The Threat of Laughing Gas; Salvation in Fake Trees

From Jenna Orkin:

Collapse
Americans’ income slump biggest on record (from Rice Farmer)
Japan jobless at record
Fears for economy Business investment suffers sharpest fall in 44 years. (UK)
Greater Than One in Four FDIC Insured Institutions are Unprofitable; Bank Problem List at 15 Year High
Barney Frank Says Ron Paul's Audit The Fed Bill Will Pass in October
Federal Reserve Says Emergency-Loan Disclosures Would Hurt Banks, Economy
Racketeering 101: Bailed Out Banks Threaten Systemic Collapse If Fed Discloses Information (from Rice Farmer)
Markets In for a Bumpy Ride to a Bottom
California Taxpayers Lose $1 Billion From Unconstitutional Debt Financings
Real Unemployment at 16%
Words "For Lease" Spread Like Chicken Pox
NYC Apartment Rents Drop 7-10 Percent, National Vacancies Highest in 22 Years
Next Real Estate Bust: Office Space
Ben Bernanke "World's Most Dangerous Man"
34 Percent of Workers Have One Week or Less of Savings
Buying into the Rally, Hook, Line, and Sinker
Critically Under-Capitalized Banks Direct Result of "Wonderful Chain of Stupidity"
New Bubble Threatens Global Rebound
Obama Channeling Reagan Needs 5 Quarters of 7% GDP Growth for New Morning
'Obama Should Make Sure Cheney Is Brought to Justice'
9/11 Planner is Recast as Asset for CIA (from Rice Farmer)
German state to act as second crunch looms
German Economy Endangered by End of Rebate Scheme
Wolfgang Joop on the Crisis in the Luxury Industry'I Anticipate Many More Bankruptcies'
UK population hits 61 million
The UK population increased by a record amount last year to top 61 million for the first time, figures revealed today.

Environment/Science
'Fake trees' could fight climate change
When they can synthesize air and water, we'll be home free.
Laughing gas is biggest threat to ozone
Annual cost of climate change 'will be £190bn'
Climate change will cost the world more than £300 billion, say scientists
Measuring the Damage of our 'Water Footprint'
Planet found that defies the laws of physics
Creationist Zoo
The Dawning Age of Mind-Reading Machines

Latest Buzz on Bees

From Jenna Orkin:

Colony Collapse Disorder
Beekeepers lose one fifth of hives (UK)
Vanishing Bees
New Clues in the Mass Death of Bees

Civilization Collapse Disorder
Credit Card Delinquency Wave Reaching Tidal Force
Huge Plunge In Mortgage Cure Rates Portends Foreclosure Disaster
The Next Shoe to Drop in Banking: An Options Strategy
Bernanke's Self-Promotional Reappointment Campaign A Stunning Success
Court Orders Federal Reserve to Disclose $2 Trillion Loan Program Details
Berlin Urges Calm Over Opel Dispute
Reuters The German government sought to calm a growing trans-Atlantic dispute over the fate of carmaker Opel on Monday as unions threatened “spectacular measures” to force a decision by U.S. parent General Motors.
Roubini Says Risk of Double-Dip Global Recession Rising on Exit Strategies
Millions face shrinking Social Security checks
Private Prisons: A Reliable American Growth Industry
‘Peak Oil’ Is a Waste of Energy
New York Times editorial by the same analyst whom Democracy Now! used to debate Julian Darley for their one show on Peak Oil. It will be interesting to see which letters in response they publish.
'Prolonged diapering' revealed as 'enhanced interrogation' technique
UK: Strikes Looming as Disputes Worsen
Britain wary of sting in tail
Britain sleepwalking towards economic misery
Counterfeiting and North Korea

Environment
Native Americans join tar protest
Amazon tribes fear river dams plan
Disaster Looming for Kenya
A Farm on Every Floor (New York Times Op-Ed)

And...
Real Life Decepticons: Robots Learn to Cheat (from Rice Farmer)

The Amount of Water in a Cotton Shirt

From Jenna Orkin:

