From: bill@chaos.cs.umn.edu (Hari Seldon ... psychohistorian)
Newsgroups: misc.rural
Subject: Re: Capital Suicide (was Real Farms)
Date: 15 Sep 92 00:34:35 GMT
Organization: University of Minnesota

please note i have not identified all places where i have deleted lines.

In <FKITTRED.92Sep10134034@spchp11.BBN.COM> fkittred@spchp11.BBN.COM (Fletcher Kittredge) writes:

>In article <BuD2LF.7s5@watserv1.uwaterloo.ca> bobw@csg.uwaterloo.ca (Bob Wildfong) writes:

>>   From: bobw@csg.uwaterloo.ca (Bob Wildfong)

>>   100 years ago, most people had much more appreciation and respect for

>They appreciated agriculture alright.  They knew agricultural labor
>was a backbreaking, dangerous and economcially and intellectually
>unrewarding life.  The vast majority were extrodinarily glad to get
>off the farm, even if it meant working in some factory on an assembly
>line.

gee. proves people were stupid even way back then. they busted their
butts and what did it get them. 'another day older and deeper in debt'
thats just an old depression? era song.

>>   I believe that it is very dangerous for our society to look at farming as

>I defend to the death your right to have such opinons, but *MY*
>opinion is that this is an example of muddy thinking.  Farming is just
>another business enterprise, abet one with political clout.  The

no i do believe the clot of which you speak is the clot of corporate
farms. you know them the ones that bring you produce with a shelf
life of a few hundred years, you can throw it against the wall w/o
damage. but it tastes like cardboard. you know them 10's of 1,000's
of acres on monoculture just waiting for the right strain of disease
to come along and wipe out whole counties of production. yea them. 
you know the folks.

>economic laws of efficient producers hold as well as any other
>business, and we should buy our food from whomever is the best
>supplier.  Punishing consumers to support the livestyles of a few

and who/what do you judge to be the best supplier??

>farmers is morally bankrupt.

and what about the lifestyles of [insert your own group here] supported
by ss, welfare, gov handouts. but not by training.

>By you line of reasoning, every country should maintain a complete and
>independent agricultural industry in order to protect their
>"civilization."  Therefore, the Japanese, Europeans, Russians, Arabs,

ok show me,,,,, mmmmm eithiopia? what was the biggest weapon used to fight 
the rebels? bzzzt wrong. food.
show me an eastern african country not in big trouble (thats not rich)
that has/had massive crop failure?

>Africans and Mexicans should ban imports of North American food
>products in order to protect their own inefficient argricultural
>industries.  I suspect this would be a net blow to the North American

whats the root cause of this?? our family farmer?? come on now.
how about our export of big farm tech which does not scale down!! and is
not supportable w/o a major influx of supporting technologies.

>agriculture economies.

>As to your second point, the economy is so interdependent, if the a
>industry the size of the software industry went belly up, we would all
>be in big trouble.

see my other post about the auto industry. we are in trouble, but we can
fix stuff. how? do it yourself. you don't *need* all the stuff everyone
wants to sell you. you don't *need* to dial 1-900-phonsex. we do *need* to
learn a few of the lessons we forgot from the turn of the century, and 
the dustbowl days.

>I applaud your choice to live on a farm.  Just don't expect us to pay
>for it!

and i applaud your choice to stay in the city. just don't expect me to pay 
for your excess. if you see a social problem/ill then you go out and help fix
it don't tax me to pay for it.

hmmmm. wait a minute. didn't i see that your from the ne? i wonder if the
people that used to work with you would love to hear you say what you've
said about the weeding out process. don't forget you may be the next 
one weeded out.

bill pociengel

ps if i've attributed a coment to you and you didn't say it then you have 
my permission 9as if its needed) to flame me.
--
bill@chaos.cs.umn.edu
Newsgroups: misc.rural