Fri, 13 Nov 2009

Midwest migrants

It is getting very weird here in west central Indiana. A lot of the illegals have left, heading home for want of work. The "immigrants" that are staying are refugees from the city, most of whom moved out here in better times and are now hanging on by their fingernails to small holds and farmsteads.

It gets more depopulated the further west you go - Walmarts in county seats have killed many a small town down town, and the consolidation of farms just accelerates the process.

It's really very sad. But history moves in cycles, and the population will return. It's not a question of if, but when.

I've become increasingly convinced over the years that our modern American way of life - the rampart consumerism and materialism, the globalization and constant movement, is inherently unsustainable. The shit will eventually hit the fan, and it will probably take the form of some great cataclysm or catastrophe. Biowar, peak oil, global warming, nuclear war - who knows? I doubt that I'll live to see it, but my grandchildren almost certainly will. And they'll have a small hold of their own, if they're up to it.

Two towns, two very different faces of the US heartland

(link) [BBC News]

/Agriculture | 2 writebacks | permanent link


On 11/14/2009 08:51:04
Soli wrote


On 11/14/2009 09:01:32
Dave H wrote

Doomers


comment...

 
Notes: If you put a <mailto:> link in the URL field your address will not be mangled: this could be a bad idea as your email address could be easily harvested by bots designed for SPAM. The comments field should now format correctly for line feeds and carriage returns: when you hit the 'Enter' or 'Return' keys in your comment it should break to a new line. The text should wrap cleanly. Please let me know if it doesn't. No HTML tags will pass through - entering links seems to be the main cause of comment SPAM. Also, please be sure that Javascript is enabled in your browser before attempting to post a writeback. Sorry for any inconvenience, but this really helps cut down on the amount of comment SPAM I have to deal with.
 
 Name:
 URL:(optional)
 Title: (optional)
 Comments:  
Save my Name and URL/Email for next time