[Dialogue] ENERGY DEPLETION

[James Wiegel]

The author set out to have 4 different meals around
the notion that what makes life complicated for us as
humans is we are omnivores -- we eat just about
anything vs, like Pandas.  He suggests that having to
figure out food may even account for some of why we
need such big brains.  I know deciding dinner every
night between Judy and I seems more and more an
intellectual (not to mention volitional) challenge.

But, I digress.  The first meal was a fast food meal,
a McDonald's meal for the family and he traces the
food system back to its origins of where that meal
came from -- visiting a farm in Iowa, etc.  This is
his analysis of the degree to which the large grain
companies and the department of agriculture have
worked together to generate such huge surpluses of
corn and then continued the invention of ways to use
the surplus, part of which is corn fed beef (cows
don't naturally eat corn, they have to have their
digestive system modified to deal with it) and all the
way to ethanol.

The second meal is organic, bought mostly at an
organic food store, but also showing the degree to
which the "organic" food business is now
industrialized and pretty much nation wide.

The third meal is part of the local food culture and
mainly set on a "grass farm" in Virginia that is quite
a remarkable story of integrated food production --
they are such strong believers in local foods that
they won't ship outside the area . . .

The fourth meal he hunts and gathers himself in
Northern California -- shoots a wild pig, gathers
mushrooms, etc.

The first section is a bit overwhelming re:  the
industrial food system, but it jibes with another book
I got from my daughter about the 6 families that
control the global grain trade.  The other 3 sections
are quite absorbing.

$.25 please . . . 

Jim Wiegel
--- FacilitationFla at aol.com wrote:

>  
>  
> Please summary the jist of this book.  Thanks.  Cyn
>  
> In a message dated 1/29/2007 12:29:43 P.M. Eastern
> Standard Time,  
> khess at apk.net writes:
> 
> Pretty much the whole corn economy is a fraud. You
> can be sure Archer  
> Daniels Midland is behind it.  The recent book on
> this is  The Omnivore's Dilemma: A 
> Natural  History of Four Meals by Michael Pollan. 
> There was an interview  
> with him on NPR not that long ago.  The book is
> copyrighted 2006.
> 
> 
> The mainstream media will not cover this, certainly
> not the Lehrer New  Hour.
> 
> 
> Karl
> 
> 
> 
> 
>  
> Cynthia N.  Vance
> Strategics International Inc.
> 8245 SW 116 Terrace
> Miami, Florida,  33156
> 305-378-1327; fax 305-378-9178
> _http://members.aol.com/facilitationfla_ 
> (http://members.aol.com/facilitationfla) 
> 
> Want  to build your own facilitation skills? 
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> Mark your calendar for the International  Assoc. of
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> 2007 
> Portland, Oregon -- March 8-10, 2007.  See
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> (http://www.iaf-world.org/) 
> 
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