#4
What I'm looking for tonight is the results here in Georgia. Can Edwards have a comeback here? Can he win the Minnesota caucuses? Can he keep it close in New York and Ohio? And barring a miracle, I mean a real miracle, John Kerry will be within a stone's throw of winning the nomination.
#5
I believe that the layabouts who suck on the welfare teat and give nothing back are taking my money and taxes. Whether that person is black, white, hispanic or purple means nothing to me. They are lazy and a parasite on society.
They will have to invent a new word besides "racist" for people that don't want to "spread their wealth around". Let's see, capitalist pig is a bit worn out. They need something new.
#6
There is one element of welfare that is totally different from the others, which is food aid. An overabundance of food has been a problem in the US for a century, and it would be both cheaper to the taxpayer to give the surplus away than to store it, *and* it would actually stabilize, not raise, retail food prices.
But the brains in D.C. have even overcome that abundance by wasting vast amounts of food to produce alcohol to add to gasoline. If they will just cut *that* idiocy out, then food will be back to such abundance in the US that literally no one should do without, and we can keep our expensive warehousing to a minimum.
#9
American agribusiness is the Twilight Zone. It has been essentially socialized since Ol' Frank, and ironically, most of the subsidies are to farmers to *not* produce food. So with the end up subsidies--more food.
Even at the height of the Dust Bowl, wiping out tens of thousands of farms from Texas north to Canada, the rest of the farmers produced so much food that corn was being burned for fuel and wheat was fifty cents a bushel. Low prices made much worse by severe deflation. Food was too cheap to be worth transporting to where people were starving.
So the Federal Surplus Relief Corporation (FSRC) was created, to *destroy* food. One of its first acts was to confiscate, kill and bury six million pigs from the totally decentralized swine farmers.
And it took just a small part of all the crops it destroyed, and transported them for distribution to charities, to hand out to starving people.
To this day, the Russians still believe that this event in the US was the same as Stalin's collectivization of the Ukraine, which there starved millions of people to death. And they assume that millions of Americans also starved to death, but that it was hidden by the government.
Since then the US has poured vast amounts of money into keeping farmers from overproducing, and even more, to keep prices from fluctuating too much. This ends up in weird production circles, for example.
The price of dairy was dropping too much, so major dairy farms were paid to slaughter a bunch of their cattle. The slaughtered cattle dropped prices in the meat market, so ranchers were paid to slaughter some of their herds, which further depressed meat prices.
This also drove down the price of feed grain, so the government had to pay them as well to destroy grain to sustain grain prices. Then because the price of dairy went up, the government had to pay cheese makers to keep their prices down.
And it never ends.
The power involved in all of this is immense as well. Reagan probably broke the Soviet Union's back by selling them as much grain as they wanted, which cost so much that we got all their oil, and gold, and foreign currency, and drained their economy dry.
#10
They will have to invent a new word besides "racist" for people that don't want to "spread their wealth around".
Survivorist?
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
04/12/2011 12:21 Comments ||
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#11
So Donna sez...
"That's the reason we've had such a very deep trouble...deep and abiding trouble of getting the white vote...the middle class in this country is squeezed. Blue-collar workers...are feeling squeezed...so when they feel the squeeze they don't blame it on somebody...ultimatly that blame goes to those people."
Sound fammiliar? Yeah, try this one on for size.
You go into some of these small towns in Pennsylvania, and like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.
Hey...all you Blue-collar white folks...how come you get so irrational when the economy sucks?
#12
My grandparents were forced (by the local party controlled apparatus) to plow under 40 acres of crops. The next year they had to slaughter sheep which were then doused in kerosene so they couldn't eat the meat themselves. They were paid a fraction of the market rate. Oh yeah, and they were Republicans. Funny how the Democratic farmers just down the road were allowed to sell their crops on the open market. That was a story that has been told for generations now. Wonder why it didn't make it into the history books?