Collapse
Coming Soon: Banking Crisis of Historic Proportions
Rep. Bachus: "Social Security Could Face Default Within Two Years"
Commentary: Getting ready for the dollar’s fall
Prime Mortgages Are Also Going Sour
Hidden Backlog of Foreclosures
Big banks still hold FDIC captive
FDIC May Add Special Fees on Banks as Mounting Failures Drain Deposit Fund
Manhattan Commercial Real Estate Office Sales Plunge 91%
Pensions' Private-Equity Cash Reduced 59% as Profits Shrink
U.S. Initial Jobless Claims Unexpectedly Rise as Companies Seek Cost Cuts
U.S. postal service could run out of money next month (from Rice Farmer)
Last Week's Insiders Transactions: 10 Buys For $60 Million, 136 Sells For Over $1.15 Billion (from Sebastian Ronin)
Swiss to reveal UBS accounts to settle U.S. tax fight Full Article
UBS to disclose details of 4,450 accounts in US tax evasion case
Swiss Banks Turn to Emerging Markets, Shun Americans as UBS Erodes Secrecy
Guard Troops May Be Needed in Troubled Alabama County (Aug. 4)
Unlike AmEx, Capital One's Defaults Worsening
Bank Lending Standards Tighter, Fed Says
Banks' Problem Loans Keep Growing
Credit Card Defaults Down, But Not All Reasons Are Positive
Crunch victims use anti-stalking laws to challenge 'greedy' banks
One city, 15,000 homeless veterans
Putpockets Give Extra Cash
One way to beef up the tourism industry.
China Launches Defense Website in Transparency Bid
PetroChina in Huge Australia Deal
Japan Youth Fuel Pension Bomb by Shunning Politics Aimed at Old
US troops and drones to deploy to Colombia (from Rice Farmer)
Nigeria Threatens Largest Debtors
Buffett Gets Busy
Buffett says unchecked U.S. debt threatens economy: report
The Greenback Effect, by Warren Buffett
Buffett's Latest: Inflation Forecast
Buffett on the Dollar's Destiny
Buffett: Debt Mountain Could Turn America into a Banana Republic

Tom Ridge: I Was Pressured to Raise Terror Alert to Help Bush Win

From PostCarbon.org:

Got Sustainable Solutions? We Want to Publish Your Story.

As you may know, our Senior Fellow, Richard Heinberg, is widely recognized as one of the world’s foremost educators on the perils of a global oil economy. Right now, Richard is starting his next book about how individuals and communities can build resilience in the face of uncertainty and rapid change caused by economic collapse, peak oil, climate change, and other crises.

In short, this book is about you. So, you see, Richard wants to hear your stories; the stories of what individuals, families and communities are doing to transition to a post-carbon world. Please contact us with your stories. Tell us about your inspirational efforts, or maybe about those of someone you know. Are there any businesses, communities, or families who inspire you? Not only is Richard looking to illuminate these efforts in his new book, but we’d love to feature them on our soon-to-launch, brand spanking new website.While we hate deadlines, publishers seem to derive great joy in imposing them. Meaning we have to your stories by September 18, 2009.e-mail us at: stories@postcarbon.org

Science/Environment
The End of Cheap Water?
...to make a 1 tonne passenger car takes more than 100,000 gallons of water. Just to make a cotton shirt takes over 1,000 gallons of water.
Leaders In Alternative Energy: Germany Turns On World's Biggest Solar Power Project
WHO casts doubt on Tamiflu use
UK Anti-Terror Technology: 007 or 1984? (from Rice Farmer)
Driverless vehicles 'could be on Britain's roads within 10 years'
Rotten algae plagues French coast
Environment Agency launches investigation as algae problem spreads

And...
Russian Gov't Looks To Buy Golden Bed

FDIC Bankrupt

From Jenna Orkin:

What if you threw a 'Going-Out-Of-Business' party and the problem wasn't that nobody came; it was that everyone came only they didn't realize where they were? Would that be the sound of one hand clapping?

Collapse

CoLLapse to Show at Toronto International Film Festival
Collapse Of The "Ownership Society"
As of Friday August 14, 2009, FDIC is Bankrupt
House prices suffer biggest fall this year
Run on the Dollar: What It Could Mean for the Yen
World stock markets slide into red
Global Sell-offs Visit US
Taking Wall Street Advice in Rally Means Owing $6000
CalPERS Admits California "Pension Costs Unsustainable" - So What To Do About It?
U.S. Treasuries Yields - Where To From Here?
Raising the Debt Ceiling - Again
Brace for a Wave of Foreclosures, the Dam is About to Break
Be Prepared for Extraordinary Circumstances
Is a Huge Selloff Coming?
Germany braces for second wave of credit crunch
Six Million British Adults on Benefits
Youth unemployment doubles in Sweden (from Rice Farmer)
Misguided Worries About Inflation
Why This Economic Recovery Is On Such Shaky Ground
Optimism about a recovery starting to fizzle
The U.S. debt bubble: Lessons from Japan
Regulators Were Told of Stanford Fraud, Investors Say
“I feel the U.S. government is responsible for my loss,” Mr. Nelson said, words that earned a standing ovation from the audience of more than 250 Stanford investors in a crowded auditorium.
Worst Performance Ever For Back-To-School Sales
130 million credit card numbers stolen in identity theft scheme
Oil and Copper Double
National Guard drill at high school to prepare for possible H1N1 riot
The above article, submitted by Rice Farmer, anticipates desperate anxiety on the part of the public to get the vaccine. The article below betrays a different take on the issue from a more informed population.
Most nurses unwilling to have swine flu vaccine

