Famine in America?

Not possible? Can't happen here?

Get real! Wake up! It can and will happen here! As you read this we are just one nation-wide social uprising away from famine in this country!

Try these ten reasons on for size;

First, you need to understand that there has not been but a couple of modern day famines that were not contrived by man as a tool of war or as a means of attaining a political objective!

Second, this country, for the first time in modern history, became a net food importer in 2007! We have obviously learned nothing from importing our oil!

Third, there has been a gradual shift away from large crop yields in order to "save the earth!"

Fourth, in the name of food safety truck crop production has gotten more expensive and will eventually put small truck crop farming operations out of business.

Fifth, this nations transportation system is very delicate and depends on foreign oil to run the trains, trucks and farm equipment. Any major disruption of that system could increase the cost of food dramatically overnight.

Sixth, Americans, even rural Americans, have gotten away from gardening and canning. No time! And it's cheaper to buy it at the super Wal-Mart! The problem is that we've forgotten how!

Seventh, Americans have mostly ignored government advice to store and rotate non-perishable food items. Harumpf! One of the few times the government does indeed give good advice and we ignore it!

Eighth, the majority of bulk seed for farming is controlled by fewer and fewer large corporations like Monsanto and DuPont. May I suggest you look up their world views on politics?

Ninth, food production and processing has moved farther and farther from the average consumer. Reliance on the above mentioned transportation system. That shelf at the Safeway store with the canned peas? Well, there is likely NOT a few cases of those peas back in the warehouse in the back of the store! Those peas very likely came palletized straight off the truck last night and will be replenished again tonight!

Lastly, the big cities will suffer first and the suffering there will be the worst! Large concentrations of people mean a serious need for a stable transportation system. PEOPLE! WE DO NOT HAVE A STABLE TRANSPORTATION SYSTEM!

Thanks to the EPA being run by a bevy of environmental extremists for more than 20 years, through the administrations of both political parties, we have pushed offshore oil exploration way out into deep waters where a spill disaster was inevitable. While we have vast amounts of oil reserves we do not take advantage of it to save the earth! We have lowered crop production in the face of an increasing population. We have made farming too expensive and unprofitable an enterprise for the next generation to get into! While we have vast quantities of coal reserves we have failed to use it in order to save the earth!

When our overly delicate transportation system fails a family breadwinner making $100,000 per year could go overnight to being hungry and unable to feed his children! How naive we seem to be!

"A solid smile covers the prickly anxiety Adrianna feels each time she steps into the growing crowd outside of New York City’s Hopeline. Just like 23% of the clients the Feeding America network serves, Adriana is a college-educated individual trying to do the best she can for her family. Twelve years have lapsed since her ailing 83-year-old mother first moved in with the former embalmer. Today, Adriana struggles to take care of both herself and her mother after losing her job three years ago when the company she worked for moved to Connecticut. As she searches for a similar job, her life is consumed by the numerous odd jobs she must take in order to tend to her mother’s needs.

'I want to go back to my profession because I went to college for three and a half years and I worked very hard. I don’t think it’s fair that I have to come through the food line if I’m willing to work,' she says somberly of her position. Adriana refuses to go on welfare, seeing herself as a healthy and educated individual who just doesn’t need the program. It’s why coming to the food pantry caused her a great deal of inner turmoil. 'You have to do what you have to do,” she states as a matter of fact, “and that is why I am here.'

This new chapter of her life doesn’t define the person Adriana knows that she can become. She spends most of her days searching for new jobs in her field, diligently fighting an uphill battle. 'When you send in an application for a job, the job is there, but there are so many other people waiting in line for that job…. I never thought I would have to be in this position, but if it happens to me, it can happen to anyone.'

The disappointing job climate does not dismantle Adriana’s fortuitous demeanor. She knows she can get her family out of its rocky predicament, and maintains that, 'This is just a bad patch I am going through right now, but I will get back on me feet.'"

Adraina's story comes from one of a growing list of feedamerica-type websites that are doing a wonderful job of trying to wake Americans up to the problem of hunger in this country!

Get this through your head! Famine is coming to America! It'll be here much sooner than we think!

My personal opinion is that every household should have at least one year's worth of non-perishable, regularly rotated food on hand at all times.

Look at the photos! Try and visualize the heartbreak of a mother unable to feed her child!