Healthy soil and sustainable growing

[Daniel Conine <dconine@bertramwireless.com>]

The price of grain tied to the price of oil works both ways. If farmers 
plant 30% more grain in anticipation of high oil prices and high demand 
for grain to drive cars, then the reverse can happen if the economy 
crashes and people stop driving cars. The price of grain would crash, too.
The transportation/oil/grain/speculation circle is teetering along with 
the stock market right now: based upon the perception of Perpetual 
Growth. The stock market just went down 300 points because the Fed says 
there is a problem and they will need to lower interest rates. Too late. 
Now we have to start looking at how to get people fed who have no money, 
by a system that is going to be bankrupt (because people aren't working 
because they aren't buying houses because they can't borrow money 
because the price of houses and construction are inflated and there are 
more houses than potatoes), and without half of the oil it used to have 
(because China will use our money to buy what's left of the oil and use 
lots of cheap soldiers and cheap guns to hold on to it).

We will have to rebuild an economy from the land, without oil. I don't 
know why I'm still sitting in front of the computer. I've got a lot of 
work to do now.
(Unless, of course, Dick C lets G.W. reveal the energy secrets they have 
been hiding for 60 years.)

Dan C.
Belgium, WI

> More of US Grain Crop to be Consumed by Family Car
> http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/46428/story.htm
> US: January 16, 2008
>
>
> WASHINGTON - Almost a third of the US grain crop next year may be diverted
> from the family dinner table to the family car as fuel, putting upward
> pressure on food prices, a leading expert warned on Tuesday.
>
>
> Grain prices are near record levels as the United States produces more
> ethanol, now made mostly from corn, to blend with gasoline and stretch
> available motor fuel supplies.
>
> Farmers, hoping to cash in, are expected to grow 30 percent of next year's
> grain crop for ethanol use as more refineries that process corn into fuel
> come online, according to Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy
> Institute and long-time critic of using food grains for fuel.
>
> "The price of grain is now tied to the price of oil," Brown said at the
> Reuters Global Agriculture and Biofuel Summit.