#13
Perhaps the damn white people don't turn out to vote Democrat because they are tired of the constant slurs of racism coming at them from that direction.
UNITED NATIONS Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving "Mother Earth" the same rights as humans having just passed a domestic law that does the same for bugs, trees and all other natural things in the South American country.
The bid aims to have the UN recognize the Earth as a living entity that humans have sought to "dominate and exploit" to the point that the "well-being and existence of many beings" is now threatened.
The wording may yet evolve, but the general structure is meant to mirror Bolivia's Law of the Rights of Mother Earth, which Bolivian President Evo Morales enacted in January.
Clearly high on his own supply...
That document speaks of the country's natural resources as "blessings," and grants the Earth a series of specific rights that include rights to life, water and clean air; the right to repair livelihoods affected by human activities; and the right to be free from pollution.
It also establishes a Ministry of Mother Earth, and provides the planet with an ombudsman whose job is to hear nature's complaints as voiced by activist and other groups, including the state.
Of course, since Mama Earth can't speak for herself (other than the occasional earthquake) we need activists to speak for her. And the activists always seem to know what Mama Earth wants to say...
"If you want to have balance, and you think that the only (entities) who have rights are humans or companies, then how can you reach balance?" Pablo Salon, Bolivia's ambassador to the UN, told Postmedia News. "But if you recognize that nature too has rights, and (if you provide) legal forms to protect and preserve those rights, then you can achieve balance."
The application of the law appears destined to pose new challenges for companies operating in the country, which is rich in natural resources, including natural gas and lithium, but remains one of the poorest in Latin America.
Just have all the multi-nationals pull out, and make sure no coca leaves the country. Then Evo can live in harmony with Mama...
But while Salon said his country just seeks to achieve "harmony" with nature, he signalled that mining and other companies may come under greater scrutiny.
"We're not saying, for example, you cannot eat meat because you know you are going to go against the rights of a cow," he said. "But when human activity develops at a certain scale that you (cause to) disappear a species, then you are really altering the vital cycles of nature or of Mother Earth. Of course, you need a mine to extract iron or zinc, but there are limits."
"We want ours."
Reflecting indigenous traditional beliefs, the proposed global treaty says humans have caused "severe destruction . . . that is offensive to the many faiths, wisdom traditions and indigenous cultures for whom Mother Earth is sacred."
We can't impose Christianity on the world since that would be 'wrong', but "indigenous traditional beliefs" are okay, because they're always right -- at least after 'activists' are finished interpreting them.
It also says that "Mother Earth has the right to exist, to persist and to continue the vital cycles, structures, functions and processes that sustain all human beings."
Whatever that means -- where's an activist when you need one?
The UN debate begins two days before the UN's recognition April 22 of the second International Mother Earth Day another Morales-led initiative.
Posted by: Steve White ||
04/12/2011 16:28 ||
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Link ||
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#1
Let me know when Bolivia collapses since they won't be able to grow, harvest or slaughter any plants or animals since they have the same rights and that would be considered "murder" and "cannibalism".
#3
"Rights" are based upon "responsibility", which requires rational thought. That's pretty well limited to human beings at this point. In fact, it's questionable with a majority of human beings.
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
04/12/2011 17:53 Comments ||
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#4
What's next, rights for Father Time, and the Grim Reaper?
Posted by: The Other Beldar ||
04/12/2011 18:00 Comments ||
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#5
"since Mama Earth can't speak for herself we need activists to speak for her"
And those activists need to be well-compensated for their vital work! Along with their large staffs of friends and relatives.
#7
It also needs to be addressed what abortion rights Mother Earth has. Especially she needs to have at least the same rights as men have. Because Men Have Abortions Too
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
UNITED NATIONS Bolivia will this month table a draft United Nations treaty giving "Mother Earth" the same rights as humans having just passed a domestic law that does the same for bugs, trees and all other natural things in the South American country.
