Carbon-zero skinny jeans and John Prine in the same piece. Nice. It all feels like another Prine line goes something like: “got muscles in their heads that ain’t never been used”. Great piece
This is spot on. I retired and moved back to Iowa 3 years ago. I was surprised at the changes. I initially thought Iowa was being turned into Mississippi because of the poor support of public education. Since learning about the environmental issues, I’ve decided it is being turned into West Virginia, poor education and ruined environment.
This could have just as easily been written about the corn and soybean center of Illinois, even if state politics on the whole might be different. They sure aren't in the middle.
A friend and I were discussing how both Republicans and Democrats are very happy and enthusiastic to shine the Big Ag Apple. The Sacred Cow PR campaign of the "original land stewards" has been incredibly effective. Certainly no shots will be fired in an election year.
Funny you should post this today. Two years ago a developer had stripped the land on the west side of Dubuque St. and we had about 4 inches of rain. We looked out our windows at the Dovetail Pond just south of that area and so much dirt and silt was flowing into it that it looked like diarrhea. My hubby started singing “They tortured the timber and stripped all the land” in verse 3.
Chris, what a great piece, with many fine turns of phrase (I restacked one especially delicious morsel). My family roots are in Iowa, although I haven't lived there for 50 plus years, but your Substack helps me understand what's going on there. Well done, and many thanks!
I was watching a show set in the north of Scotland, where there are small holdings called crofts.
"The Scottish croft is a small agricultural landholding of a type that has been subject to special legislation applying to the Scottish Highlands since 1886.[2] The legislation was largely a response to the complaints and demands of tenant families who were victims of the Highland Clearances." Wikipedia
Here is a fantasy: Imagine one or more of the modern robber barons initiated land reform by buying up large blocks of land and then breaking them down into crofts, subject to rules about land use. Is there an environmentally and economically sound way to make small holdings feasible?
Chemistry was far from my best subject, but a bit of googling confirmed that mixing water and carbon dioxide produces carbonic acid. Carbonic acid, as the caves and sinkholes of the karst lands of NE Iowa show, can dissolve carbonate rocks… Now, who could want to dissolve carbonate rock strata? Nobody in Iowa.
But wait! Did I hear someone say “oil frackers”?
What if we were to pipe CO2 to, say, the shale oil fields, mix it with H2O and pump it underground to “sequester” it?
We could get paid for transporting it, and we could get paid for supplying more “environmentally friendly” fracking solutions, and we could get paid tax subsidies, and we could get paid more profitably for the oil—more profitably because of our lower fracking costs.
Golly, aren’t we just super stewards of our environment?
California is a big driver for these "advanced biofuels".
So derives this irony: California was demanding the hog CAFOs provide more humane stall space if they wished to market big-pork into California. Yet, the credits from the corn ethanol, CO2 pipelines that California takes will have no comparable concerns for the taking of the environmental rights of humans by toxic-technology corn.
Are our environmental rights lesser than the rights of pigs? Seems to smack of some kind of convoluted injustice.
But to be fair, how many of us think about the human sacrifices that bring us fresh fruits and vegetables from big-food CA?
We are all in the sacrifice zone in the realm of big. We are paying that $2.00 cost that never gets accounted for in the $1.00 price of big-food and "advanced biofuels". The market would just rather not bother CA with this thought. Might upset some notion of progress.
Carbon-zero skinny jeans and John Prine in the same piece. Nice. It all feels like another Prine line goes something like: “got muscles in their heads that ain’t never been used”. Great piece
This is spot on. I retired and moved back to Iowa 3 years ago. I was surprised at the changes. I initially thought Iowa was being turned into Mississippi because of the poor support of public education. Since learning about the environmental issues, I’ve decided it is being turned into West Virginia, poor education and ruined environment.
Thank you, Chris. I always learn from your posts.
Most excellent. I was clueless
This could have just as easily been written about the corn and soybean center of Illinois, even if state politics on the whole might be different. They sure aren't in the middle.
A friend and I were discussing how both Republicans and Democrats are very happy and enthusiastic to shine the Big Ag Apple. The Sacred Cow PR campaign of the "original land stewards" has been incredibly effective. Certainly no shots will be fired in an election year.
PS Your expertise is in water quality and river systems, but the abuse for corn squeezin's goes wide and deep . . . and high. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=op9SJBojiVU
This!
You have me singing Prine in my head now.
Funny you should post this today. Two years ago a developer had stripped the land on the west side of Dubuque St. and we had about 4 inches of rain. We looked out our windows at the Dovetail Pond just south of that area and so much dirt and silt was flowing into it that it looked like diarrhea. My hubby started singing “They tortured the timber and stripped all the land” in verse 3.
Chris, what a great piece, with many fine turns of phrase (I restacked one especially delicious morsel). My family roots are in Iowa, although I haven't lived there for 50 plus years, but your Substack helps me understand what's going on there. Well done, and many thanks!
I was watching a show set in the north of Scotland, where there are small holdings called crofts.
"The Scottish croft is a small agricultural landholding of a type that has been subject to special legislation applying to the Scottish Highlands since 1886.[2] The legislation was largely a response to the complaints and demands of tenant families who were victims of the Highland Clearances." Wikipedia
Here is a fantasy: Imagine one or more of the modern robber barons initiated land reform by buying up large blocks of land and then breaking them down into crofts, subject to rules about land use. Is there an environmentally and economically sound way to make small holdings feasible?
Yes but not with corn/soy
Chemistry was far from my best subject, but a bit of googling confirmed that mixing water and carbon dioxide produces carbonic acid. Carbonic acid, as the caves and sinkholes of the karst lands of NE Iowa show, can dissolve carbonate rocks… Now, who could want to dissolve carbonate rock strata? Nobody in Iowa.
But wait! Did I hear someone say “oil frackers”?
What if we were to pipe CO2 to, say, the shale oil fields, mix it with H2O and pump it underground to “sequester” it?
We could get paid for transporting it, and we could get paid for supplying more “environmentally friendly” fracking solutions, and we could get paid tax subsidies, and we could get paid more profitably for the oil—more profitably because of our lower fracking costs.
Golly, aren’t we just super stewards of our environment?
California is a big driver for these "advanced biofuels".
So derives this irony: California was demanding the hog CAFOs provide more humane stall space if they wished to market big-pork into California. Yet, the credits from the corn ethanol, CO2 pipelines that California takes will have no comparable concerns for the taking of the environmental rights of humans by toxic-technology corn.
Are our environmental rights lesser than the rights of pigs? Seems to smack of some kind of convoluted injustice.
But to be fair, how many of us think about the human sacrifices that bring us fresh fruits and vegetables from big-food CA?
We are all in the sacrifice zone in the realm of big. We are paying that $2.00 cost that never gets accounted for in the $1.00 price of big-food and "advanced biofuels". The market would just rather not bother CA with this thought. Might upset some notion of progress.
You've made a very aggravating subject into an entertaining read. It still makes me mad, but I'm also laughing at some of your phrases. Thanks!
Everclear in a hot skillet gave me a chuckle. Another brilliant way to burn excess corn! The future of Iowa cuisine?
Why not?
Thanks for reading Eleanore, I enjoy your column.