16 Comments so far

1. bahippie March 9th, 2007 2:07 pm

   Just yesterday Common Dreams ran an article about how wonderful ethanol made from sugar cane was in Cuba and Venezuela, since it didn’t use food crops. (The link seems to have vanished now.) Today ethanol made in Brazil is exploitive and downright evil. I realize labor and economic practices are greatly divergent, but the liberal bias here is appalling. Don’t get me wrong, I’m a true tie-died-in-the-wool liberal tree hugger myself, but I can’t stand propaganda no matter which way it leans. Ethanol is not particularly good for anybody, whether it’s made by communists or capitalists. There are better, less polluting and resource depleting ways to harvest sunlight. I am so sick and tired of media spin, even if it is from “my side”. B A Hippie

2. commonwealth1234 March 10th, 2007 1:27 am

   Communists. Capitalists. What’s the difference when it comes to staying on the subject of land? Not much. Communists can’t leave tools and factories in the hands of capitalists for long enough to engage just ordinary, quasi-informed folk in a discussion about land, independent of capital. And capitalists vociferously conflate property right in stuff made by people with property right in ownership of land such that you’d think there was no difference.

   My, my, my. Now what if both sorts of folks would come tothe table and agree “we’re only going to take about land for the next half hour?”

   Who made land? Did nature decree it to be privatable? Aren’t those human laws that say the rent of land belongs to the owner of land? What if land remained nominally private but the rent of land were treated as a public revenue? In such case would anything be taken from the owner of land which he had made? In such case would workers of and on land be exploited when they paid land rent, seeing that the land rent went for public goods such as schools, roads, health care?

   This might not satisfy the socialists. It certainly wouldn’t please the capitalists. But they could both agree on this much: existentially speaking, land is distinguishable from capital.

   The ironic inconsistency of thought which bahippie noted above in yesterday’s “ethanol good,” today’s “ethanol bad,” gets some intellectual resolution when the land dimension of the story is clarified.

3. rtdrury March 10th, 2007 3:36 am

   Evidence is overwhelming that small enterprises are far more efficient than large enterprises, and deliver the social, political and economic equity.

   Efficiency is needed in biofuels production to minimze the amount of land needed. Responsible public policy is to allocate the land in small parcels to independent small farmers who interplant species for ecological stability, avoid synthetic imputs, and are allocated a share of the local market.

   Global shipping of commodities such as ethanol, grain, etc, is pure nonsense. That’s laissez-faire capitalism producing nothing but wealth for itself, at the expense of “people and planet”. Efficiency requires shipping of commodities be limited to 100 to 200 miles.

   Migrant workers must not be employed anywhere. One of the fundamental goals has to be the banning of the plantation and instead permanent allocate the land and the local market to the small independent farmer.

   The fuel consumer may contract with the local small farmer. Store a year’s supply in a 250 gal. tank in the garage.

   Ethanol crop harvest is very energy/labor intensive. Biodiesel production/processing has about half the cost of ethanol, and the ecological benefits of biodiesel crops are much better.

   Biofuels cannot sustain expansion of US consumption patterns around the world. With a heftly consumption tax, efficient transport becomes marketable and may be fueled with biofuels.

   It’s the people’s responsibility to maintain these policies – land and market allocation to independent, small local enterprises, ban on consolidation of production & markets, consumption tax to drive efficiencies, and ecologically sound production.

4. awaitingthefall March 11th, 2007 4:02 am

   I guess we may soon see accelerated defoliation of the Amazon rainforest so that Brazil will be able to meet future export quotas of ethanol to feed the free-wheeling American motorists.

   I would assume as well that today’s American rural poor will be tomorrow’s home-grown “corn cutters” should the debt-burdened and flagging U.S. economy offer no other alternatives. Will there be an “ethanol bubble” to replace the housing bubble?

   As usual under the current presidential regime that has mesmerized a sleepwalking American public, everything Bush touches has bleak future prospects for everyone but those select few who will profit grotesquely.

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