Food Crisis Starts Eclipsing Climate Change Worries

excerpt 2: "With prices for rice, wheat, and corn soaring, food-related unrest has broken out in places such as Haiti, Indonesia, and Afghanistan. Several countries have blocked the export of grain. There is even talk that governments could fall if they cannot bring food costs down"

excerpt 3:"One factor being blamed for the price hikes is the use of government subsidies to promote the use of corn for ethanol production. An estimated 30% of America's corn crop now goes to fuel, not food."

excerpt 4:""It takes around 400 pounds of corn to make 25 gallons of ethanol," Mr. Senauer, also an applied economics professor at Minnesota, said. "It's not going to be a very good diet but that's roughly enough to keep an adult person alive for a year."

What's wrong with 'shipping food' out of the country? We get loads of food stuffs from all over. There is such a thing as global commerce, {not Globalization} which is responsible for raising living standards and knowledge, which is as old as nations are.

I find it curious that those who're inclined to blame America for the world's ills refuse to see the real potential danger of burning up food supplies for no net economic or environmental benefit, at the cost of rising food prices throughout the world, which will bring us levels of resentment we've not seen before.

Imagine a country which refuses to develop its own energy resources so that folks on the mainland can "feel good" about a few acres in Alaska, not have to see wind farms on Cape Cod, or risk property values on Florida's coast.

Our priorities are screwed up. We're spoiled.

Bio-fuels may make better sense some day, especially if they can be made from various waste by-products or refuse. But a constant readily available affordable supply of food is required. Food-fuel is not, and now threatens to demonize us in new ways, real ways that impact real people the world over.