Russia/Asia
U.S. Army Will Train Georgians
America's New Air Force
Virtual reality for real.
Prisons to Free Inmates to Do Public Works
At Least 20 Dead in North Caucusus
Britain in Afghanistan 'for another five years'
Who is funding the Afghan Taliban? You don’t want to know (from Rice Farmer)
Potential for water conflict between India and Pakistan (from Rice Farmer)

Africa (from Rice Farmer)
Africa: U.S. Military Holds War Games on Nigeria, Somalia
Clinton Threatens War in Horn of Africa
Polio surge in Nigeria after vaccine virus mutates

Energy/Environment
Anniversary: Drake's Pa. oil well idea changed world in 1859
Environmental Movies Have a Green Problem: Money
New Eating Disorder: Obsession with Healthy Food
90% US Money Laced with Cocaine
Ironic, no?

Whereas

From Jenna Orkin:

Whereas...
150 Banks May Be Pushed to Point of No Return
"Fair Value" Accounting is Horror Flick Monster
The biggest reason that stocks have rallied since March, Wesbury said, is that the House Financial Services Committee forced FASB to loosen its mark-to-market rules. Other reasons for the rally are the easiest monetary policy in the Federal Reserve Board’s 96-year history and the end of panic selling, he said.
Insiders Continue to Sell, Sell, Sell
The Federal Reserve Is Immoral
Did Lehman Save America from a Dollar Collapse?
Stock Market and Monetary Disorder
US repossessions reach record levels
More Asset Bubbles and a Dollar Primed for Collapse

Chinese officials have a funny way of counting. When products are shipped from the factory, for example, they are counted as 'sales' even though no one may actually buy them...

'Green Shoots' Are a Mirage: Economy Will Deteriorate Further
Keep in mind," says The Richebächer Letter's Rob Parenteau, "China needs at least 9% growth to soak up the 24 million new Chinese workers who come of age each year - something even the Chinese Premier doesn't like to mention."
China Exports Down 22%
Shipping Industry Fights for Survival
Recovery Only a Statistician Could Love
Why Is the Fed Buying Treasuries? (from Rice Farmer)
"The fact that the U.S. government needs to resort to such tactics is the clearest indication yet of how close the U.S.'s Ponzi-scheme economy is to total collapse."
Germany's Steinbrück Warns of Return of 'Casino Capitalism'
Local Currencies During Recession

...Whereas all of the above indicates the opposite, we're supposed to believe the economy has turned a corner.

UK
Former head of Britain's biggest credit union declared bankrupt
Bug Resistant to Antibiotics Enters UK
Hospital bugs kill 30,000 people

Russia/Asia
Kremlin Burning Bridges With Every Neighbor
Ex-ISI chief says purpose of new Afghan intell. agency RAMA to "destablize Pakistan"
Costly U.S. campaign expected in Afghanistan (from Rice Farmer)
US losing in Afghanistan, top general admits (from Rice Farmer)
Army Drills to Protect Pipelines
Kalashnikov Maker Stops Production

Environment
Earth's Cycles, Once in Concert, Falling Out of Sync (from Rice Farmer)
Germany's First Offshore Wind Park Goes Online
Can New Growth Save the Amazon Rainforest?
Phew; we can keep destroying it.
Drug Promises Fix for Radiation Poisoning
And we can build more nuclear power plants with a clear conscience too!
Food giants say U.S. running out of sugar
Let them eat Splenda.
Customer Spots Poison Stems in Salad (Germany)

China to Beat Us at Our Own Game; Who'll Get the Last Laugh?

