Month: May 2008

Latin America’s Food Crisis

Even a year ago, few people would have predicted that a global food crisis would make headlines as one of the major concerns for the future of the world. Yes, critics of agrofuels warned that food shortages and price hikes would result from the headlong rush to divert land from food to fuel production. And climate change experts predicted that global warming would hit small farmers—who even in today’s world of industrialized agribusiness still produce much of what we eat—the hardest. Agricultural economists alerted the world to the dangers of leaving the food supply to a highly concentrated international market.

But all these threats seemed nascent, not imminent.

So what happened? How did we get to a full-blown crisis, with children who before were fed going to sleep hungry, with rioters banging empty pots in the streets, with mud cakes standing in as dinner?

The answer involves all the dire warnings above. How they have played out depends in part on where you are. The interplay of pests and policies, drought and dollars, futures and farmers has always made agriculture a hard call for both almanac writers and policymakers. But international trends and a case-by-case analysis show common culprits.

In the Western Hemisphere, two countries—Haiti and Mexico—reveal the forces that are leading societies into a crisis that could become permanent if deep changes aren’t made to our food and agriculture systems.

The standard explanation for the global food crisis rests on the convergence of the demand for food crops due to agrofuels, the hike in gas prices, urbanization, increased demand from emerging economies, climatic changes, and environmental deterioration from erosion and pollution.

All of these factors have played a part in the crisis. Agrofuel development has been mandated well into the future, although it may be slowing down as criticism mounts. A recent report by the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) blames biofuels in part for price hikes. The report concludes, “Governments need to carefully consider the impact of bio-fuels on the poor.” Gas prices are likely to remain high. With so much food moving around under free trade policies this will continue to affect the price and access.

With agribusiness corporations posting record highs (like Cargill, ADM saw profits soar from $363 million in 2006 to $517 for 2007) and investors salivating over “ag-flation” windfalls, it’s clear that what’s a crisis for some is a bonanza for others. That in itself should be a clue that the structural problems with the global food system do not lie in poor yields, “inefficient” small farmers, or climatic disasters. It’s manipulated prices; faulty trade, aid, and promotion policies; distribution and wrong priorities that are starving the world’s most vulnerable inhabitants.

Oddly enough, international solutions do not address these fundamental issues. Policy prescriptions from the wealthy countries and international financial institutions emphasize hand-outs and more free trade. They tend toward increasing, not diminishing, developing country dependence on imports and aid, and further lining the pockets of the companies that are fleecing the public.

The World Bank’s proposals include: “calling on the international community to make up the $500 million food gap required by the UN’s World Food Program to meet emergency needs,” increasing its loans for agriculture (promoting the same model that led to the loss of food sovereignty in developing countries facing today’s food crisis), “expanding and improving access to safety net programs, such as cash transfers, and risk management instruments to protect the poor” and strengthening free trade through “advocacy on the negative impacts of policies such as export bans, which create price spikes in importing countries, and the high levels of trade tariffs and subsidies in the developed world.” World Bank President Robert Zoellick, IMF Director Dominique Strauss-Kuhn, and former WTO President Pascal Lamy have all used the food crisis to argue for a reinvigorated Doha Round of the WTO to deepen the free trade system. This constitutes an offensive against measures that question the international markets which helped cause the food crisis.

The mass media portrays “food riots” in Latin America—demonstrations in the streets of Haiti, women banging on empty pots in Lima, cries for an affordable tortilla in Mexico—as ominous signs of instability. Instead they should be seen as wake-up calls to fix our most vital link to each other and to life itself—the food system.

The Anti Civil Rights Movement

.Over the last few months one of the most important electoral struggles of 2008 played out in Missouri. The deceptively-named Missouri Civil Rights Initiative (MoCRI), which would have outlawed affirmative action programs here was blocked May 4 because petitions to get the measure on the ballot were not submitted.

Ward Connerly, an African American multi-millionaire lobbyist for the construction industry, who also financed successful anti-affirmative-action initiatives in California, Washington and Michigan, was the main backer of the measure here.

For Connerly’s anti-civil-rights movement, this year was supposed to be a watershed moment eventually leading to a majority of states banning affirmative action policies, and eventually a federal law.

