've had since 1965.

$4 Gas

Just filled up with my first tank of $4 gas. Long time since gas was $.30 and the stations competed for your patronage with freebies. (I guess I'm showing my age.)

When you look at Europe you find $8-$9 gas so I'm not complaining, but I understand the anger of those who have no choice but to put diesel in their 18 wheelers and tractors. As I've said, I think the high prices will dampen demand enough that prices will fall for a good while. But back in the 1970's we thought we were seeing a permanent change in our economy. Turned out that oil was below $20 for several years, before the latest rise.

How Bureaucrats Are Made--Kris Koth

One of the things I find fascinating about bureaucracy is how it is staffed. I'm going to make a generalization--for 100+ years the role of the USDA has been to provide jobs for children of farmers. Instead of farming full-time, they leave the farm and go to work for USDA, in the last 50 or so years after going to college and graduating from their state's land grant university. Sometimes they stay in their home state, sometimes they move elsewhere, to DC or Hawaii.

I don't mean that everyone who works for USDA in the field was raised on a farm, but that's the pattern. I suspect other bureaucracies have other patterns (like the Catholic church used to attract one boy from a large Irish family).

Here's a piece on someone who's following the pattern in Iowa.

The Iraq Index Today

Here's the May 29 version from Brookings. It's interesting--lots of the tables haven't been updated recently. I suspect it's because people have lost interest in the subject. (The people at Brookings just assembled data from various governments and organizations, they didn't do research themselves.)

The headline news is, of course, the 19 U.S. deaths in May are a low for the war since the first year. And there's been several optimistic articles and op-eds in the past few weeks, even though most of them don't get the attention of the past. I don't think that's liberal bias particularly--it's mostly the idea that conflict and bad news is lots more newsworthy than good news. It is true, though, that we liberals have a hard time fitting the news into our overall narrative so it's often easy to ignore.

Personally, I've a bureaucratic narrative--there's a learning curve, it's taken us 4-5 years to learn, but we're at last much improved over what we were at first. (You can see this in Vietnam, the last few years under Abrams were much more effective than the first years under Westmoreland.)

A couple factoids, without links: NYTimes had an article on the US prisons in Iraq--we're holding over 20,000 prisoners, of which about 1 percent are foreign. It's possible we killed most of the people who were willing to come to Iraq and die, or people just got tired after so many years, but it doesn't fit with a war against international terrorism. Attacks against oil infrastructure are way down this year--good news for the Iraqi economy and for our gas prices.

The Process of Certification and Proofing

I posted yesterday on the Iraqi bureaucrat whose signature is known all over. I post today on the explanation (in part) for the screwup on the farm bill. (The trade title was omitted in the version sent to the President.) This article from Politico describes the process by which a bill is sent to the President and blames Newt Gingrich for the penny-pinching which opened the loophole resulting in the problem. In brief, instead of printing two copies on parchment, proofing one, and sending the other to the President, he had them print the bill twice, once on plain paper. Somehow, between the first and second printing the title was dropped. Probably because each title was being treated as a document (or perhaps a subdocument with a master document). And the usual bureaucratic routine was being upset by the call for haste. As mom always said: "haste makes waste".

Forgive my enthusiasm for this detail--but it recalls the days when my office had to certify true and correct copies of regulations to be published in the Federal Register.

DC Gets Organic Fast Food

One of the interesting developments since the 1950's when mom first subscribed to Organic Gardening is all the cross-cutting currents in this area. There's the development of big food chains like Whole Foods that focus on the organic area, there's the development of Community supported agriculture chains, there's the "locavore" movement that would seem to reject organic food shipped in from abroad and accept hothouse food grown locally, there's the infighting among the various elements of the organic community over what the term means, there's the possibility of genetically modified organic food. And now, coming to DC, is organic fast food.

(I recognize this is an oversimplified summary. The bottom line is folks should be happy at the confusion and conflict--it all means people see a bandwagon passing by and they're jumping on.)

A Faceless Iraqi Bureaucrat

The Post has a fascinating (to me) article on an Iraqi bureaucrat:

The looped and dotted script of Abdul Ghani's signature is etched in rubber and slicked with ink. His signature is the final stamp of approval for many foreign matters involving Iraqi citizens.

"Every embassy in the world has a record of my signature," says Abdul, 28, leaning forward on his thick arms.

Apparently, he and other "authorizers" have to sign documents, like high school diplomas being used to apply to college abroad.

What's fascinating? Well, he is a faceless bureaucrat, but as he says, his signature is known. And before bureaucrats had signatures, they had seals, authenticating a document (i.e., like the Great Seal of the U.S. or the "signet" ring which was a more personal seal). Some movies make a big deal of the application of seals--like the warrant for execution of someone in British politics (Queen Mary, Cromwell, whoever). So on the one hand you have the anonymity of the bureaucrat, the document stating a bureaucratic rule without a hint of the author, but on the other hand you have the authentication, tracing the document back to some process with legitimacy.

There's Always Tradeoffs

From Saturday's LA Times:

Law enforcement officials estimate that as many as 1,000 of the 7,500 homes in this Humboldt County community are being used to cultivate marijuana, slashing into the housing stock, spreading building-safety problems and sowing neighborhood discord.

Indoor pot farms proliferated in recent years as California communities implemented Proposition 215, the statewide medical marijuana measure passed overwhelmingly a dozen years ago. A backlash over the effects and abuses of legally sanctioned marijuana growing has emerged in some of the most liberal parts of the state.