From Jenna Orkin:

US/Global
US Consumer Credit Shows Steepest Contraction in Over 5 Decades
Consumer Bankruptcies in U.S. May Reach 1.4 Million on Job Losses, Credit
Underwater Mortgage Holders Approach 25% as Home Prices Fall, Zillow Says
Deflation Hits Porn Industry, Canadian Grocery Stores, Newspapers, Firefighters, Lawyers, High Tech
A hollow joke during the Depression went: "Once there was a family that was very poor. The father was poor; the mother was poor; the cook was poor; the butler was poor..."
Fed's Proposed Framework for Addressing "Systemic Risk" Misses the Moving Target Government Bailouts and the Stock Market - The Seen and the Unseen
The Market Bubble Is About to Pop
Dismal Unemployment Situation in Chart Form
Banks come up with new tricks (from Rice Farmer)
Who's most likely to secede? (from Rice Farmer)
IATA warns of ‘de-globalisation’; latest traffic casts doubt on the bottoming of air travel declines (from Rice Farmer)
Pathogenic flu 'increases risk of Parkinson's disease'
How Secure Is Our Food Supply?

China
China's Growth an Accounting 'Miracle'
Chinese property sales are up over 60% so far this year, their National Bureau of Statistics proclaimed yesterday. That puts the housing bubble here to shame. We've heard a bunch of nosebleed data points outta there in the last few weeks...check these out:

New loan issuance has tripled in the first half of 2009, to $1.1 trillion. That's more than half of the entire Chinese GDP over the same period. 95% of those loans went to state-owned enterprises or provincial entities. The Shanghai Composite is up 79% year to date, the best major market performance in the world. Stocks on the Shanghai Comp. trade for 35.4 times earnings, double that of the MSCI emerging market's index. M2 money supply rose over 28.5% in the first half. The seven largest bond sales in the world this year were domestic transactions in China.Damn near everything is up dramatically in China in 2009...except exports. Strangely, we don't hear a lot of concern that the backbone of their economy has contracted 23% since this time last year.

Europe/Russia
German Bundesbank Puts Gold Reserves in US (in German)
Polish Government Approves Sale of State Assets to Cover Swollen Deficit
Relative Calm May Be at an End
Villains, Oligarchs and One Beekeeper

Asia
Pakistan's nuclear bases targeted by al-Qaeda
Kuwait becomes net gas importer (from Rice Farmer)
"Direct Overt U.S. Aid and Military Reimbursements to Pakistan, FY2002-FY2010

Environment
Dust clouds sap UAE's solar panels’ power (from Rice Farmer)
A Farming Revolution is Needed
...in British MSM
Almost 100 places in Brittany have toxic seaweed
Global warming causing birds to shrink

Yin/Yang, Economy/Swine Flu

From Jenna Orkin

US/Global Collapse
The FDIC Is in Trouble
...the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation currently covers each dollar on deposit with a trivial 2/10ths of a penny.
Inside Man on the Great Bank Heist (from Rice Farmer)
Hundreds Hurt in 11-Hour California Prison Riot
California Told To Prepare Massive Prisoner Release (from Rice Farmer)
Despite Promises, Downturn Will Hit Coffers of Social Safety Net (Germany)
Worry that Britain risks a Japan-style lost decade
10,000 children suspended for bullying or racial abuse

Military/Intelligence
A Request to Snoop on Public Every 60 Seconds (UK)
C.I.A. Missile Strike May Have Killed Pakistan’s Taliban Leader, Officials Say
U.S. sure Pakistan's Taliban leader is dead
Again. Apparently, reports of Baitullah Messud's death were greatly exaggerated the last two times he was killed.
General Sir David Richards: Afghanistan Will Take Forty Years
Obama adviser rejects 'global war on terror'
Ministers: We cannot eliminate all risk of torture
Ministers' admission links MI5 to 'torture victim'
Twitter Crash Linked to Attack on Georgian Blogger
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Fort Meade
Rio Tinto Accused of Spying by China
Obama Denies US Increasing Military Bases in Colombia
The new security arrangement would allow the Pentagon to lease access to seven Colombian military bases for U.S. support in fighting drug traffickers and guerrillas involved in the cocaine trade.
The agreement would also increase the number of American troops in Colombia above the current total of less than 300 but not more than 800, the maximum permitted under the existing pact.
Ore. Rep. floats mileage fee to replace gas tax
All cars would carry GPS to track miles under Blumenauer bill.

Swine Flu
How Safe Is the Swine Flu Vaccine?
Girl Dies After Swine Flu Misdiagnosis
Interview with Epidemiologist Tom Jefferson: 'A Whole Industry Is Waiting For A Pandemic'
Looks like they'll get it, or a reasonable enough facsimile that they'll reap the benefit anyway:
MPs plan flu vaccination in schools
Obama Team Mulls New Quarantine Regulations (from Rice Farmer)
Healthy People Lying to Get Tamiflu

Energy/Environment
Cloud Ships to Deflect Sun and Allow Us to Keep Polluting
Occupation of Wind Factory Ends
Lab-Burgers Better for the Planet?

