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ORIGINAL: StrangerThan

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ORIGINAL: rulemylife

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ORIGINAL: truckinslave

RML, that's not even a non sequitur. It's just nothin, dude.

Seemed pretty clear to me.

Cheap food is higher in fat content and calories.

But do let me know if that still confuses you.

Cheap processed food is higher in fat and calories.

Locally grown vegetables during summer months are some of the most inexpensive foods you can buy and are fairly easy to store long term. If you're not into canning, some you can just toss in the freezer - like corn. Just bag it, husk, silk and all. Microwave 4-5 minutes when you take it out. Tastes like it just came from the garden.

Doesn't take 40 acres and a mule to make a difference either. I planted tomatoes along my fence line, cabbage and pepper are scattered through some of the flowerbeds, cucumbers and strawberries occupy another fence line planting that's smaller than most of the flowerbeds. Corn is running around 4-5 ears /dollar right now. Planted dwarf versions of pears and peaches. Already have an apple tree in the back yard. Two types of grape vines on the side.

Even if you don't grow it yourself, visits to the local farmers and a few days work during summer months can provide enough food to last most of the winter.

To the OP, if the ideal is unattainable, and if every form tried has ended as a bastardization, seems like being a communist is akin to living in fantasy land, maybe on a plot right next to Huxley.

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ORIGINAL: wittynamehere

Agreed with the above. I put in some decent work out back of my place, and still only get a few boxes of potatoes, tomatoes, and various herbs etc per year. It's not as easy as just going to a place with dirt, scattering some seeds, picking out weeds once about halfway through the season, and coming back several months later to pick up your boxes of groceries.

And even those who do it for years, and do it well, still have to trade for and buy other stuff. Try eating nothing but plain beans, or maybe a salad made of nothing but lettuce and tomatoes, and you'll realize just how much variety you eat (and require for nutrition) every day.

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ORIGINAL: BitaTruble

FR

Freedom has been tasted and it is addictive. We are much to complex as a species to be molded into tiny shapes so as to fit into the boxes of pure communism and socialism. The Sun revolves around the Earth. The Earth is flat. People have less value because of the amount of melanin in their epidermis or because they love in an unconvential manner.

No. It's just not so.

Society has been too wrong for too long. Society has produced nothing, invented nothing, bred nothing. We have no books, art or music because of society. Society has cured no ills, nor cooked a meal, nor fed the masses. People do those things. Individuals and sometimes groups of individuals. Not society.

Society is undeserving of such a vast and complex leadership role. We need high standards, with high bars and rewards for excellence commensurate with ability and results.. not with need. Society just isn't good enough.

The guy with 10 children will consume far greater resources than the single guy with no children. They are not equal in need, but may be equal in ability.. and should be rewarded for the ability and what they do with it, not for the need. The ramifications are too significant, the cost to benefit ratio too high because it does come at the price of freedom and that's a price that should not be paid to benefit the nameless, faceless society that would set it aside for another blanket or cord of wood. I don't believe there are many things that are worth killing or dieing for, but I do believe that freedom is one of those things and I have instilled that into my children and pray that philosophy will remain in the bloodline of my family for untold generations.

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ORIGINAL: E3

Yep another case of mis-implimented Communism. 

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ORIGINAL: vincentML



Bita, your post is well written and well reasoned. However, the historical fallacy is that at no time has Capitalism extended "freedom" to everyone. There have always been slaves, indentured slaves, wage slaves and the unemployed. The fruits of Capitalism are not shared according to ability except in the ideal fantasy. There have always been successfully wealthy nonproducers, monopolists, and oligarchies as well as government subsidies and special advantages granted to Capital. Left to its own unfettered devices Capital has shown it will run amuck over Labor. Labor is just another capital investment and so will be short changed whenever possible. In the labor/management struggles that turned violent in the late 19th Century police were always marshalled to protect property not people.

Consider the contemporary world of haves and have-nots. The wealth accumulation is way to the favor of the Corporate Class who greedily clamor for more, more, more. We live in a world of economic injustice because Capital has pockets deep enough to buy off Govt. Those who bitch and moan about excessive regulation are grinning on the other side of their faces because they know full well their campaign contributions to both major parties will bear fruit for them.

What freedoms do the poor have? Security, health care, shelter, opportunity? Hardly. I am not advocating socialism. I don't know what socialism truly is. But surely it is not too much to ask for social justice for everyone who are living their one and only lives. Capitalism as we know it does not provide for human decency let alone freedom for all. The evidence speaks for itself.

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ORIGINAL: thompsonx

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Even if you don't grow it yourself, visits to the local farmers and a few days work during summer months can provide enough food to last most of the winter.

You do not seem to know much about farming.
I have been a subsistance farmer for the past 25 years and I still spend about $600 dollars a year in the grocery store. I do not grow chocolate, coffee or wheat. Consequently I need to purchase bread,coffee and chocolate(life without chocolate is barely existence) as well as salt and other spices.
It would be more than a bit presumptious to claim that 10,000 square feet of garden qualifies as a farm but it takes somewhat more than a few days a year to make it produce what I need.

