Eutrapelian LandMinds: Letters to the Editors of Local Papers Regarding Local Issues and Current Affairs

 

 

Eutrapelian LandMinds

Warren Wind Farm: The Fix Is In

In his book, The Careless Society, John McKnight has written that "revolutions begin when people who are defined as a problem achieve the power to define the problem." When the Warren School Board voted to abate three years' worth of taxes to assure the construction of a huge wind farm, the residents of Warren were in effect defined as a problem. This sad fact was established by the Board when it opted to only allow public comment rather than public debate. Then and there, it became clear that the (quick) fix was in, and the time for any questioning, let alone organized opposition, had long passed. The outside pressure to vote for the abatement proved too strong, and the perks--including some possible conflicts of interest involving Board members--too enticing to beg abstention. And just like that, the future of the Warren School District was put in jeopardy, along with that of the town, for the sake of becoming de facto guinea pigs for an economic and social health experiment. With public leadership like this, it may well be time for the people of Warren to consult Webster's and then break out the pitchforks. 

(Published in The Flash, 6/2009)

Nothing Conservative About It

Leave it to a Republican to hasten the the demise of conservatism in our county....

Joel Salatin, a self-described "dirt farmer" and a man of many admirable qualities in addition to that one, has noted that "[o]ne of the greatest assets of a farm is the sheer ecstacy of life." Contrast that feeling with the comments of Jim Sacia, one of the many "hollow men" (and women) who seem to believe that genuflection at the altar of the marketplace is all that is needed to rationalize and eventually justify any agricultural policy peddled by the likes of the Farm Bureau. Thus, ten large factory farms preferable to a hundred family farms. Neglected by these same champions of the "free market" is any mention of the benefits current farm policy has for "big government": ten large factory farms are a good deal easier to regulate (and potentially fine or penalize) than a hundred family farms. Moreover, any fine, say, for a manure violation is a petty annoyance for the operator of a ten-thousand head dairy; for a small, family-run operation, it can bring on its demise.

There is nothing conservative about hastening the demise of family farms. There is nothing conservative about the embracing of efficiency to the detriment of a cultural institution that has kept the worst tendencies of the market and the state in check. There is nothing conservative about a Republican Party that offers the likes of Sacia, Bivens and Manzullo as its representatives to the people. Better to fight for an end to the timocracy, and trust not in its princes. 

Letter Distributed to Supporters of the Mega-Dairy

I am writing to thank you for your continuing support of farming in Jo Daviess County. By backing the Bos Dairy proposed for Nora Township, you signal a desire and willingness to prostrate yourself before the powerful forces that currently guide and dominate American agriculture. Clearly, you recognize and understand the relationship government and business must maintain for both sides to profit. Large dairy operations are simply easier to monitor and regulate because they are fewer in number. The fewer dairies that regulating agencies have to bother with, the fewer the number of agents that will be needed to bother with them. Government overhead is reduced, and the visits to farm operations are minimized and their management is thus easier to surveil. Fewer surprises at local facilities will aid in keeping fines for manure, chemical and employment violations to a minimum. 

What is currently needed, however, is a data base that would input any and all information related to regulatory violations by smaller farm operations. Once compiled, arguably industrial agriculture's least-valued members of its community, could then come under the same scrutiny as larger ones. Willing partners could also then be enticed to provide tips to a violation hotline, anonymously reporting any and all incidents of concern, with the end game being market consolidation and the centralization of power. 

Any further discussion and/or inquiries should be brought to the attention of Mr. Saul Versaille c/o ART.neg.INK

Eutrapelian LandMinds: Letters to the Editor on the Matter of the Proposed Nora Mega-Dairy

 

Eutrapelian LandMinds

LTEs on the Matter of the Mega-Dairy

Ag-Ignorance Ain't Bliss

The late Philip Rieff has noted "[t]hat the propertied classes, their lawyers and editorial writers, are self-interested, which is not the same as conservative." Similarly, there is seldom anything remotely conservative about anything labeling itself "traditional." This is particularly the case when it comes to "Traditions Investments, LLC."; i.e.,  the actual name for the proposed mega-dairy deemed viable by Judge Ward.

Despite whatever images that readily come to mind regarding "the countryside," acres of manure-filled lagoons and warehouses filled with large mammals could hardly be thought of as bucolic. Yet this is the imagery the livestock industry trades in and feed its "ag-ignorant" audiences. Or if red barns and happy cows grazing in green pastures doesn't cut it, the high-tech showcases are offered, highlighting the advances industrial agriculture has made--dutifully ignoring the growing safety and health concerns that seem to be part and parcel of ever-larger operations.

