How does one explain the food riots in Haiti, Egypt and Bangladesh? Are they so far away that it is easy to be obtuse?   http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/04/14/world.food.crisis/  While the article I referenced attempts to down play the seriousness of the issue by saying it is due to a number of issues, the point is semantics are lost on the world's poor whose wages haven't risen in tandem with the price of grains and rice.  Is there a "food" shortage? No, what there is for the poor of the world who live at the margins with nothing to spare is a severe reduction in the standard of living, for them it is a zero sum game.  A person can starve to death when there is no shortage of food when the price is so high they can't afford to eat.  

We are looking at the beginning of a huge humanitarian crisis of epic proportions if ethanol subsidies and mandates are not immediately suspended.  Regardless of the growth of India and China, ethanol made from corn or any other food crop or displaced food crop is the straw that breaks the camel's back.  By the end of summer we will be seeing starvation in the third world if we do not act immediately.  

The AGW supporters claim global warming will harm the poor of the world, I ask you, how can you support AGW and ethanol when in fact you are starving the world's poor, the very people you claimed you're trying to save. This is a classic case the cure being worse than the disease.  

I will put this in very black and white terms: Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid have the power in their hands to alleviate the suffering of the world's poor with an exercise of political courage, repeal the ethanol mandates and subsidies.  If they fail to rise up to the challenge of our times, which btw they helped create, then they will go down in history as two people who condoned genocide of the world's poor by sacrificing them on the alter of AGW just so they could sanctimoniously claim they were trying to save the planet.  How many millions will die on the alter of AGW?  How many is too many?  Will you close your eyes to the suffering of the world's poor that you caused in ignorance if you claim you didn't intend the result?  If you didn't intend starving the world's poor, then you have an ethical commitment to undo the damage you caused.  If on the other hand, you care little for the poor, then say nothing and do nothing and let them starve, you have been warned and you can't claim you didn't know.

 Lord Sidious / Darth Vader 2008  Long Live the Empire!  Come to the Dark Side, it is your Destiny.

Noel,

 This is incredible indeed.. I remember on 9-11 gas down the street blew up to 5.99 a gallon and folks were waiting in line! I refused to buy into it so to speak and within a day it went back down.

     Its scary when folks start panicking then ya know for them its i dont care about what is good for the country im getting mine and folks start hording stuff... its nuts.

   This was a great post. I hope they wake up before folks go nuts and run this place into the ground... Excellent job as usual sir.

honesty is the best policy... unless your running for office.

Is anyone paying attention to the cold fronts still sweeping across the USA? Did you know that planting of the seasons crops starts around early April so they have plenty of time to germinate and grow to full yield by harvest? The clock is ticking, the ground is wet and the temperature is too low. The fields cannot be prepared in the mud, and seeds don't do well when floating.

Crop failures in the USA are very real this year.

Cold is much worse than warm, if you like eating.

Each year China as an industrializing nation has fewer rice farmers. Their exports of this crop has dropped tremendously in the last several years. China is moving people from farms to the factories.

sk,did you say something?.....Yawn.

I too didn't know anything about this until I heard it on "the news."  Anything like this that just pops up out of nowhere is very suspect.  I don't believe any of it. Unfortunatly, now that it's out, it will feed on itself until every anti-Bush, anti-American market, AGW, angle that could possibly be thought up is crammed down our collective throats, forcing us to adjust our lives to the whims of the elitist, liberals in power.  Comply, all you gluttonous rice eaters! 

Apparently Costco and Sams are only limiting the purchases of their 25 lb bags of rice. It is apparently some restautaunts that are trying to stockpile rice in response to the fear mongering of the MSM.

Yes, once again the MSM is creating the exact atmosphere that they "reported" existed. These people are getting giddy with all the power that they are realizng they have.

Remember the age old addage...power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely.

The day that "politician" became a career choice is the day we started losing the Republic. Let's get it back! Alan Keyes '08.

Eh, I can't eat rice anymore anyway.  Too high in carbs.