Wednesday, December 31, 2014
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Saturday, December 27, 2014
What is Farmocalypse Now?
1. "Farmocalypse Now" is the name of my "farm."
I spent a year or so dreaming about buying a piece of land, 5 acres, 10 acres, 20 acres, 50 acres, I wasn't sure. I read about farming, I looked at real estate ... and with the help of my wife, realized that it just wasn't going to happen. Owning two properties, two mortgages, when we really weren't even doing justice to our own home?
So I came the conclusion that this is it: whatever planting I will do, will be on this property, with all its limitations (and HOA, for one thing, so no animals). And maybe the attics can be used as a root cellar, maybe I can hang piece of meat up there, lager some beer ... in the winter?
Also, it made now sense for me age-wise to embark on this task 10 years from now, the physical lbor is hard enough as it is, and it is not going to get any easier.
The time for me to "farm" is now.
2. Then there's also the second meaning, that the current economic/political/monetary/social system in the U.S. (and world?) is approaching its inevitable conclusion (collapse), and it will be helpful to be as self-sufficient as possible when that happens.
I spent a year or so dreaming about buying a piece of land, 5 acres, 10 acres, 20 acres, 50 acres, I wasn't sure. I read about farming, I looked at real estate ... and with the help of my wife, realized that it just wasn't going to happen. Owning two properties, two mortgages, when we really weren't even doing justice to our own home?
So I came the conclusion that this is it: whatever planting I will do, will be on this property, with all its limitations (and HOA, for one thing, so no animals). And maybe the attics can be used as a root cellar, maybe I can hang piece of meat up there, lager some beer ... in the winter?
Also, it made now sense for me age-wise to embark on this task 10 years from now, the physical lbor is hard enough as it is, and it is not going to get any easier.
The time for me to "farm" is now.
2. Then there's also the second meaning, that the current economic/political/monetary/social system in the U.S. (and world?) is approaching its inevitable conclusion (collapse), and it will be helpful to be as self-sufficient as possible when that happens.
Friday, December 26, 2014
Buffalo Bleu Cheese Dip
Pulled a few carrots from the garden, and dipped them into a good dip I bought at Aldi's . Little Salad Bar, Buffalo Bleu Cheese Dip, ingredirents:
soybean oil
cultured nonfat buttermilk
water
aged red peppers
blue cheese
milk
cheese cultures
salt
vinegar
eggs
egg yolks
modified cornstarch
whey powder
onion and garlic powder
dextrose
natural flavors
spice (including ground mustard)
sugar
molasses
corn syrup
tamarind
caramel color
Probably could whip up something like it.
soybean oil
cultured nonfat buttermilk
water
aged red peppers
blue cheese
milk
cheese cultures
salt
vinegar
eggs
egg yolks
modified cornstarch
whey powder
onion and garlic powder
dextrose
natural flavors
spice (including ground mustard)
sugar
molasses
corn syrup
tamarind
caramel color
Probably could whip up something like it.
Agrarian Hypocrisy and the Evils of Distributism by MARK T. MITCHELL
Good to know I'm not alone:
I think the attentive reader will find at FPR a genuine commitment to the ideals of place, limits, and liberty in various configurations. In more concrete terms, this amounts to the promotion of political decentralism, economic localism, and cultural regionalism
... the final arbiter, according to Berry, is not human will but nature itself.
I think the attentive reader will find at FPR a genuine commitment to the ideals of place, limits, and liberty in various configurations. In more concrete terms, this amounts to the promotion of political decentralism, economic localism, and cultural regionalism
... the final arbiter, according to Berry, is not human will but nature itself.
Monday, December 22, 2014
From Yeoman Farmers to Peasants
This aside provides a hint as to why federal New Deal and after policy led to the extinction of small farms:
"The United States does not have roots in peasant culture. In such cultures, attacks by outside forces -- Cossacks, dragoons, bandits -- are met with flight and whimpering of the 'if the czar/doge/elector only knew, he’d surely do something' variety.
But the United States derives from the English yeomanry culture. Yeomen are not peasants. They are independent smallholders jealous of their rights and protective of their property. When pressed, yeomen tend to strike back, as a number of English monarchs learned to their dismay."
This insight helps to explain U.S. immigration and agricultural policy, the goal being to transform the U.S. into a society of peasants, which are dependent on and no threat to our now unlimited federal government. It was not an accident that we went from lots of self-sufficient citizens, to being dependent on government and others for just about everything.
"The United States does not have roots in peasant culture. In such cultures, attacks by outside forces -- Cossacks, dragoons, bandits -- are met with flight and whimpering of the 'if the czar/doge/elector only knew, he’d surely do something' variety.
But the United States derives from the English yeomanry culture. Yeomen are not peasants. They are independent smallholders jealous of their rights and protective of their property. When pressed, yeomen tend to strike back, as a number of English monarchs learned to their dismay."
This insight helps to explain U.S. immigration and agricultural policy, the goal being to transform the U.S. into a society of peasants, which are dependent on and no threat to our now unlimited federal government. It was not an accident that we went from lots of self-sufficient citizens, to being dependent on government and others for just about everything.
Sunday, December 21, 2014
Principles and Assumptions
1. Political control must be returned to local and state governments, as per the U.S. Constitution.
2. Economic control must be returned to local and state communities, as per the U.S. Constitution.
3. The present debt and interest based monetary system, in which a private banking system has the power to create currency out of nothing, lend it, and receive it back with interest, is unjust and cannot be sustained.
4. That the present debt and interest-based, export-based agricultural system, in which plant and animal manure is not returned to the soil, cannot be sustained.
5. The first step to returning to a sustainable agriculture is to return to constitutionally limited government, self-government, and federalism, as per the U.S. Constitution, in which politics (and so economics and agriculture) is under local control. An unlimited federal government, and the unlimited issue of currency as interest-bearing debt, are the real causes of the policies about which those who believe in organic agriculture rightly complain.
2. Economic control must be returned to local and state communities, as per the U.S. Constitution.
3. The present debt and interest based monetary system, in which a private banking system has the power to create currency out of nothing, lend it, and receive it back with interest, is unjust and cannot be sustained.
4. That the present debt and interest-based, export-based agricultural system, in which plant and animal manure is not returned to the soil, cannot be sustained.
5. The first step to returning to a sustainable agriculture is to return to constitutionally limited government, self-government, and federalism, as per the U.S. Constitution, in which politics (and so economics and agriculture) is under local control. An unlimited federal government, and the unlimited issue of currency as interest-bearing debt, are the real causes of the policies about which those who believe in organic agriculture rightly complain.
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