And...
Disney version of "Global Corp"

Rock, Paper, Scissors, Germs, Economy

From Jenna Orkin:

Germs
Foreign reports about escape from NW China plague
Thailand Tightens Border Controls Against Pneumonic Plague ‎
VN closely supervises border to prevent plague ‎
Military Poised to Help FEMA Battle Swine Flu Outbreak(from Rice Farmer)
Judge: Swine Flu Reason to Suspend Constitutional Rights (from Rice Farmer)
Whisky: a cure for swine flu, and so much more
Mandatory anthrax vaccinations raise concerns (from Rice Farmer)

Economic Collapse
Why Another Stock Market Collapse Could Be Imminent
The Dollar's Continued Decline: Unintended Consequences
Federal Tax Revenues Suffer Biggest Drop Since Great Depression
Office Volume Down 50% to 91%
Joblessness up in 90 percent of metro areas (from Rice Farmer)
Wages and Salaries Fell 4.7%, Most On Record
Infrastructure Spending Seen Set to Fall in 2009 Despite Stimulus (from Rice Farmer)
Global GDP Rebound Is Underway, But Who's The Buyer?
UK: Negative Interest Rates?
Britain's value falls 2pc

Russia/Central Asia
Georgia Says Russia Making New Border
Georgian Peace Key to Pipelines
South Stream Gets Assent From Turkey
One-Third of Russian Clothing Retailers Going Bust, European Exporters Say
Russia: Clinic Left in the Cold By New Timber Rules
Putin’s Popularity Not Oil Dependent

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Absolute Zero
Big Bang Collider to Restart with Less Energy
Charles Saint-Ange Thilorier, the first to freeze carbon dioxide into dry ice, ran an experiment that resulted in an assistant losing both legs. In 1886, James Dewar’s laboratory went up. Dewar himself . . . was nearly killed.” Frostbite’s for kittens...
At Harvard, in 1999, a beam of light fired into a Bose-Einstein condensate slowed from 670,616, 629 miles per hour to 38 miles per hour. In a later experiment, it stopped dead. Cool.

And...
New hive that's causing a buzz
"Buzzy" Krongard and Blackwater
Banks May Be Added as Defendants in Madoff Suit: N.Y. Post Link
Fewer Germans in the Future?
Barack Obama faces 30 death threats a day, stretching US Secret Service
Thousands Exposed to 9/11 Fallout Now Have Asthma
Secret Report: Ground Zero Construction Lags; Slated for 2018
Royal Mint doubles production of gold coins

Out of the Mouth of the IEA

From Jenna Orkin

Collapse
IEA Warning: Oil Supplies Are Running Out Fast
U.S. commercial mortgage delinquencies jump 585% (from Rice Farmer)
1 Month, 24 Bank Failures: Random Event or Wilting Economy?
China: U.S. must manage dollar supply
Weekly Unemployment Claims Portend Disaster
Free Money Runs Out, Congress Authorizes More
Air Safety Plunges in First Half of 2009
Such a graphic verb, given the subject.
Wall Street Profits from Trades with Feds
75% Favor Auditing The Fed; Fed Job Approval Rating Lower Than IRS
Arizona May Sell State Capitol Building To Balance Budget
Toxic asset insurance slows recovery
Agencies to Set Up Mass Swine Flu Vaccinations (from Rice Farmer)
Far Right Warning: Neo-Nazi Threat Growing Despite NPD Cash Woes
Southern Migration Spikes Power Usage
Electrical Demand Plunges in Ontario, Canada; US Demand Expected to Drop 2%

Intelligence/Defense
Hackers attack MI5 website
Secrets of CIA "Ghost Flights" To Be Revealed (from Rice Farmer)
Microwave Weapon Will Rain Pain from the Sky (from Rice Farmer)

Africa
Foreign Investors Snap Up African Farmland

Russia/Asia
Russia: State Weapons Firm Executive Shot
Tajikistan Moves to Ban Russian Language
Kyrgyz Candidate Condemns Vote as Fraudulent
Pakistan Consumed by Violence as Taliban Power Grows.
Bankruptcy Laws To Be Overhauled
A Failure of State and Military in Afghanistan

Relationships in the Time of Collapse
Brothel Usage Down 30%
China's concubine culture is back
Big spenders tend to marry big savers, researchers find
Are these the marriages that last or the ones that get divorced? And whom should the US marry next, given the dicey state of our marriage to China?

