A brief comment about the Green Party.
I am sure that all the criticisms of the greens, expressed by Cassiodorus and others here are accurate.
However, those of us who care about things like the health of the natural world, which does sustain all of us, and of which we are all a part, clean air, water and soil, sustainable farming and the right to garden right now have no where else to go.
The President-Elect has announced a pro-biotech, pro-big ag team to advise him on farm policy, so the last remaining hope we might have had that the the Rs would be any less hostile than the Dems. to sustainable farming has vanished.
About Monsanto, glyphosate and genetic engineering. Yes, I know that the genetic engineering technology may have uses, especially in health care, as Senator Sanders said during the campaign. I also know that there many companies doing pioneering work in that field, in Israel and in other places. I know of no reason to suppose that those companies are not good corporate citizens, but the fact of their existence does not excuse the crimes against humanity committed and being committed by Monsanto, Syngenta, Bayer and the rest of agribiz.
A good, exhaustively researched summary was provided by Marie Robin in her book, The World According to Monsanto. A movie of the same name was also released.
GE technology may indeed have some uses. I think of it as being like nuclear energy; very dangerous and needing to be regulated for the public good, not private profit. No one gets to build a nuclear reactor in their back yard and no one should be tinkering with the basis of life itself with no oversight just because they can.
The chemical glyphosate, OTOH, is dangerous and NEEDS TO BE BANNED. Period. IMHO, it is a worse threat than DDT. For DDT, there was at least the excuse that it was needed to eradicate dangerous diseases, and it is still being used for that purpose in some tropical countries.
The complaint that our people/family/the poor need aribiz jobs is without merit. People have to eat. There will always be a need for farmers and farm workers, because someone has to provide the food. Everyone involved in farming and food production, from the farm worker to the farmer to the ag investor to the food distributor to the processing worker to the processing supervisor to the Safeway retail clerk to the grocery store manager needs to find a way to make decent livings without poisoning people, and contaminating the air, water and soil on which all of life depends.
The primary purpose of the ag sector of a nation's economy is to support the health and vigor of the nation's population. This, our farm sector does not do. History shows us that centralized food production DOES NOT WORK. It did not work for the Romans, with their latifundiae, nor for the Soviets, with their collective farms, and it is not working with us. OK, maybe if you are so fortunate as to live along side a large, placid river which obligingly deposits 4-6" of muck on your fields once a year, centralized control can be effective, and maybe even needed if the floods last for 5 months, but that is an accident of geography.
The same time that Earl Butz, remember him, proclaimed get big or get out, and the Reaganites removed commodity price supports--which did not cost the taxpayer a dime--and ceilings, and turned the likes of Goldman Sachs loose in the commodity markets, that was the beginning of the rise in obesity and catastrophic decline in the health of Americans.
For right now, those of us who do care about building a sustainable farm economy, which would in turn sustain the health and vigor of Americans, and about the health of the natural world, have no where else to go but the Greens.
Those of you of younger generations, take a good look at photos of groups of Americans in the 50s, 60s, and 70s. How many obese people do you see? How many wheelchairs? Very few, and that was in spite of the tobacco and alcohol consumption and high cholesterol diets of those times.
Comments
Remember that I don't object to the Green Party per se --
I'm just world-weary of those who would 1) praise or 2) denounce the Green Party without 3) having joined it or at least having bothered to engage its institutions. I think another party is probably necessary because nobody outside of the office staff seems to care about the Green Party itself; rather, the "Green Party" serves the nice debaters here and elsewhere as a rhetorical device, contributing to arguments for why they're still loyal Democrats or why they're not voting or why they're going to conduct symbolic protest votes from here on in or whatever. One exception might be the commentator at the top of my most recent diary who (I suppose) organized a new Green local.
"there's something so especially sadistic about waving the flag of a country that you're actively destroying" -- Aaron Mate
Thank you for the response, Cassiodorus.
I am registered WFP, for now. There is no Green Party office or apparatus where I live. I found no other choice on the ballot this year which I could remotely support.
Mary Bennett
Take Over the Greens?
Maybe we should focus on taking over the Green Party and making it more viable--instead of focusing on taking over the Democratic Party?