Worse, perhaps, is how so many local civic and business leaders--often one and the same!--sign off on permitting such obvious detriments to their communities. Clandestine investors? Ego enhancements? Short-term gain for long-term pain? Rieff has also commented that our culture is "constituted by its endless transitionality" and our leaders "have learned to want it that way."

Unfortunately, even Warren and Nora's self-styled elites, perhaps Mr. Bos's "strangest of bedfellows," will have nowhere to run when their neighbor's limited liability enterprise "transitions" their little utopian dreams of progress and profit into dystopian twin nightmares of aquifer contamination and even worse rural blight.

(Originally published in The Galena Gazette, 1/13/2010)

I believe it may have been Mr. Benjamin who once said that our new nation was "a republic" if we "could keep it." If nothing else, the megadairy controversy has demonstrated that the hold the American people have on their republic is tenuous indeed. How else can one explain the replacement of politics by legal action, and politicians by lawyers? By allowing our local and state government officials to abdicate responsibility for issues related to the health and welfare of their constituents, we let them off easy. Any good bureaucrat is only too happy to relinquish authority over any matter that might mean eventual consequence; that doesn't mean we should permit them that luxury. Judges are not legislators; a team of lawyers do not a public make. Retaining our republic will  require fewer lawyers, less bureaucracy, and a citizenry more concerned with the "whys" and "hows" of politics than the "whos" and "whats." Foes of the mega-dairy had no real allies in either political party. One seemed intent on abusing them, the other content with using them. Lessons need to be learned in a hurry and efforts recalibrated to focus on a state-wide ban on any future factory farms and to seek the means by which local control is fully restored.

(Originally published in THE ROCK RIVER TIMES, 6/24/08)

Big Developers Forcing Out Local Owners

There is no denying that the civic leaders of the towns of Nora, Warren and Stockton have let their constituents down. The respective village councils and mayors must be regarded as either guilty of complicity or blind acquiescence, given their deafening silence on the potential disaster that the mega-dairy and future factory farms portend to unleash. One would think that even the most remote possibility of ground water contamination would elicit some response. Instead, it would appear that the heavy-hitters lurking behind developments like the Bos dairy--organizations like the "Blackhawk Hills Resource Conversation and Development"--have greased enough local palms and pulled enough local strings to nurture and sustain the learned helplessness and resignation of area residents.

As land values continue their vertiginous rise here, one must wonder if future land ownership will be restricted to the likes of "ordinary farmers" such as Mr. Bos, and "local folks" of the Eagle Ridge variety. Current trends suggest that true family farms will be forced to sell out, while the remaining towns become post-colonial, "quasi-colonies," parasitic partners of whatever "boon" the likes of Blackwater Hills sees fit to bestow on them.

(Originally published in THE ROCK RIVER TIMES, 10/22-28/08)

Mega-Dairy Boycott Letter

Last checked, America was still a free country, and we all are yet able to choose to support whatever political or economic endeavors we please. As a business, you have chosen to support Traditions Dairy. My family and I are in opposition, for all of the health and welfare issues that we are all familiar with by now. As you have chosen to support Mr. Bos's dubious business efforts, we so choose to not support yours, and we will also encourage others to refrain from spending their hard-earned dollars in your establishments as well.

We realize that you will hardly feel the impact of the loss of our purchases at this time or perhaps even in the near future; regardless, we believe it important to remind business owners that they do not function in a vacuum, and do indeed have a civic responsibility as well as an economic one to and for the communities that they are an important part of. By putting profit before people, we believe that you put the very community that you economically benefit from in jeopardy. Nothing could be less dime-wise and more penny-foolish.

 

As Wendell Berry has remarked, "To have everything but money is to have a lot." There is much wisdom in Berry's words; and on the remote chance that you might one day see their merits, here's my contact information. Give me a holler. Until then, though, my dollars and those of hopefully many others will be spent elsewhere. 

(Distributed to various owners of local businesses who had publicly shown support for the Bos megadairy, one of whom attempted to get me fired from my job at the Journal-Standard.)

Toxic Subsidies

The irony of our area's farmers belittling the regulatory efforts of the federal government needn't be lost on any of us. After all, these same farmers are generally this county's greatest beneficiaries of corporate welfare in the form of crop subsidy allotments. If the meager requirements of government oversight and crop mandates are proving to be too much, foregoing said subsidies is always an option. Doing so would of course leave one at the mercy of the market, just like the in-town neighbor struggling to make this month's mortgage payment. But any self-respecting member of Jim Sacia's Republican Party wouldn't want it any other way....

(Published in The Rockford Register-Star and elsewhere.)