Going.....Going.....

I'm sure it's a good thing that President Bush stopped saying how great our economy is doing; sooner or later people would actually begin to realize how out of touch with planet Earth (and America in particular) he really is. If this is the beginning of the end, it's happening a lot faster than I expected. Now, that's not to say that we're heading towards a depression or full economic collapse, but I think it could easily go in that direction.

The title of this article from the Independent UK doesn't help me sleep any better at night: USA 2008: The Great Depression. According to the article, "Food stamps are the symbol of poverty in the US. In the era of the credit crunch, a record 28 million Americans are now relying on them to survive - a sure sign the world's richest country faces economic crisis."




What has really struck me as an ominous sign is the abrupt end of two of the United States' major airlines and a charter airline. Champion Air, with about 550 employees, announced on Monday, March 31, 2008 that they will cease operations effective May 31, 2008. Also on Monday, Aloha Airlines went out of business laying off about 1,900 workers. And today, Thursday, April 3, 2008, ATA Airlines went out of business laying off about 2,200 workers while it was reported that workers in the banking sector will see 200,000 of their co-workers, if not themselves, laid off in the next 12 to 18 months. The article on commercial banks cutting their workforce, found here, compares these record cuts to the record cuts made just last year when 153,000 employees were let go as well as Citigroup's firing of 20,000 people "with at least 2,000 more to come."

According to the White House web page on the economy here, "The U.S. economy is structurally strong, but we are experiencing a period of economic challenge." What exactly do they mean when they say "structurally strong?" What exact "structure" are they talking about? The workers aren't strong, they're getting laid off in record numbers. The businesses aren't strong, they're going out of business one after the other. How this administration is still in office is one question I really wish I could answer.

In an interview with Michael Pollan, author of In Defense of Food?, here, he talks about how he came to value a more balanced interaction with nature and human farming efforts. Pollan also discusses his opinions on why we eat food (not just for nutrition), what goes into our food, and how mom's good advice on what to eat has gone the way of the rotary phone. Here's a sample:

The more you process the food, the more profitable it is. If I go to the supermarket, I can buy a pound of organic oats for 79 cents. Now that's a lot of oats, and no body's making much money. But if you turn it into Cheerios, suddenly you have a brand. You've got your little doughnut shape, you've got an ad campaign, and suddenly you're charging four bucks for a few ounces of oats.

Then you come up with a Honey Nut Cheerio Cereal Bar with a layer of artificial milk in the middle. Now you've got a convenience food that's very much your own, because you've got this special formula to make your fake milk. And kids can eat them in the car or on the way to school. Now you're charging $10 or $20 for a few penny's worth of oats. That's the gist of the food industry. That's the economic imperative.

If you don't think the United States is an empire or even if you know we are, this video animation by Howard Zinn is a great watch. It's simple, effective, and tells you what you weren't taught in school.

It's like the world has gone mad

The FDA, as well as those on the side of the meat industry, feel that it is safe for humans to eat meat and drink milk from cloned animals. (I do not in any way, shape, or form, support this position). In addition, they are against the labeling of such meat and dairy products in order to let consumers know what they are about to ingest has come from cloned animals. “The problem with labeling is that it implies that something is wrong with the food,” says William Hallman, director of the Food Policy Institute at Rutgers University. “Just like a label warns of peanuts, a label on cloned foods will be interpreted as a warning.”

Excuse me, but, does the "warning" label on cigarettes stop people from smoking? And the peanut warning label is so that people who have allergies know to stay away from food containing peanuts or processed in a facility that processes peanuts. It's called health and safety. It's called allowing the "free hand of the market" to decide, right? Isn't that what all of these big industry capitalist CEO's are always raving about? So, why not label cloned animals as such - and let the consumer decide if he or she feels safe eating an animal that has no evolutionary genetic history on this planet and is literally made up from a brand new, rarely discussed or debated technology in a laboratory?



More hypocrisy. Hey, all of you conservative, right-wing, "family-values" Americans...why don't you do something about this truly disgusting situation? Isn't this more important than abortion?



Speaking of disgusting... Those killed in the twin towers on 9/11 have never been given proper, body-identified burials. The remains of their bodies as well as the buildings they died in were rushed out of NYC: sold, junked, scrapped, melted, and otherwise destroyed and retransformed. Even though it was a crime scene, no investigation was ever done on any of the "evidence" contained at ground zero. Why? And why is it OK to use crime and burial scene evidence and steel as building material?



Why is this being released now? The report even states that, “At this time, there is no credible intelligence regarding specific plans by any extremist groups or individuals to perpetrate an act of terrorism against the U.S. mass transit system." So, why scare and frighten people? Is it because enough people aren't paying attention to Bush's low approval ratings? Is it because Hillary and Obama are dominating national television coverage? Why does my government continually try to terrorize me?