On Friday my wife and I shared a dinner that was unusual at least for us. Other than the fresh (at least fresh-ish) sockeye salmon that I had received from my “small fisherman to table” subscription service I’ve mentioned before, we had lettuce, tomatoes, and potatoes, all grown in our own garden. Simply prepared, all were incredibly delicious.
The more distant we get from the land, the more we lose sight of what food actually tastes like. What we buy in our markets are either highly processed or fruit and vegetable varietals selected because they ship, store, and display well rather than because they’re tasty.
It hasn’t always been that way and doesn’t have to be that way. Until about 80 years ago every city in the United States was ringed by mile after mile of “truck gardens”. You can frequently see the remains of old truck gardens in nurseries and garden centers with greenhouses. At least there was some chance of getting fresh-grown fruits and vegetables. Now the produce we buy has all too frequently been shipped for days or even weeks from thousands of miles away.
We’re able to get produce out of season but don’t kid yourself. It doesn’t taste as good as locally grown and freshly picked produce. A simple example is corn on the cob. Good as it may be the fresh corn you buy in the store isn’t nearly as good as fresh corn you’ve picked yourself, cooked, and eaten nearly immediately. The natural sugars in the corn have continued to turn into starch while it was shipped, stored, and displayed.
Bananas in places that actually grow bananas taste much better than the hard, bland things we get here.
Specialization has resulted in greater economic development than would otherwise have been possible but we’ve lost in that process as well.
In this post unless I specify otherwise “Russian” refers to ethnic Russians, “Ukrainian” refers to ethnic Ukrainians, etc.
Having devoted a considerable amount of time studying the language, history, and culture of Russia, I would suggest that Russians are illiberal and predisposed to autocracy. I think that Ukrainians are basically Polonized Russians. There are some differences but they are differences in detail.
I think we should support the Ukrainians in their conflict against the Russians (who were wrong to invade Ukraine) and use whatever influence that gives us with the Ukrainians to encourage them to settle for something less than the pre-2014 borders. The territory of Ukraine is not and never has been a nation-state in the sense of a country consisting of a single ethnicity. It has always been multi-ethnic and multi-cultural.
Immediately following the Maidan Revolution of 2014 the new government signalled its objective of turning Ukraine into a nation-state. Although I think we should support the Ukrainians in their fight against the Russians I think we should be cautious about supporting the Ukrainians’ goals since they are not ours.
8% of the population of Crimea was Ukrainian. 90% were Russians or Tatars. The population of Donetsk Oblast was split roughly evenly between Russians and Ukrainians. The population of Luhansk Oblast was about 40% Russians and 50% Ukrainians. I say “was” because we have next to no idea what their population demographics are now. IMO what makes the most sense is for Crimea to federate with Russia while Donetsk and Luhansk be granted substantial autonomy.
Having finally come to their senses the editors of the Washington Post articulate their plan for wresting control of the production and processing of rare earths and other materials used in battery production from China:
The U.S. transition to cleaner energy technology is underway, supported by new incentives in the Inflation Reduction Act. Benefits to the planet could be significant. Yet so could the geopolitical risks to the United States. Moving from fossil fuels to wind and solar power means shifting from reliance on resources the United States produces to reliance on imported ones. And for many of the materials — lithium, nickel, copper, cobalt — the United States’ long-term adversary China is a key producer, processor or both.
The most useful aspect of the piece is the graphic at the top of this post which illustrates the top three producers and processors of a number of key materials. It provides a succinct statement of the problem.
The editors conveniently neglect to mention that until recently the United States was the biggest processor if not the biggest producer of most of those materials. U. S. companies have largely gotten out of those businesses due to a combination of regulations, Chinese investment, and Chinese dumping.
The editors’ plan consists largely of recognizing that this race is a marathon rather than a sprint and something they call “friend-shoring”. So, for example, Canada could produce a lot more cobalt than it does at present, and would be a good source.
This is the best advice in the editorial:
Environmentalists should remember: The question is not whether mining will occur but where. If not under regulated conditions in this country, it could well be in places such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, the world’s leading cobalt source. Though companies there have cleaned up their act recently, working conditions remain poor and a significant minority of the substance still comes from artisanal mines, often dug by children.
A shorter version would be that for the last 30 years they’ve been wrong and I’ve been right. We should have taken whatever steps were necessary to maintain our production and processing. Now we need to play catch-up which will be more expensive than maintaining our production and processing would have been.
CHICAGO (WLS) — The jury in Tim Mapes’ perjury case found the former Michael Madigan confidant guilty on two counts at the Dirksen Federal Building Thursday afternoon.
Mapes was charged with one count of making false declarations before a grand jury and one count of attempted obstruction of justice.
The 68 year old was found guilty on both counts after roughly five hours of deliberating.
Mr. Madigan himself is under indictment on charges of corruption. I don’t know whether he will be convicted or not but at least to me his guilt is pretty obvious. Mike Madigan was chairman of the Illinois Democratic Party most of the last 40 years. That party leaders were blithely unaware of Mr. Madigan’s actions is beyond comprehension.
Many Democrats these days have what I can only describe as an obsession with Donald Trump. He’s all they want to write or talk about. IMO those who voted for him did so in the hope that he would “drain the swamp”. That there is a swamp to drain is obvious to anyone who will allow him- or herself to see it but thinking he could drain it was mistaken. He can only make it swampier.