The Greens will be on the ballot automatically in 20 states plus DC in the next presidential elections. That's a nice foundation to build upon.
apenultimate
On the ballot in 20 states and DC is progress.
I intended my diary to tell people considering a new party that farming issues should no longer be ignored, or handed over to a particular interest group. In the past the attitude seems to have been something like, OK, we won't bring up farming or GMOs because...farmworkers need the big ag jobs, or...someone's uncle owns a distribution company or... our constituents in the inner city don't want to hear about it.
Keep in mind, new party builders, that what used to be called organic farming, until USDA decided it gets to "own" the term, is a growing sector of the economy, a bright spot in an otherwise dismal economic picture, and is passionately supported by a growing number of people who vote.
Mary Bennett
Trump picked Myron Ebell to lead transition at EPA
Trump is a climate change denier. Ebell is a Flaming CC Denier.
Maybe the US will be like Greece. They finally got pissed and threw the establishment parties out of power. Unfortunately, Greece had to go bankrupt before they got into pitchforks mode.
Lucky that US citizens are so much smarter than Greeks. (do I really need to put a /snark tag on this line)
Donnie The #ShitHole Douchebag. Fake Friend to the Working Class. Real Asshole.
But, of course.
They are all about smash and grab what we can while we still can.
Mary Bennett
Thanks for your thoughtful and well written diary.
To get my main point out of the way first: Global monopoly capital, where transnational corporations administer prices rather than have prices set through competition, and can commandeer national military and diplomatic resources to further their greed for profit, has to be replaced before a return to sustainability in both the agriculture and manufacturing sectors can be realized, in my opinion.
"Get big or get small" is exactly what has happened and is continuing to happen. It used to be a farmer, growing multiple crops, could make a decent living on 500 acres. Today, it's closer to 20,000 acres because of the patented seeds, heavy reliance on inputs such as fertilizer and herbicides and pesticides and heavy machinery. I think it's realistic to say that farmers are captured employees of those who supply the above inputs and control the price the farmer receives by owning the distribution networks.
In the area of poultry farming, the farmer has to build to certain specifications, feed the birds only what the Big Ag companies sell; sell only to Big Ag, etc. The poultry farmer is a low level contractor for Big Ag as he/she owns the land and buildings but only operates according to what suits the corporations. If the corporations move to a cheaper locale, the farmer is stuck with the land and useless buildings.
200,000 or so farmers in India have committed suicide because their neoliberal government has allowed a land grab by international Big Ag capitalists. The farmers could not compete with the subsidized mega-farms growing a one-crop-for-export product, and could not support their families, felt shamed and ended their lives. Indian maize - corn - sustained the people of southern Mexico for centuries until NAFTA allowed the dumping of subsidized American corn on the Mexican market. There is ongoing grand scale social upheaval so that the banks and global Ag can profit.
The one thing that can be done on a local level is to buy what is grown locally especially if the produce is organically raised. It is also important to try and have country or origin labeling restored and working for meaningful standards for Organic and Non-GMO.
Genetic engineering has been very important in producing insulin. GMO crops however are being loosed on the environment without an understanding of the long term ecologic impact. Those who claim GMO crops are safe for the ecosystem are engaging in an absurd reductionist view of natural systems and are dangerous to the health of the planet, in the view of experts in the fields of evolutionary biology, genetics, and sustainable agriculture.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
With the newer ability to target gene editing or insertion
the need for a herbicide resistance selection marker goes away. So no need for Roundup-ready crops? Some farmers like them. Increased yields even with patents and Roundup cost. I have no comment further, other than I hate the acreage involved in monoculture. Wheat fields in Kansas 50 years ago were large enough to require dump trucks driving alongside the harvester. So this is not all that new. My deceased husband learned to drive a dump truck then, and he grew up in NYC. My 96 y/o demented mother thinks 40 acres is enough to be self-sustaining. She is currently living in the 1940's. In Indiana, where tomatoes, picked by migrant labor and locally canned was enough to survive.