For example, in neighboring Mendocino County, a measure on Tuesday's election ballot seeks to repeal a local proposition passed eight years ago that decriminalized cultivation of as many as 25 pot plants.

The experience of Arcata, a bastion of cannabis culture, reveals the unintended consequences of the 1996 Compassionate Use Act, designed to provide relief to AIDS patients, cancer victims and others.

Why We Have Fast Food

This excerpt from 100 years ago says it all, via a Christian Science Monitor article on alternet:

"In 1907, Laura Clarke Rockwood wrote poignantly in The Craftsman magazine about the need to simplify housekeeping: "This mother of to-day hurries from kitchen to nursery and over the other parts of the house, performing as best she can the many home duties of our times. But she is so overwearied in the doing of it all that the deep well of mother love which should overflow, flooding the world with happiness and cheer, runs well nigh dry at times."

As one solution, Mrs. Rockwood proposed moving meal preparation out of the home: "There should be food kitchens easily accessible to every home where cooked foods can be bought cheaply because of consolidation, and delivered hot to our homes with promptness and regularity in pneumatic tubes perhaps, or by whatever means the master mind shall decide is the cheapest and the best.

A quote such as this tends to discredit ideas that fast food has been foisted on an unwilling populace.

High Gas Costs Hurt Rural Areas

This story about a rural district going to 4 days a week because of high fuel costs reminds us of tradeoffs. (If you remember, back in 1993 the new Clinton/Gore administration was pushing a carbon tax, then a gasoline tax, for environmental reasons. Their big opposition came from Western Democrats whose constituents need to drive long distances. Particularly on the High Plains you have to drive distances incredible to an Eastern city dweller.)

Problems of Rural Life

Include broadband access (or rather limits thereon) as John Phipps discovers when Apple upgrades its OS and he runs into download limits.

And too much to do, as Erin discovers.

Amish, Mennonites, and Tom Philpott

From the Brownfield Network, this report:

Amish and Mennonite farmers currently produce about 10 percent of Missouri’s fresh commercial vegetables, but 15 years ago that market didn’t exist. That’s according to the University of Missouri Extension, which has hosted workshops to teach growers about new farming techniques.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency provided a grant to help develop the workshops with MU. Extension Horticulture Specialist James Quinn says the EPA was interested in helping emphasize reduced pesticide applications with the Amish and Mennonite growers.

It's not clear from the broadcast whether the growers have been moving into the area or whether the market is new. The Amish have been expanding, courtesy of their high birth rate. And I know they've moved into new areas for them, like upstate New York, where they can find cheaper land to support their life style.

Meanwhile, from the organic ag movement, comes the news (a bit late) Tom Philpott has moved on from the NC farm he ran. No doubt he has good reasons for the change of occupation--he's now full time at Grist. But it fuels my cynicism, nurtured over the years of community gardening watching people come and go, that for many in the movement it's a phase, rather than a livelihood. That's not the case for the Amish--it's a way of life. One might view the organic /locavore niche as the scene of a contest between Amish and "crunchies". Given the rate of natural increase and the community share, the Amish will win. In another 50 years farming in the U.S. will be divided between the Amish and the Mennonites, and a few surviving megafarms.

Predictions Via Blogger

Blogger has a new feature, relatively new that is. The software will now honor a post-dated post. If I want to go on vacation, I could post date posts for the period of time I was away from the Internet and my dear readers would never know the difference.

That feature makes it possible for me to do some honest predictions--i.e., I put them out in a post now, and copy the post and date it for whatever date in the future.

So, what do I feel safe in predicting?

• concern about "peak oil" will fade as oil prices drop. They're now about $130 a barrel, I predict them to fall to $80 by January 1. (Of course, I would have made a similar prediction last year--a big drop in prices.)
  
• Obama will win the Presidency in a squeaker.
  

Doctor Krauthammer Misses on Science

Charles Krauthammer writes his version of an agnostic column on global warming, but misses here:

Consider: If Newton's laws of motion could, after 200 years of unfailing experimental and experiential confirmation, be overthrown, it requires religious fervor to believe that global warming -- infinitely more untested, complex and speculative -- is a closed issue.

Newton's laws weren't overthrown, they were subsumed within Einstein's. See Wikipedia.

Making Government Work--Credit to Bush

I stumbled across this site yesterday. I think I've criticized the Bush administration before for their efforts at e-government and improving management, but this is a creditable effort as applied to a program I know. The problem is persuading everyone along the line to agree on these evaluations. For example, the evaluation of the direct payment program questions the design of the program. But it was just reauthorized in the farm bill. I very much doubt that the American Corn Growers Association or the House or Senate Ag committees took much note of the evaluation. If the people with the money don't pay attention, then it's not likely the big shot bureaucrats are going to pay attention.

I'm not sure the extent to which the Secretary's office or OMB paid attention to the evaluations. If they did, it's good. If not, the only gains are in forcing bureaucrats to look at themselves--perhaps useful.

As a side note, one item that did hit the media was the issue of erroneous payments. It's good to see the latest erroneous payment figure is .37 percent (that's 37 hundredths of one percent). Of course, no one's going to put that on TV.

Morality and Politics

I've "shared" a post by Jim Manzi at the American Scene, extensively criticizing Obama's graduation address at Wesleyan. I don't necessarily share his criticism, but I am ambivalent. But it seems to me that JFK's "ask not" line was criticized at the time by some on much the same grounds.

Note: I comment on Manzi's post, challenging the $14,000 figure for college graduates. Briefly, Obama had 2 years work experience and could easily have qualified as a GS-7 at about $17,800 if he had wanted to work for the government.