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ORIGINAL: StrangerThan

Maria, maria, who named her sons Carl John and John Carl - I shit you not - was a sweet little lady from Brooklyn who lived next door to me in Boston. I grew up on a farm so I never even considered the tiny little back yards at the rental houses for growing food. She planted maybe an 8x8 square plot of summer vegetables, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash, basil I don't know what else. That little plot looked like a rain forest and bore enough so that she bought none of those during the summer months.

Agreed, many farmer's markets are anything but local. Food is shipped in from everywhere. It's little more than going to a grocery store with a bit of farm decor. But I've lived in Boston, LA, San Diego, Jacksonville, and Houston. I'll grant you it's easier to find vegetables where I live now at cheap prices than it was in those places, but they could still be found. Hell, weekends were often spent going outside the city for one thing or another, beach, mountains, something. We just picked it up along the way.

Buy in bulk, and preserve it. Corn has to be the easiest thing in the world to store. Just bag the crap and throw it in a freezer.

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ORIGINAL: thishereboi

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ORIGINAL: StrangerThan

Maria, maria, who named her sons Carl John and John Carl - I shit you not - was a sweet little lady from Brooklyn who lived next door to me in Boston. I grew up on a farm so I never even considered the tiny little back yards at the rental houses for growing food. She planted maybe an 8x8 square plot of summer vegetables, tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, squash, basil I don't know what else. That little plot looked like a rain forest and bore enough so that she bought none of those during the summer months.

Agreed, many farmer's markets are anything but local. Food is shipped in from everywhere. It's little more than going to a grocery store with a bit of farm decor. But I've lived in Boston, LA, San Diego, Jacksonville, and Houston. I'll grant you it's easier to find vegetables where I live now at cheap prices than it was in those places, but they could still be found. Hell, weekends were often spent going outside the city for one thing or another, beach, mountains, something. We just picked it up along the way.

Buy in bulk, and preserve it. Corn has to be the easiest thing in the world to store. Just bag the crap and throw it in a freezer.

Yes, corn is easy to freeze and delicious to eat. Unfortunately it doesn't have much nutrition to it. Same with potatoes. I would imagine there are ways to preserve other veggies, like broccoli and carrots but do you seriously want to go back to living like that? And do you honestly think there is that much produce available in say the Detroit area to feed everyone in the city for the winter? And if you come up with the food, who is going to pay to supply everyone with the equipment to properly save the food? My sister moved to a farm a couple of years ago and is getting into preserving now. That stuff is not cheap. Then you have to train everyone how to use it, so they don't screw up and poison themselves.

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Try this one for size...and reason. European middle ages (dark ages) survival was almost entirely through a form of communism. It was villages living collectively to survive because it was absolutely necessary.

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Honestly, I could give a shit less about the population of Detroit or those who complain that cheap food is full of fat and calories - which is where this started. It's full of fat and calories if you choose to eat it. What it boils down to is choices and who or what you're going to be beholden to. Most folks are too lazy to do much more than go to the grocer and complain about the prices. Fine. Got no problem with them or the choice they made. All I am saying is there are other options if you choose to pursue them.

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ORIGINAL: BitaTruble

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ORIGINAL: vincentML



Bita, your post is well written and well reasoned. However, the historical fallacy is that at no time has Capitalism extended "freedom" to everyone. There have always been slaves, indentured slaves, wage slaves and the unemployed. The fruits of Capitalism are not shared according to ability except in the ideal fantasy. There have always been successfully wealthy nonproducers, monopolists, and oligarchies as well as government subsidies and special advantages granted to Capital. Left to its own unfettered devices Capital has shown it will run amuck over Labor. Labor is just another capital investment and so will be short changed whenever possible. In the labor/management struggles that turned violent in the late 19th Century police were always marshalled to protect property not people.

Consider the contemporary world of haves and have-nots. The wealth accumulation is way to the favor of the Corporate Class who greedily clamor for more, more, more. We live in a world of economic injustice because Capital has pockets deep enough to buy off Govt. Those who bitch and moan about excessive regulation are grinning on the other side of their faces because they know full well their campaign contributions to both major parties will bear fruit for them.

What freedoms do the poor have? Security, health care, shelter, opportunity? Hardly. I am not advocating socialism. I don't know what socialism truly is. But surely it is not too much to ask for social justice for everyone who are living their one and only lives. Capitalism as we know it does not provide for human decency let alone freedom for all. The evidence speaks for itself.