New film by the makers of CoLLapse

From Secrecy News:

In 2005, the National Security Agency released a partially declassified (pdf) 1952 history of communications intelligence prior to Pearl Harbor with several passages censored. But this month, the NSA released the complete text (pdf) of the document after the Interagency Security Classification Appeals Panel (ISCAP) determined that there was no justification for continued classification of the withheld portions...The new disclosure illustrates once again the efficacy of the ISCAP in overcoming the reflexive secrecy of executive branch agencies, including those that are represented on the ISCAP itself. More often than not, the ISCAP has released information that one of its own member agencies said must remain classified.

Sustainable Blather

Scott McGuire

For most of my grown life I’ve been a plant person; farmer, gardener, tree-planter, landscaper… and for quite a while now have been beating the sustainable-living drum as a “food-supply activist”. For the past few years, in addition to growing a backyard demonstration garden (www.greentownaction.tv/sustainable-garden), I’ve been teaching classes on plant-craft, as well as going to meetings and organizing activities like the Neighborhood Garden Project, matching folks wanting to expand their gardens with others without any space for one. The Transition Towns movement is well underway in our small Oregon town, which is quickly becoming a haven for retirees and other equity immigrants from California.

But I’m burnt out on all the blah-blah. Sometime last spring I stopped going to these kinds of meetings due to the lack of focus and distracting blather that never seems to get grounded in any compounding action (oh, and it was also time to sow seeds, so seeya). One symptom of denial around the immensity of the changes required/pending, is the invisible goo that fills a room causing everyone to think and move as if they were underwater, or in a dream where you can’t run away fast enough or find where you left your backpack… It’s absolutely surreal, the effective slow-motionizing of cognitive dissonance.

Some of the suggestions for action steps, coming from otherwise intelligent and informed people, I find either unworkable or outright absurd; I’m drawn into conversations I’ve concluded years ago, which is frustrating and useless and costs a baby-sitter. Here’s an example:

If neighborhood gardens could become a retail business I think that more people would have the incentive to spend their time and effort to make more neighborhood gardens happen.

The idea is that with promotion and education 'lawn care' professionals could become market gardeners. Are there city regulations that would make this difficult?

I would love to see a meeting organized with lawn care professional and gardeners to see if there was any consensus that produce production could be profitable.

And another:

I suggest that we design and implement The Ashland Front/Back-Yard & Community Edible Gardens Project (ACEGP).

I'm talking about a very focused project: to accomplish a 5-year goal of utilizing 30% of existing front-yards, back-yards, vacant lots, a larger portion of neighborhood parks, every school campus, and businesses with the space, to implement organic methods for edible plant gardening. And, have a longer-term goal to reach 80% by 2020.

First of all, I can’t muster much respect for “lawn care professionals” otherwise known as mow-blow-and-go guys. Setting aside my personal political prejudices is difficult, because for over three decades of doing landscaping projects as well as “maintenance” work (some weekly m-b-g), I’ve been continually under-cut in the bidding by illegal immigrant “landscapers” who know very little about plants and basic English, but can sure wail those small, loud 2-stroke engines. Yet these idiots get hired by the Wal-Mart minds of even the wealthiest, conscious townies, neither of whom will ever call each other neighbors (but they have so much in common!). And of course the work is seasonal, while the bills aren’t. Trying to support a family from this scenario leaves a sour taste. Time for something new!

It is not an exaggeration to say that lawn care horticulture is utterly saturated in the repugnant toxicities of the worst chemicals ever cooked up to make a profit. Chemicals exist to replace work (herbicides; weed-pulling, ferticides; composting, etc.). No such thing as soil-building, recycling nutrients, or deep digging in the perverted universe of ToxoLawnChemGreenCorp. Educating these guys about organic food growing when they can’t read the labels on their own buckets of poison is definitely the long way home.

There are a zillion regulations in every jurisdiction that hinder making money off your back-yard. Business license? Sanitation? Worker’s Compensation? Parking? These are off the top of my head, there are surely more, and are all possible hurdles to bureaucratic legitimacy. Just try to cut down an ornamental shade tree for more sunshine for food growing. The Tree Commission will crawl up your alley and slap you with a big fine faster than you can say “persimmon”.
I believe that the one most effective thing our city could do to promote backyard food production is to create parity within the water billing. If your property sprouts nothing but worthless shrubs and lawns, you pay the top rate. Demonstrate a substantial transition to edibles and receive a discount. The devil’s in the details as always, and spirals back to a core revenue glitch: the City needs the receipts from the water usage to function. How do we incentivize home food production without choking the flow of dollars back to the City?

