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Rants February 27, 2011

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1. I just read that zinc deficiency can cause a "spacey" feeling that some vegetarians may mistake for the "high" of spiritual enlightenment. And I’m going to leave that right there for you to think about because anything I might say would get me in trouble with three or four dozen of the world’s most popular religions.

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2. I just read in the newspaper that "large retail stores are bad for the economy and should not be built." There are those who are oblivious to that great sucking sound of dollars leaving Maine through big box stores and casinos and banks and insurance companies and there are the others, like myself, who would just as soon see dollars circulate in Maine. A Maine State Bank like the state bank they have in North Dakota would be a good start at keeping your money and your business here in Maine. I admit that I would rather walk into your little store and give my money to you than shop in a big box. Anyone who can remember the many businesses that were in their area 50 or more years ago realizes that most of them are gone. In Rockland about the only things we can buy without going to a big box store are burgers, insurance, oil, cars and art. You might even remember that a few car dealerships near you have recently closed their doors, so things are moving right along. In 1950 most dollars spent in a Rockland store might have passed from hand to hand in Knox County several times. Now most dollars spent in a big box store are sucked out of the area, not to be seen again until our mighty country begs China for one more loan --- and every cent we spend in a big box store makes it more impossible to repay the last loan. You and I know who makes the items we buy every day although knowing that every dollar we give them helps put one more American out of work bothers us not at all. You would probably tell me that we could escape this downward spiral --- this lose-lose economic situation we find ourselves in today if we were only to stop buying anything that was not made in the USA. But then where would we get the things we need --- unless we have our own blacksmith shop and animals out back in the barn? And how could we afford to buy an American made item anyway if we are scraping by on the wages paid by big box stores? Yes, more Americans who have lost their businesses to big box stores are employed by low-paying big box stores than ever before. But how many do you suppose would eagerly move next door into a plant that paid them $22 an hour for manufacturing plastic widgets? You’re right. There are a lot of things happening in Maine and America today that you and I are wondering about, and I don’t claim to have the definitive answer. But a Maine State Bank like the North Dakota bank that is keeping the dollars circulating in North Dakota would be a good start.

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3. There is presently a move afoot here in Maine to set up cameras that would take pictures of vehicles running stop lights or stop signs. If you ask any of my closest friends and my closest relative why they do not like to ride with me, they will tell you it is because I stop at stop signs. I enjoy riding with them, because they wind her right through. I admit it. I am an old fuddy-duddy. For the past 40 or so years --- ever since I taught driver education in Rockland and Waldoboro – I have stopped at stop signs. This does not make me better or worse than anyone else, but I do it, even though there are situations where even a fool knows it would be safer to simply slow down, look, and go through. Many times over the past 40 years --- 6 or 8 times --- I have been struck in the rear end when I stopped at a stop sign. You see, the people tailgating me expect me to run that stop sign like most everyone else in this law-abiding land, and they are looking left to see if a car is coming so they can run it, too, and are not looking at the character in front of them who, against everything that is right and reasonable in America, stops dead in his tire tracks. Kaboom. You certainly know that many progressive countries have yield signs in some places where we have stop signs and you might remember what a joy it was to drive there. Wouldn’t you welcome yield signs here? If you haven’t already seen it, you should watch the YouTube piece on the police camera that enables an officer to drive down the road or through a parking lot and immediately spot a stolen car. The argument about cameras turning us into a police state is a curious one because there is no question but what over the past 10 years our very own votes have brought us closer to totalitarianism than we’ve ever been before. So I’m puzzled why the very people who have consistently voted for a police state would oppose a camera that might catch them going through a stop sign.

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4. Someone told my wife she would enjoy reading Pillars of The Earth. Knowing that it is about life in England 800 years ago I found a synopsis of the plot. Halfway through the first paragraph it said, “Alfred comes to despise Jack because he is clever and can read.” Nothing changes. This is probably the most delineating dichotomy in our society today.

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5. Last night my friend Winky heard on the TV news that there is so much snow and ice out there that anyone travelling should make sure that they have a shovel, tire chains, a bag of rock salt, a flashlight and booster cables. Winky said he felt like a fool getting on the bus this morning.

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6. Have you ever heard of a television show called Ice Truckers? Here’s a letter from a very astute radio friend named Pete who lives way up in northern Maine, and Pete says, "Ice Truckers" is a sort of slow-motion NASCAR by producers who have read too much Jack London.

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7. An 11-year-old boy from Arvada, Colorado was handcuffed and arrested after drawing stick figures in school of himself drawing a gun at other figures, with the words "teachers must die." Nobody would have thought twice about this if the kid had a nation-wide syndicated show on talk radio. 8. All I know about the recent Camden Conference is what I read in the paper: "Freeman tied China’s success, in part, to improved college education. America too needs to improve its higher education, he said." One would expect to see red lights flash and hear buzzers sound when people say dangerous things like this. Would not that stalwart defender of all America stands for, Joseph McCarthy, have deported the man for this? And this? --- “The best thing America can do for its college students is to give them passports, he said.” You know that I got an important part of my education in Europe, and you’ve heard me beating that drum for years. There are many people in Camden who have lived abroad and still read European newspapers. They have little in common with their neighbors whose mental nourishment comes from talk radio. Have we not learned that educated young people are likely to vote for liberal causes? And does not a real education encourage young people to leave the church? Patriotic, flag-waving Americans might find these things to be disturbing. And would not a college education for all Americans completely destroy one of our great political parties and bring another one back to the values it hasn’t embraced for 70 years? So forget this education stuff and keep your eye on that Camden Conference. Wouldn’t bottom-line America benefit more if our kids spent a couple of years in the military --- or simply had half a dozen babies and got a nice job at Walmart?