I approve of individuals doing farming again. I am trying, and failing to grow specialty crops like mushrooms. In the woods. I have no pasture land, nothing open, not even enough now for potted tomatoes. I will never have an orchard, rely on local ones. Next year doing community growing I think. My local grocery stocks local produce and meats and grain products. I think that that is a slow adaptation.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
The point of roundup ready seeds is to sell roundup
Crispr/Cas9 makes gene targeting more accurate and the original roundup-ready soybeans were apparently a molecular genetic mess that reduced yields by 10% (i.e there was not a nice, clean single integration in an inconsequential region of the genome). They were rushed to marked with complicity by Congress and federal officials without proper documentation of the number and places of integration of the transforming DNA into the chromosome. So one could a more accurately targeted strain but since the purpose is to sell roundup, the glyphosate resistance gene will not be removed.
I hear you well, riverlover!
I hear you well! Like the vast majority of today's Americans, I have no access to the land at all. (apartment dweller and NOT by choice!)
"US govt/military = bad. Russian govt/military = bad. Any politician wanting power = bad. Anyone wielding power = bad." --Shahryar
"All power corrupts absolutely!" -- thanatokephaloides
Amen, duckpin.
About what can be done on the local level. Obviously buying from local producers is where to start. Yes, it is more expensive. So is medical care. I have found, on a small budget, that if I combine cooking at home with buying locally produced and organic where I can, and unadulterated--READ those labels--where I can't, I can afford the expense. As a person who has not had medical insurance for 20 years, I believe I would be dead if I had not adopted a radically non-chemical diet.
Discount retailers like Big Lots and Grocery Outlet on the West Coast, do sometimes have discounted organic products.
Also, we can encourage local officials to support FMs, to make those accessible to EBT users and (gently) encourage our EBT acquaintance to avail themselves of programs which are available for them.
And, we can grow some of our own, if we have a yard, and share, share, share. We can learn how to winter sow, which is easy peasy and wonderfully productive, and share the extra plants.
Mary Bennett
More money is now spent in restaurants than at markets in
the USA. I know people don't have the time but dried beans, brown rice, certain canned fish, are not expensive and certainly better for you than KFC, for example.
My wife and I don't eat beef or processed meat of any kind and eat a lot of sweet potatoes. She grows many kinds of herbs that make dishes very tasty.
I think avoiding as many chemicals as possible is wise. It's not a one-size-fits-all world and some people react much more strongly to a chemical than others. Household chemicals can be another problem especially if they get mixed.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
Speaking of herbs, consider donating spices to food banks
If you are donating products, not money, think about spices. They make foods so much better, add new and different flavors (think curries for example). I had not thought about it. Be the change.
Hey! my dear friends or soon-to-be's, JtC could use the donations to keep this site functioning for those of us who can still see the life preserver or flotsam in the water.
Agree completely
My problem, at this point, is how to find other Greens in my area. The NC Green website sends you to facebook--a cesspool I refuse to sign up for or get involved in. Tried emailing the contact listed, got nothing back. Tried the national website, nothing...not really sure how to get involved or find others to start laying some groundwork with...
I'm worried about global warming and our food supply more than anything else that's on the chopping block. I know its going to suck for every single thing we hold dear: education, SS, Medicare, clean water (air, soil), green energy, but if global warming continues (and it looks like it will), no matter how genetically modified the food is, it still won't grow above 104F and the entire midwest is seeing weeks of that every year now. No matter what they splice, if they're watering crops with fracking waste water, those crops will die (and egads--if they survive it, I don't want to contemplate what that means).
The evil of big ag can't be overstated in terms of environment and health, but where to start? If I grow my own garden will Monsanto (I'm sorry, that's Bayer now, isn't it?) descend on me, claim the plants cross-pollinated from the stuff down the street and take it all, sue me and take my house? If I try to keep seeds from what I grew last year to replant, will that be against the law?
I have no idea what craziness is going to come out of the next few years, and my biggest problem is figuring out how to prepare for taking care of myself and my loved ones. If anyone has suggestions, I'd love to hear it...
FB was a stumbling block for me too
I made a throwaway account to read Jill's news feed (why wasn't it just on their web site?) My occasional like of comments got me invitations to connect and so forth that I felt bad ignoring but I'm not going there. I attend conferences where they explain their latest data mining algorithms and it creeps me out.