Also, the prospect of an African American or woman Democratic presidential nominee meant that the extreme right wing in the GOP needed to mobilize voters using racism and sexism, with the belief that they would vote for the Republican candidate in November.

After Connerly made his intentions known, Missouri labor, community, civil rights and faith groups came together to form Working to Empower Community Action Now (WeCAN) and decided the best way to stop the initiative was to do direct action voter education.

By tirelessly searching out anti-civil-rights petitioners and then giving Missouri voters information about the true intent of the petition, we informed thousands of Missourians, most of whom said to the petitioners, “No, thank you.”

Why did we do this? Because the petitioners if seldom ever said that the initiative would ban affirmative action. Most said it would end workplace discrimination. It was necessary to speak with voters at the point of contact, so that they would be aware of the true meaning of the petition.

Missouri became the poster child for the national right-wing campaign. Outside money and resources began pouring into MoCRI’s coffers. They not only increased the amount they paid per signature (some petitioners were being paid as much as $10 per signature) started to pay for flights and lodging for signature gatherers to come to Missouri.

Missouri is known as the Show Me State, where you have to try hard to win trust and back up your promises with action. Right-wing forces believed that they would easily triumph here. But, in the end, it was the voters of Missouri who showed them.

Clinton: A Victim Of Misogyny

“Some have said your votes didn’t matter, that this campaign was over…” the New York senator said over and over on the campaign trail in Kentucky in the days before the primary there on Tuesday.

If you talk to voters at her rallies, you will find women who resent what they view as Clinton being pushed out of the presidential race. A Clinton support group formed last week and has run full-page ads in newspapers stating, “Not so Fast.”

Many female Clinton supporters are suddenly galvanized and are angry at what they call blatant sexism in this presidential race.

IMO, she is not being pushed out of a race she cannot win without help from Party insiders. So that argument is just damn silly. A victim of sexism? By whom? Obama? I have not seen anything that would appear to be so. If we are talking about that sign in early January held by one who opposed her, saying “Iron my shirts”…then I will concede that it was a sexist sign, but so far I have not seen the blatant sexism that some are saying is being committed toward Clinton.

Bill Clinton Sunday defended U.S. presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton, saying he’s “never seen a candidate treated so disrespectfully just for running.”

Speaking at a campaign rally in Fort Thompson, S.D., the former president said there has been a “frantic effort to push” his wife out of the race for the Democratic nomination, but asserted she “will win the general election if you nominate her,” ABC News reported.

“They’re just trying to make sure you don’t.” he said.

“And I have never seen anything like it. I have never seen a candidate treated so disrespectfully just for running.”

Granted I am a male and may not be as sensitive to misogyny as a female, but I do not think that it applies to the campaign run by Obama.  And Bill’s accusation is just unwarranted, the MSM has done more to keep her in the race than Bill himself.  It is more of an excuse for her lose to an upstart that most people ignored in the beginning.  She lost her inevitability and now they are trying desperately trying to explain he lose.

Mars Or Bust!

The spacecraft Phoenix landed safely on Mars yesterday, making a hazardous soft landing on the planet’s far north with all its scientific systems apparently intact and ready to begin an intensive new search for life beyond Earth.

Like the Viking landers, Phoenix is designed to look for organic material and other signs that life has existed on Mars, or could exist on the planet. Unlike the two rovers that have been exploring the Martian surface for nearly five years, Phoenix is built to stay in one place and use its robotic arm to dig into the soil and ice. The vehicle is equipped with several miniature chemistry labs to analyze the material it digs up.

The lander touched down further north on Mars than any previous lander. NASA scientists think the frozen water on or near the surface may tell them whether the minerals and organic compounds needed for life as we know it exist, or have ever existed, on the planet.

All scientific eyes will be watching.  For what?  God only knows for sure, but they will be watching and waiting…maybe now the world will get back to the exploration of space.

Bob Barr, Libertarian Nominee

After 6 ballots, the Libertarian Party national convention has nominated former Congressman Bob Barr. Barr has turned around on many major issues since leaving congress. He now favors:

– Ending the Iraq War, withdrawal of all American troops from all foreign countries.

– Ending the federal War on Drugs.