Now who actually owns all those nice lawns? The people who live behind them? Not always. Not even mostly. It’s my impression that owner/residents are the minority, and that at least half the homes in town are rentals, or possessed by an absentee owner. Insert the Property Management Company into the equation, many of whom operate their own Mow Blow and Go divisions to make another cut off the properties they manage.

Most homeowners simply want to maintain their market value without a hassle (good luck with that). Who wants the garden? Often it’s the renter, who in these days of depressed home sales and increased availability of rentals might actually have some clout, as in, “let me make a garden here, or I’ll rent somewhere else”. Yet most rational renters are justifiably hesitant to invest tons of work and manure into a place they could be asked to vacate within a single cycle of the moon.

A lot of homeowners have not yet figured out that a garden might actually increase the appeal of their house for sale. Even so, in growing numbers are the home/owner/dwellers who in order to grow their own food either must be able to afford the moderate expense of hiring someone with the skills, tools and muscle to help (that’s me!), or face a much more expensive and steep learning curve with fresh blisters and too many trips to the rental yard.

Maybe one solution is to start an alternative landscape company, offer to take over existing contracts, rip out the junk and plant food. Could this company make money doing this for the same amount, trading chemicals for the serious labor and know-how required? I’m not reaching for a pencil and calculator right now, but someone else just might…

Besides, how much money is made from growing food in the first place? These days, based on the cheap chemicals, cheap gas and massive cheap transportation, not much. Food’s pretty cheap for what you get, staying alive and all. Sometimes really good food fetches dollars per pound, but it’s mostly still cents, two digits on the wrong side of the decimal.

Next door, the neighbors are calibrating their checkbooks with a scale that matches their participation in the real estate market/investment realm of dollars, 5 or 6 digits way over on the other side of the decimal and much closer to the dollar sign. As long as property is valued according to “dollars per square foot”, how will cents-worth of food ever compete in the same market for the same grid of earth-space? These two economies of scale may as well be on different planets.

Food will become precious again when the true value of a meal re-asserts itself in the minds and bellies of our neighbors. When the Centralized Machine of Big Ag begins to creak and croak from all of this not being so cheap anymore, we’ll begin to snap out of our complacent grocery store trance and recall the deep worth of a dependable local food supply. Blink, blink, where are all the farmers?

Of course, we can all grow more food in our backyards to share the value of its nutrition and goodwill bonding, without requiring that it make us a buck. The simplest tried-and-true formula for community building has always been Feed One Another. What is the point of “community building games and exercises” without a food supply? No food, no community, because everyone has left to go where they think the food might be.

Even if a household couldn’t make decent money (what a concept) from growing food, it could offset some material costs like I’m doing this year with a garden CSA or CSG where I feed 7 households for 5-6 months for less than $20 per share per week. This isn’t enough dollars to make a big impact on a modern household budget, and only makes sense if the household is already mad enough to grow significant amounts of food for themselves anyway.

In my case, this small group serves to absorb the excess produce and cover some expenses. But unlike most tiny city lots, I’m in an old farmhouse with 2/3’s of an acre and a well for the gardens, so no water bill for growing, only household use. Still, more and more versions of home production could expand this niche, somewhere between community gardens and farm CSAs.
But if you want to make some money in your backyard, get a medical marijuana card and grow six plants. You’ll make thousands, enough to invest in local agriculture in any way you see fit. I’m not kidding. Of course, this is recommended only if you’re fortunate enough to live in one of the 15 states (and rising) that have passed such sensible legislation that challenges the rapidly eroding federal Prohibition. In the process we’ll be un-demonizing one of the most useful agricultural plants ever to exist, because we’ll need fibers and oils as much as foods when we finally take stock for ourselves. (And a little safe plant medicine can’t hurt as much as Big Pharma’s billion dollar mind-numbing boondoggle…).

And then it comes down to the biggest hurdle, the re-skilling. Who really knows how to do any of this food production stuff? Within the general population, about the same percentage as locally grown food itself; 5-10% at best. The vast majority is clueless, and without a clue they need to get a clue. This is the true bottleneck when awareness finally turns.