After the election, I deleted the app and I haven't gone back.
We can’t save the world by playing by the rules, because the rules have to be changed.
- Greta Thunberg
Have you tried this site? [Never mind. You're right.]
http://ncgreenparty.nationbuilder.com/
This site includes links to several local green groups in NC but they all refer you to FB.
However, I did find this:
Green Party Meeting Today 11/16
6:00 to 8:30 p.m.
Earth Fare
66 Westgate Pkwy, Asheville, North Carolina 28806
ETA:
This site gives you email addresses for people in the Green Party of Charlotte:
http://www.charlottegreens.org/contact.html
Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.
South Carolina is ahead of New York!!
Who would have thunk?
Go South Carolinians! Please report back about the meeting if you are able to attend.
Mary Bennett
Dear jordan,
I don't do FB either.
About gardening, I do what I can in my own yard and dare anyone to come after me. I politely requested my new neighbors to please not spray chemicals onto my plants--roses cannot tolerate herbicide--and was pleasantly surprised to have them assure me that "We don't use any of that stuff". They have dogs and don't want to poison the pets.
The major GMO crops right now are corn, soybeans, canola, sugar beets and cotton. There was a lawsuit against Monsanto and its practice of suing innocent farmers. The suit went all the way to the Supremes, which essentially ruled in favor of Monsatan, after that company made "an undertaking" to not sue farmers whose crops had been inadvertently pollinated by GMO pollen.
Mary Bennett
So many people think they're either...
Going to be the HERO, or have the hero step in to save them.
Nobody wants to be the grunt who does the work. Unfortunately, that's what we need if we're going to make the Greens a real party. We've got a lot of good officers who have great ideas, but damn few sergeants.
We need folks going around, and NOT just in the nice liberal areas. We need folks who are willing to talk to their neighbors, even if they're the token liberal in the red area, who never gets the respect. Because while everybody else remembers how Trump got elected, (Endless Media Attention) they forget that it also involved a LOT of one-on-one conversations, and people stating in private that they were going to vote for him. Because stating it publicly was verboten by the chattering classes.
I do not pretend I know what I do not know.
I believe the existence of the Green Party
…makes the world a better place. Within the domestic sphere of the United States, their policies address fundamental issues that will determine the quality of lives for Americans in the immediate future. It's a zero sum game. There is no neutral. If it is not getting better, it is getting worse.
Sadly, I am a reductionist. I recognize only one fundamental opponent in planetary matters at the human scale, and that is "time." Everything we aspire to is a game of Beat the Clock. Humans have dreams and aspirations that require consistent effort for a span of time that tends to exceed their lifespan. All planetary-level aspirations require contiguous efforts across several lifespans. This, then, defines the battlefield. It is the only real battlefield for the Green Party.
The Green Party, unaware of their battlefield, is fighting skirmishes rather than the root cause of the main war. Almost all of their primary opponents, like the one you mention — big ag — pops into existence because of a great planetary need. In the case of big ag and its satellites Monsanto et al, they exist because the planet is massively, crushingly, obscenely overpopulated with humans; overpopulated beyond any sane scale of sustainability.
Now one would assume that the Green Party — which has the most essential aspiration for basic survivability in the near future for the human species — would devote all their efforts to defeat their greatest opponent. In this case, that would be overpopulation. Everything else is a mere effect or symptom; a distraction. But one would be wrong. Perhaps the Green Party exists for a different, secret reason that has not been revealed to the public. I see no other explanation for avoiding the root causes of battle they fight.
As a reductionist, I see only two logical and responsible strategies to victory:
1. Develop a program for massive global depopulation through human attrition and limited reproduction, leading to sustainability. The current big ag opponents of the Green Party would be wiped off the battlefield because their desperate markets would cease to exist.
2. Extend the human lifespan two to three times in length so that people experience the consequences of their planetary actions. They, then, will have the time to see a solution in action, and can see it through to completion.
There are political/scientific movements working on both of these very doable solutions right now. Everything else is denial, which leads to dystopia and extinction.