Simplifying everything I think that we have an anti-government party, the Republicans, who have a severe case of cognitive dissonance and a pro-government party, the Democrats. As I see it the only hope we have is for a decent, honest Democratic Party that is true to the ideals it has claimed for the last 80 years. In my own small way I’m trying to nudge them in that direction. I can’t do that by complaining about Republicans.
To understand why I post as I do, it might be helpful to understand the situation in Illinois. In Illinois Democrats hold veto-proof majorities in both houses of the legislature and a Democrat is governor. The Illinois Republican Party continues to exist but it is, as has been said, supine. If every Republican were to vanish magically from the state of Illinois it would make no difference whatever in Illinois’s situation.
In Chicago no Republican has even bothered running for mayor for a decade or more. When people vote for the Democratic candidates it’s because those are the candidates running.
I have no idea what Republicans are thinking at the national level. The only thing they can seem to agree on is they want lower taxes. Consider the following (rather complicated) chart:
As that chart illustrates even were we to eliminate all spending other than healthcare spending, Social Security, interest on the debt, and defense, we would still be running a deficit.
Republicans have defended entitlement spending and defense spending and yet still want to cut taxes. There’s a mismatch there that I simply don’t understand.
I think establishment Republicans like establishment Democrats are hopelessly corrupt. They are so corrupt they don’t even realize it’s corruption any more.
Why should I perseverate in kvetching about Republicans? They have no impact on my life.
I did not listen to the first Republican candidates’ debate. I don’t plan to listen to any of them although I might if someone other than Trump begins to seem more likely to emerge as the Republican candidate for president.
When I first encountered the peculiarities of retail accounting, I was introduced to the term “shrinkage”, the euphemism for theft, damage, etc. of merchandise.
The shares of Dick’s Sporting Goods, Foot Locker and other retailers are selling off this week as companies report lower earnings amid softer consumer spending. But retail executives are also pointing to another trend shrinking profits: Theft.
Second-quarter earnings were dented by “higher inventory shrink, organized retail crime and theft in general, an increasingly serious issue impacting many retailers,†Dick’s CEO Lauren Hobart said on an earnings call Tuesday. Dick’s CFO added that “the number of incidents and the organized retail crime impact came in significantly higher than we anticipated.â€
Foot Locker executives likewise noted on Wednesday that inventory “shrink†has been increasing. Target CEO Brian Cornell last week said that “shrink†remained “well above the sustainable level where we expect to operate over time,†and that the company was facing “an unacceptable amount of retail theft and organized retail crime.†Home Depot execs last week also flagged “pressure from shrink†on earnings. As did Walmart execs. “Shrink has increased a bit this year. It increased last year,†its CFO noted, adding that “shrink†was “uneven†across the country. “There needs to be action taken to help protect people from crime, including theft,†said CEO Doug McMillon.
I found “sustainable level where we expect to operate over time” an interesting choice of words. It suggests that if the present level of organized retail theft continues, it will accelerate the transition to online that has been proceeding for the last 25 years, accelerate it even. That will only be good for online retailers and will especially hurt cities and the people who live in them, particularly people in the poorer neighborhoods.
What I expect to emerge from this are calls for the enforcement of sales taxes on all online retailers, whether they have a local nexus or not.
I realize that just about everybody assumes that Putin had Prigozhin killed. He might have but what strikes me is the long list of people who wanted him dead. Did anyone not want him dead?
I think that for reasonability deniability if no other reason that it’s more likely that Sergei Shoigu of the Russian Ministry of Defense had Prigozhin’s aircraft shot down. IMO he was more of a threat to Shoigu than he was to Putin.
Update
I continue to hear all sorts of theories about the downing of the aircraft. The most convincing argument that I have heard against Putin having been behind it is that if Putin had wanted him dead he would have been killed earlier and in a less messy fashion. The wildest idea I have heard is that NOONE was on the plane; it was controlled remotely and destroyed to throw Western intelligence into a frenzy. If that was the objective, mission accomplished.
I wanted to commend this piece by Norman Davies at The Spectator on the complex history of Poland and Ukraine to your attention. Conflicts among Poland, Ukraine, and Russia have been going on for at least a millennium. Each country has its own view of that history. Reading the article probably won’t clear anything up for you but it may illustrate how complicated the situation is.
I don’t defend the Russian invasion of Ukraine but I also don’t want the Ukrainians to be exterminated or a nuclear war and that’s the direction we’re heading in if this goes on.
My mostly futile efforts have been targeted at explaining the Russian point of view not defending it. Here’s my probably equally futile attempt at proposing a compromise resolution to the conflict. Ukraine should renounce any claim to Crimea and allow Donetsk and Luhansk provinces their independence , something to which it committed some time ago. NATO should guarantee both this new Ukraine’s independence and the independence of Donetsk and Luhansk.
Nobody will like that resolution but IMO it has an outside chance of ending the carnage.
This morning when I went to the console of The Glittering Eye I was greeted by a notification to update one of the plug-ins I use for this blog. I did so and it disabled access to the console. After going through some shenanigans I determined that there was an error in the updated plug-in which has since been fixed.