I’ve spoken at length with our mayor (who was elected on a sustainability platform) about an educational farm facility, cutting out some Parks Dept. land to develop an ongoing learning center. Because truth is, even the best class or workshop is woefully inadequate, being only a slice. The essence of plant-craft is not only knowing what to do, but when to do it. Timing is everything, and learners need a seasonal context into which they can grow a consolidated understanding of how all the pieces fit together.

This would become a destination place, where locals and visitors spend dollars to learn Big Sustainable Skills. This would be an excellent project for the Transition Towns movement, as it blends many an agenda into a purposeful creation that is both achievable and politically possible right now.

The number of backyard food gardens is growing, and will continue to increase, although in increments necessarily defined by the growing season itself. People can decide to grow their own any time, but that decision can only be applied during the next turn around the sun. Living on plant time requires a deep personal commitment, because it’s so at odds with cubicle time. Getting “the public” to focus on “projects” (ACEGP above) is like herding cats, but a shining beautiful farm for teaching will draw and inspire and educate at once. And it might just break even before all the banks are broken.

When the City Parks Dept. starts ripping out ornamentals for edibles, citizens will do the same. (Or is it the other way around?). Then we can start in on the School District (which I believe has more farmable land and water rights than the City), kick out the venal corporate nugget-pusher currently holding the cafeteria contract, and start feeding our own children our own food. Then get the re-skilling into the curriculum, and boot the little buggers out into the field!

Just kidding. Once the kids know how to grow it, we’ll be on our way to hopeful.

Scott McGuire is an organic farming and permaculture master based in Ashland, Oregon.
**************************************************************************
From Jenna Orkin:

US/Economic Collapse
Incredible Shrinking Boomer Economy
Geithner Assures a `Concerned' China the U.S. Will Shrink Record Deficit
"Concerned" is the new, "scared out of our gourds."
Real Treasury Yields Highest In History
U.S. to conduct record long-dated Treasury sales -- $115 billion (from Rice Farmer)
But China's still concerned:
China to hasten dollar dump to buy resources, energy (from Rice Farmer)
June U-6 Unemployment Rate Topped 20% (25% SGS) in Michigan, Oregon, Nevada, California, South Carolina and Rhode Island
U.S. Jobless Claims Rise More Than Expected
States Where the Unemployed Are Giving Up (from Rice Farmer)
Caterpillar: Second Quarter Down 66%
Foreign cash for U.S. jobs
Reappoint Him
Roubini endorses Bernanke.
U.S. Home Vacancies Hit 18.7 Million; What's the Real Story?
Detroit Heads For Bankruptcy; 50 Cities Must "Shrink to Survive"
Hotel Hell - Luxury Hotels Foreclosed
UN Group Gets Look at Post-Katrina Housing Woes
US prepares major terrorism readiness exercise (from Rice Farmer)
High Frequency Trading and Goldman Sachs
Goldman Sachs Says Attempts to Reduce Speculation Could Disrupt Markets
Video: We Now Have A Total Gangster Government (from Rice Farmer)
And if no government, we'll still have gangsters:
GOP Candidate: If We Lose Elections, We Still Have Guns (from Rice Farmer)
Dow Chemical Loses $486M In Q2
Short Range Missiles Biggest Threat

Swine Flu
Swine flu cases doubled to 100,000 in one week
Who should get the swine flu vaccine?

Energy/Environment/Science
Hydrocarbons in the Deep Earth
Can the Military Find the Answer to Alternative Energy? (from Rice Farmer)
"The U.S. forces deployed in Afghanistan and Iraq are voracious consumers of energy. As a result they have become perilously dependent on long, costly, and vulnerable convoys of diesel-fuel tankers. More vehicles are used to transport and guard the fuel than are deployed in actual combat."
World temperatures set for record highs
World Will Warm Faster Than Predicted in Next Five Years, Study Warns
Insects to be brought in to control Japanese Knotweed
Swiss Scientists Aim to Create Synthetic Brain Within Decade

Europe
Jobless Youth: Will Europe's Gen Y Be Lost?
The Pain in Spain: Recession Hits Hard
Drawing up the Drawbridges: Europe Falls Out of Love with Labor Migration
Counterfeiters Target the Euro
Defiance as Pound Crashes: Brits Own Up to Euro-Phobia
Massive Fraud in France: Societe Generale Hit By €4.9 Billion Crime
The Banks that Wouldn't Lend: Experts Warn of New Credit Crunch in Germany
Put the Champagne Away: Too Soon for Optimism on German Economy, Survey Reveals Criticism Grows Over Banking Data Deal
Germans Hoarding Traditional Light Bulbs

China:
New 1 Plus 1 Child Policy