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9. Would not everything you have read indicate that men who cannot bring themselves to be violent get their violence vicariously? The wimpiest of these men lick their lips at every NASCAR crash, the broken necks at a hockey rink, the inevitable torn tendons at a high school football game and the bloody faces of a Rocky. And then there are the real men like myself whose insatiable lust for the intimate details of the uninhibited slaughter of millions for profit draws us to the study of history. Do you remember the good old days when you could flick on the history channel and watch Caesar and Pompey slugging it out toe to toe at the Battle of Pharsalus? --- or see the United States giving aid to both Chiang Kai-shek and the evil communist monster Mao? You don’t have to be a history buff to realize that was money well spent. But turn on the history channel now and, alas, what do you see but people with flashlights creeping about in moldy passageways looking for ghosts. Ghosts on the history channel. I don’t know about you, but the last thing to interest me would be ghosts on any channel. But, because old habits die hard, with hope in my heart I still occasionally turn to the history channel. And one day I hung in there long enough to see that Dickens was right: there is a Ghost of Christmas Future and there he was on the history channel. What surprised me was that, according to Christmas Future --- well, let me repeat the conversation he had with the ghost hunter: He said, “Oh yes, in 2041 life here in the USA is great. I have wonderful healthcare. I have a great job. Everyone in the US has a great job, great healthcare, good food, good housing. We don’t lack anything. Over 440 million of us are working here together side by side. No one complains. We have no worries.” The man with the flashlight said, “We’re all relieved to hear that. You know, from where I’m standing it looks like the Republicans and their big money backers are going have our children living in the exact opposite kind of world that you’re telling us exists in 2041. When did working people finally get together and vote big money out of Congress?” “Oh --- they never did --- I’m in a privatized factory prison in Texas.”

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10. You have read that Governor LePage is trying to repeal a law that got toxic chemicals out of everyday items used by kids. This certainly shouldn’t surprise you. You got what you voted for. We are finally moving toward the Maine that real Mainers want. Yippee yi yo ki yay. You knew that if elected, Governor LePage would weaken a wide range of protections for Maine’s clean air, clean water, public health and natural heritage. And why shouldn’t he? These nasty regulations that keep arsenic out of your drinking water get in the way of honest folk trying to make a living. So whenever they can get you to vote them into office, the regulations that protect you --- and cost them money --- go out the door. You certainly recall that after the regulations on financial institutions were removed, the capitalists who removed them went wild, enriched themselves while bringing their financial houses down, and then conveniently turned --- socialist --- and persuaded George W. Bush to bail them out with your tax dollars. Capitalists are able to compartmentalize their thinking: They will tell you that socialism is great when it provides for millionaire bankers who screwed things up. But, without even blushing, in the next breath they will tell you that socialism is bad if it provides you with healthcare. In other words --- socialism is good for me because I own a business --- socialism is bad for you because you work for me. We read that the Governor’s proposal includes repealing a law that passed with overwhelming bipartisan support in 2008 to get toxic chemicals out of everyday items used by kids, scaling back hazardous waste and water quality standards, abolishing the Board of Environmental Protection and opening up 30% of Maine’s North Woods to development. The Governor is actually thinking very logically: The only people to oppose toxic chemicals are liberals. Almost every person in every trailer and carpeted office in Maine will tell you that liberals are bad. Therefore, chemicals must be good. So let your kids eat toxic chemicals. After all, this is Maine, The Way Life Should Be. By the way, when the business community wants to eliminate any regulatory agency such as the DEP, they don't outright abolish it because you and your family know that agency is there to protect you. So, the agency is rendered ineffectual by underfunding, understaffing and a new head honcho who has probably lobbied against that particular agency for years. That way, the wreckers can point out that the agency is still there protecting you, even though it becomes no more than a shingle over a door. You ain’t seen nothing yet so keep watching. With luck you’ll soon be wearing your 45 on your hip for protection when you walk out onto the street through those swinging saloon doors.

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11. Here’s an interesting advertisement for blueberry bushes. It says, “Grow your own delicious blueberries with Blueberry Giant. … Produce up to 4 pints of juicy blueberries daily - that's 16,000 blueberries from a single plant.” I don’t know as I ever sat around counting how many blueberries were on a bush or in my dish. But I have seen blueberry bushes and I’d like to see the plant that can produce 4 pints of juicy blueberries daily. --- Times 365 makes 1460 pints of blueberries a year from one bush. I have a blueberry field and from looking at the hood of my truck I know what happens to birds when they eat only a handful of berries. I weigh 160 times as much as a crow, and if I were to eat 4 pints of blueberries every day ---- no, I think I’m going to pass on this offer.

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