Rayne Today

It's been the rational for using torture, a la Kiefer Sutherland's character on the television series "24" -- tick-tock-torture, to keep the time bomb at bay. But there never was a ticking time bomb, and they knew it. Their actions prove it. The flight logs and the timeline of the rendition flights skipped helterskelter across the world to different locations and venues; some of the flight plans took days, especially when teams of personnel from other entities and countries were involved. They didn't land at the closest place, nor did they land someplace where they would be out in the open, clearly questioning their rendered prey about the tick-tock-time-bomb because the immediacy of a potential attack warranted immediate action. Tick-tock, tick-tock.

Oh my. What a little time, less water and benign neglect can do to a garden. Compare this photo at right to the photos below at this post . Wowzer. These Early Girl tomatoes are just beginning to blush; I expect to pick them within the next 10 days. But they aren't very early, should have picked the first ones a few weeks ago. Another expectation shot in the keister: zucchinis are not yielding at all, only one has been harvested so far. You can see they've developed a case of mildew already, and that the young zucchinis yellow and drop off before they become established mature fruits. Going to hurt the double-chocolate zucchini bread forecast. Cucumbers, however, have been plentiful to the point of obnoxiousness. My spouse kept them picked while I was en vacance; I came home to a peck of them on the counter and more than a peck in the garden waiting to be picked. Unfortunately, the salad cucumbers outpaced the pickles on a 3-to-1 basis. May have to break down and pickle the sal...

This is an industry with rare consumer praise, even though consumers may want or need its services. Although there are far more than 1000 competing firms in this market, prices do not go down across the industry, suggesting competitive pressures have failed. It's a mature product, been around for most of our life times, yet the product has not earned more loyalty from consumers. Consumers die every day because of the failure of this industry to safely and effectively meet consumers' needs. It's been propped up by government through a number of different methods including market guarantees and supportive legislation. What industry is this? It's not the American auto industry and its supply chain, trying to reduce capacity and costs while taking government financing and benefitting from Cash for Clunkers. It's not the banking industry and the fat cat banksters wallowing in their TARP-funded bonuses. Give up guessing?