The Set Up

Posting has been light with the Spring chores on the farm. Before I get on with today's rant...

Wilber returned to the farm yesterday. Here he is in bacon and sausage form. Nothing like a little home grown, hormone, pesticide, and antibiotic free food, minimally processed in this case. Until the farm, I had not seen bacon like that since I was a little kid.

Yesterday we had some homegrown chicken stew for dinner.


Speaking of home grown food... every year I save 2, 5 gallon buckets of "seed potatoes" from the garden. I store them in moist sand and leave the buckets in the unheated garage. Potatoes are a "can't miss". If they have water, its almost impossible NOT to have a good harvest (disease permitting). Here is a photo of the potatoes already sending out runners in mid March. I would guess each bucket holds 10 lbs of of potatoes in the Fall, and they dry out some and decrease in volume (that bucket was overflowing). I would guess I harvest a total of 400 - 500 lbs of potatoes, and I do nothing more than throw down the cut seed potatoes on the garden ground and cover them with a foot of left over hay or straw. No digging is required. The potatoes grow right in the composting straw, and come out clean as a whistle.

OK, back to the rant.


Britain operates one of the largest welfare states in Europe. And that, it seems, is just fine with many of the British.

Despite the worst recession since World War II, many people here show little appetite for shrinking a system that eats up half the nation’s economic output, more than in Portugal, Greece or Spain — all of which are trying to push through painful cuts. Indeed, as Britain’s Labour government confronts a yawning budget deficit, public sector workers are mobilizing to head off any reductions in wages or jobs.

As a midwife for the National Health Service, Rachel Voller is one of millions in Britain who have benefited from a decade of rising public spending. Now, she wants to protect her piece of the pie.

“We work hard and struggle to make ends meet, but they are the ones that get the bonuses,” Ms. Voller, 34, said Monday, as she and a group of colleagues gathered at the headquarters of the Royal Bank of Scotland here to sneer at investment bankers and pre-emptively protest salary or job cuts for health workers.

Think about it. The U.K. came back from the brink due to the North Sea's Oil production. Then, flush with Oil money, the U.K. expands its social programs and giveaways - completely addicting (and expanding) the population to these. Now, the declining Oil production in the North Sea has demolished the U.K. economy and its budget, leaving the Pound on the brink. There is not a power on earth that can save the U.K. from economic and political disaster.

Further, SOME politically interested party is attempting to cast the blame on London's financial district. The U.K., like the U.S., has as its primary "export" financial services. Without them this sneering mid-wife's children might have experienced poverty and hunger right out of a Charles Dickens' novel. She may yet get her chance. Envy is a powerful motivator and useful political weapon. Just look at 1917 Russia.

It is NO COINCIDENCE that the countries with large Oil export capacity have large social programs (the U.S. HAD the largest Oil export capacity when it began to implement its suicidal programs). Russia, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, Britain, Norway, Canada... but once the Oil goes away, a humanitarian crisis of biblical proportions will visit each of these (with the possible exception of Canada). No Oil = No Social Programs. Can someone call the folks on the Left and clue them in? If they really wanted to help poor folks, they would organize and help fund Agricultural Co-ops, dairy, poultry, and swine production along with big time gardening on Public Housing grounds. That would actually help people. The Left does not want to "Help". They want to keep blaming the Right, the Republicans, the Religious, the Right to Life folks... They want power, and power comes from political control of people and money. Teaching them a useful skill (like providing for themselves) does not fit in with the Left's agenda.

What a crazy world.