In Defense of the Passionate Argument

Thank you, Liz, for posting.  It is your comments that inspired this post.  I hope that I won't offend you with my further comments.  This is the closest I've ever gotten to a real discussion of these issues.

Liz is a blogger.  (She writes about farm life, but she is a politically-energized mom as well as a farmer.  You'll find her blog, if you're interested, at http://iafarmwife.com/.)   In researching an earlier post I ran across her blog and became one of her "followers."  In some ways, her writing is a balm to my occasional bouts of homesickness, when I'm mired in the political drama that envelopes me here in Michigan.  When I read about pickling a cow tongue, I feel a little closer to home.  I come from the folk that pickled everything, you know.  Even watermelon rinds.  I come from the folk that don't throw anything away, ever.  The anti-consumption element - that's rural America, where the memory of the Great Depression lives on through the self-sufficiency and thrift of its people.  We didn't recycle, but then we didn't waste, either.   We had the first two R's down pat; if you do the first two, you don't need the third.)* 

It is true that I will blog with passion and emotion.  However, those things do not necessarily exclude logic.  They are necessary to any endeavor.   And it is because of my passion that you can trust my intent.  Don't hesitate to correct me when I might be wrong about something.  While I wish I understood it all, I know that I don't.  If you're knowledgeable, share it.

It's Not Sustainable, it's unjust, it's immoral . . .

Grab your coffee . . . this is long.  If you don't have a lot of time, just read the first link!

My goal here is not to impress my ideas upon you so much as to share with you the cogently and / or eloquently stated ideas of others.  The words of Vandana Shiva, which you will hear upon clicking the link below, fall into the category of both.  (We'll get to my ideas, less cogent and less eloquent, a little later.)  Give her a listen.

http://youtu.be/vi1FTCzDSck

If you're a follower of such things, then you already know the damage that Monsanto has done in India.  Google India and farmer suicides and you'll have all sorts to read about. 

Must-See TV for Sick People

Okay, so it's not really TV - it's a movie. A documentary movie.  I would rather watch a good documentary than anything else, as you've all probably figured out.  But this one is so enlightening on many levels.  The FDA and others have fought relentlessly against the use of this antineoplaston therapy, and the movie is about the battle fought (and won, not by the FDA but by Dr. Burzynski.)

I suspect that this movie won't be widely available in rental chains.  So tonight's the night.

While you watch, keep one thing in the back of your mind.

Pathways.

Here's the link:

http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articlewwws/archive/2011/06/11/b
urzynski-the-movie.aspx