But as I said at the top, the Green Party could be the vehicle that saves the day because they hold the one true universal vision for humankind. Their strength is in using their resources to promote and hold that vision, until someone brings them the solution and points them to the actual battlefield.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
Pluto's Republic,
you have noticed that birth rates are falling, worldwide, have you not?
Mary Bennett
Falling birth rates does not stop the growth
…of the massive overpopulation. The statistic is a wonderful envelope of denial for the Green Party, however. Although it is completely intellectually dishonest, few will ever see the truth of it, or ever realize this specific problem and the solutions were known since the eighteenth century. There was apparently a religious conflict....
In many regards, the tacit obscurity is a kindness. The sentient species on this planet simply could not control their animal natures. Not even to save themselves.
The earth would need to eliminate billions at this very moment to enter sustainability. Humans would need a highly negative birth rate, immediately, to begin moving in that direction. And even that is an act of faith, because mathematically it would take too long to stop the starvation extinction from runaway drought. Thus, the frenzied market for turning farming into a potentially poisonous genetic monster will continue at an ever faster pace.
This sort of self-imposed continuity failure happens billions of times on billions of planets to sentient species who gain technology before they gain evolutionary consciousness. Perhaps it's the way nature is designed to work.
____________________
The political system is what it is because the People are who they are. — Plato
We need to achieve a sustainable economy as soon as possible
The Green Party can play a leading role in highlighting and prioritizing the issues. As global warming gets worse, more and more people are starting to pay attention. There are other issues; GMOs, transparent product information, plastic pollution in the oceans, etc. I am all for it.
As far as the Green Party playing a role in the government, it will take things like electoral college reform, a more intense grassroots movement, a platform like Bernie, leadership and more.
I will become more involved with the Green Party (don't like the Dem party) and see what happens.
Off to get some green tea.
The political revolution continues
Thank you for that.
Not all of us are activists, takes all kinds and all that, but we can all vote. The way you grow a new party is vote for it.
Mary Bennett
Good essay and comments
My parents had a dairy farm on 80 acres in Iowa. Though we never had frills and toys, they earned enough to send 5 kids to college and die without debt. My siblings and I still own it and rent the land to our neighbor who with his brother farm thousands of acres. Like stated above it is the only way a traditional farmer makes it.
Where I live in Texas there are massive thousand acre farms, but nothing to eat. With the exception of maybe winter wheat, none of the crops are for human consumption. IMO big ag is going to implode soon.
I am serious about finding a place to put up a big sign that says "Green Party of Navarro County" with a phone number. Just in the window of some deserted office with fairly good visibility. Worry about connecting with the actual green party later. If we could gather a group of folks . . . then do some greenish good deed once a month and publicize it.
Of course I was serious in August about setting up a website that reviewed candidates by progressive values. Setting up the website was easy. The idea blew up quickly when I started researching local, state, and federal candidates for my area. There was no one to recommend! Every candidate from every party sucked (I couldn't find state and local greens at that point). Fortunately, by election day I discovered greens on the ballot to vote for.
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
Sounds like a plan, Marilyn.
There was a guy, Tom Whately I believe, supported by Blue America and ignored by the DCCC, who made a very good showing against an entrenched Republican. Are you in his House district?
Mary Bennett
The Green Party of Texas
can be reached by mail:
Green Party of Texas
P.O. Box 271080
Houston, TX 77277-1080
Telephone: (512) 551-0310
or on the internet at
http://www.txgreens.org/contact_form
Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.
Thanks!!
Going to that contact form now . . .
Marilyn
"Make dirt, not war." eyo
Thanks featheredsprite!
How is your local these days?
"there's something so especially sadistic about waving the flag of a country that you're actively destroying" -- Aaron Mate
It has more energy than I expected
for something just starting out. We'll see.
Thanks for asking.
Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.
We were healthier in
the '50s, '60s and '70s. No fatties. Well, damn fewer fatties. 50-somethings weren't riding the Safeway aisles in motorized wheelchairs paid for by Medicaid as they do today. "dude, you want to leave that ride for someone that actually needs one?" "punk, my 285 pounds needs one... bite me."
the little things you can do are more valuable than the giant things you can't! - @thanatokephaloides. On Twitter @wink1radio. (-2.1) All about building progressive media.