– Repealing the Defense of Marriage Amendment, which he had authored.

– Repeal of the PATRIOT Act and Real ID.

We now have the race starting to shape up. Barr is thew Libertarian, Nader is an independent, Brian Moore representing the Socialist Party, The Green Party will have their nominee in mid-July, so far McKinney is leading in the race. By Sept we will have Repub and Dem and the field will be set for the general.

But my big question is:  what will Paul do?  He raised about a ba-zillion dollars.  Will he run as an independent or just what will he do?

I would say let the fun begin and my the best person win……but I cannot…..the best person seldom wins…why?…because the best person is seldom running…….Peace

Labor Dogs McCain

This is an article from the People’s Weekly World:

Wherever John McCain goes, despite efforts to keep his schedule under wraps, labor is there letting everyone know that his election would be a third term for President Bush.

On May 19, the Republican presidential candidate slipped into Chicago where he spoke to a gathering of the National Restaurant Association. On 24 hours notice leading activists from seven different AFL-CIO and Change to Win unions showed up. They urged people coming into the event at the city’s McCormick Place to ask McCain why he didn’t support health care for restaurant workers and to ask him why he thought a 100 year war in Iraq was a good idea.

In St. Albans, W.Va. on May 17, also on very short notice, the West Virginia AFL-CIO organized a rally that drew 75 activists to a gun shop where McCain had stopped for a visit. Union members gathered outside the gun shop and demanded to know why he is proposing a health care plan that would create a new tax on working families and would end up with millions getting less coverage than they do now.

McCain operatives whisked him away from the site when they saw the trade unionists gathering. They took the candidate to an invitation-only meeting with local Republican leaders.

Avoiding union members on his tail is rapidly becoming an every-day task for the GOP candidate.

Only hours after he ducked the union crowd at the gun shop McCain attended the National Rifle Association convention in Louisville, Ky. He was confronted by more than 20 union volunteers who came out to tell people that McCain isn’t “on target” when it comes to solutions for health care and other economic issues. The Kentucky state AFL-CIO organized that event.

Pacific Is Becoming More Acidic

Waters along North America’s Pacific coast are becoming more acidic, posing a threat to marine life, federal scientists reported Friday — adding that while that fits global warming scenarios, no one had expected the acidification to happen so soon.

Acidification describes the process, natural or manmade, of ocean water becoming corrosive as a result of carbon dioxide being absorbed from the atmosphere.

The researchers said anthropogenic, or manmade, emissions of carbon dioxide are likely to blame since the acidified water that is being “upwelled” seasonally from the deeper ocean is from the last 50 years, a period when the burning of fossil fuels raised CO2 levels dramatically.Ocean acidification may be seriously impacting marine life on our continental shelf right now,” study co-author Richard Feely said in a statement released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which co-sponsored the study along with NASA and the National Science Foundation.

Feely, a NOAA oceanographer, noted that while the ability of oceans to absorb carbon dioxide helps mitigate warming, “the change in the ocean chemistry affects marine life, particularly organisms with calcium carbonate shells, such as corals, mussels, mollusks, and small creatures in the early stages of the food chain.”

NOAA echoed the experts’ findings. “Acidification of the Earth’s ocean water could have far-reaching impacts on the health of our near-shore environment, and on the sustainability of ecosystems that support human populations,” said NOAA assistant administrator Richard Spinrad.

Oh great!  Just the news we need and a president that thinks it is from cow farts.

Nader’s Serious Campaign

The Nation magazine will have a great article about Nader and his campaign in ’08.  Whether you hate hime or not, his issues are truly progressive, not some tame line to garner votes.

Ralph Nader is making every effort to be the most serious candidate for president this year, and he is succeeding despite the dismissals of the political class and the media that sustains it.

The notion that Nader is serious runs against the narrative that has developed in regard to the pioneering consumer activist who in recent years has turned his attention toward presidential politics. Nader has not run enough time for president to be treated with the respect that was accorded Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party stalwart who after six runs for the nation’s top job was ultimately accorded a the respectful “elder-statesman” status that the political class bestows upon candidates who are seen as thoughtful but harmless.