Thank you for the compliment, Vincent, but my post didn't address capitalism. This topic is about communism and socialism, so I'm not sure what, exactly, your post has to do with mine? Personally, I believe that balance is the answer and that we, as a people and as the complex species which we are, need to figure out exactly where the most favorable balance lies without stifiling individuality, motivation and creativity and, hey, if I had the answer to that question, I'd run for President myself. :)

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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Honestly, I could give a shit less about the population of Detroit or those who complain that cheap food is full of fat and calories - which is where this started. It's full of fat and calories if you choose to eat it. What it boils down to is choices and who or what you're going to be beholden to. Most folks are too lazy to do much more than go to the grocer and complain about the prices. Fine. Got no problem with them or the choice they made. All I am saying is there are other options if you choose to pursue them.

Too easily dismissed, ST. The issue is that inner cities lack grocery stores and nutritional food choices and the means of transportation to go out to the countryside for a day of shopping the farms.

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ORIGINAL: joether

Hello E3,

D) The New World Order - Both political parties in the USA, Republican, and Democrat, are in fact, one. Not only are they one organzation, but both ruled by group of individuals, in some shadow organization. Tens of millions of US Citizens, are merely slaves and serfs, clueless to the real energy and control being exerted on them, and others. And that this organization, now has its claws in to all the industrial countries and many developing countries of the world, regardless of the 'base' goverment.

The real issue, with each goverment type, is that, none of them have worked, largely due to the concepts being 'perfect'. As it is known, us humans, rarily get simple stuff, like tying our shoes, balancing our check books, or even behaving in a sane manner at town hall meetings.....perfect. So, each goverment type, when in a perfect enviroment, would work perfectly for the citizens of that nation. Even Despotism (dictatorship), in a perfect enviroment would be good for the citizenry. Unfortunately, human habits, pettinesses, and hatreds get in the way. As the wisdom goes, it is much easier to destroy a potted plant, rather then help it grow and bear fruit for all.

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ORIGINAL: StrangerThan

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ORIGINAL: vincentML

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Honestly, I could give a shit less about the population of Detroit or those who complain that cheap food is full of fat and calories - which is where this started. It's full of fat and calories if you choose to eat it. What it boils down to is choices and who or what you're going to be beholden to. Most folks are too lazy to do much more than go to the grocer and complain about the prices. Fine. Got no problem with them or the choice they made. All I am saying is there are other options if you choose to pursue them.

Too easily dismissed, ST. The issue is that inner cities lack grocery stores and nutritional food choices and the means of transportation to go out to the countryside for a day of shopping the farms.

The larger issue in the communist/capitalist debate is that we're not switching forms any time in the foreseeable future. If you want something easily dismissed, it's more the thought that someone else must provide it for me. It's the listless, I have no choice but to eat shitty foods, end up obese,  and spend my time explaining why that's someone elses fault concept that gets the eye roll. Get off your ass and do something if you want it to change. If that's not good enough, then sit around and whine and complain. Neither really makes a difference to me.

I know what big cities are like. I've lived in half a dozen of them. Nor am I positing anything for the benefit of society. I'm saying, you have choices. Choose what you will, but understand in the greater scheme of things the idea of ultimate responsibility. Eating at taco bell and McDonald's most of your life because someone didn't plop a farmers co-opt on your city block is, for many people, a choice.

And as I write this, my girl says, will you get some pop-tarts when you go out?

lol

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ORIGINAL: StrangerThan

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ORIGINAL: thompsonx

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Even if you don't grow it yourself, visits to the local farmers and a few days work during summer months can provide enough food to last most of the winter.

You do not seem to know much about farming.
I have been a subsistance farmer for the past 25 years and I still spend about $600 dollars a year in the grocery store. I do not grow chocolate, coffee or wheat. Consequently I need to purchase bread,coffee and chocolate(life without chocolate is barely existence) as well as salt and other spices.
It would be more than a bit presumptious to claim that 10,000 square feet of garden qualifies as a farm but it takes somewhat more than a few days a year to make it produce what I need.

I never said you could grow everything you eat, but if you're only spending 600 a year, you're making my point for me.

Your point was that it only takes a few days of labor to do this and that is not the case. It is not terribly hard work but it requires quite a bit more than a few days. The cost of food in the super market is always going to be less than the cost of food produced in my garden even if I figgure my time at minimum wage (which I have never worked for in my life). The major advantage of growing ones own food is that one can control the quality. My food is organic no pesticides and no preservatives.

And even if you don't grow it, this time of year you can put back enough to last a good portion of the winter by buying it at local farms and farmers markets. Go to the grocery store and spend $3 or so for 5 pounds of potatoes. You can buy a 50 pound bag for less than $10 if you spend a little time looking. Tomatoes go by the bushel. Corn as well. No, you won't find everything but you can cut your food bills by a rather large percentage with a few days work simply by buying it this time of year in the right places and preserving it.

Again, not everything, but a good portion.

$600 a year? Do you realize that the food bill for a family of 4 can easily top $1000 a month?

So a family of one would be $250 per month I spend about $50 per month...consider that working 40 hours a month (1 1/2 hours a day) in your garden at $5 per hour. I am sure you can do the math.