Nader is thoughtful. But he does not choose to be harmless. And that leads to dismissals of his candidacy by journalists and political commentators who can’t stand the notion that America politics is something other than a narrow two-party duopoly.

For his trouble, Nader will be portrayed as unduly radical or, worse yet, out of touch with the political zeitgeist of a moment in which we are supposed to be talking about candidates and their pastors.

But Nader will still be heard by enough Americans — thanks to his current campaign’s dramatically more media-savvy approach than those of his 1996, 2000 and 2004 efforts as a Green and independent presidential contender.

A good many voters will find themselves to be more in tune with Nader’s Constitutional urgency than with the more cautious constructions of Democrats Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton or Republican John McCain. And, despite the dismissals of his candidacy by most of the media, a decent number of those voters appear to be considering casting a ballot for the independent candidate.

I suggest before one condemns Nader, go to his site and read what he is proposing…..if u be a progressive…then he is saying all the right things…and proposing the right solutions.

Clinton And Obama Struggle For Power

This is a piece written by Sheldon Richman for the Future Of Freedom Foundation is an interesting perspective on the process of the Democrat presidential candidates

Many Americans are spellbound by the historic contest for the Democratic presidential nomination between Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama. Forgetting the political context, it is indeed something spectacular, even inspiring. A woman and a black man have reached a pinnacle that just a few years ago seemed impossibly far off.

If it were happening outside politics, it would be something to appreciate.

But we can’t forget the political context, and it’s the nature of that context that should keep us from truly rejoicing in Clinton’s and Obama’s achievements.

When we strip away from the process they are engaged in the democratic mythology and red, white, and blue bunting, we are left with the spectacle of two people vying for raw power. They say they want to lead and inspire. What they really want to do is rule — us.

This is a contest to determine who will decide how to spend a significant part of our incomes, who will make war or peace, and who will achieve his or her “vision” by manipulating us with carrots and sticks.

There was a time when the people saw a president as little more than a clerk. He saw that the laws passed by Congress were executed. Yes, he was commander in chief of the military, but that only meant he directed the army after Congress declared war. He certainly couldn’t take the country into war on his own. The express powers of the presidency described in the Constitution were seen as rather meager, and the people liked it that way.

Obviously, the idea of what a president should be has changed radically. How much so is the subject of Gene Healy’s new book, The Cult of the Presidency: America’s Dangerous Devotion to Executive Power (Cato Institute).

“The chief executive of the United States is no longer a mere constitutional officer charged with faithful execution of the laws,” Healy writes in a book excerpt reprinted in Reason.. “He is a soul nourisher, a hope giver, a living American talisman against hurricanes, terrorism, economic downturns, and spiritual malaise. He — or she — is the one who answers the phone at 3 a.m. to keep our children safe from harm. The modern president is America’s shrink, a social worker, our very own national talk show host. He’s also the Supreme Warlord of the Earth.”

Lots of presidents have encouraged this way of thinking of the office, especially Theodore Roosevelt, Woodrow Wilson, and Franklin Roosevelt. But every man who held the office in the second half of the 20th century has done so. Maybe they thought it was necessary for the good for the country. If so, it shows only how little they understand the individual and social benefits of freedom and the free market. Some would say that society today is too complex for Jeffersonian notions about freedom. On the contrary, the more complex society is, the more it needs government to stay out of its way.

More likely, those who have worked to inflate the office were driven by pure ambition. They were determined to make their mark on history, and the hell with our freedom.

George W. Bush has taken this up a notch with his Unitary Executive Theory, under which he may on his own invade and occupy countries, ignore congressional restrictions on his power, wiretap without a warrant, authorize CIA torture, send suspected terrorists to other countries to be tortured, and hold the people he declares “enemy combatants” indefinitely without trial.

The presidency now is an office with virtually open-ended powers. All the officeholder needs is a crisis to justify new authority, and there’s never been a shortage of crises, whether economic or foreign in nature.

This is the backdrop to the historic power struggle between Clinton and Obama. Neither has condemned the blank-check presidency as a threat to the American people. Neither has pledged to forswear autocratic powers. On the contrary, both have indicated that they will be activist presidents on the domestic and foreign fronts. So has John McCain.

As the great political philosopher Peter Townshend said, “Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.”