Genesis

Greetings good citizen,

Today’s offering is from the ‘neverending’ chronicles of Genesis:

The Sarasota-Bradenton metropolitan area, a two-county sprawl of condominiums, marinas and retirement homes, saw the proportion of people living below the poverty line rise by more between 2007 and 2009 than any other big city in America, from 9.2% to 13.7%, according to the Census Bureau. Nor is Sarasota an aberration. All the other metropolitan areas that saw jumps of four points or more are also formerly fast-growing southern and western cities: Bakersfield, California; Boise, Idaho; Greenville, South Carolina; Lakeland, Florida and Tucson, Arizona. Arizona now has the second highest poverty rate in the nation, after Mississippi. The especially severe housing bust that ended the breakneck growth of these sunbelt cities has brought with it deprivation on a scale they have never previously encountered and are struggling to address.

Were we to re-write this article to correct the glaring omissions it would read something like this:

As the Rustbelt turned from being the engine of the nation’s economy into a literal desert, the fleeing populace naturally gravitated toward the lower paying (but also cheaper to afford) sunbelt.

The sunbelt was growing while the Rustbelt was dying, so you wouldn’t be off-base to suggest that the ‘refugees’ were being ‘herded’ to the south in an unnatural reverse migration.

The above article seems to suggest that the mass migration south was driven by now shattered Real Estate market, belying the fact that few would voluntarily move to the ‘zero-tolerance’ South.

Although reality dictates that people will suffer much to enjoy tolerable weather conditions…which sort of creates a double rationale, it’s what makes the locals jerks as well as why people put up with them.

Sadly, there is another ‘trade-off’ to endure when hunting a more favorable climate. You may not freeze to death but in exchange you are obliged to ‘feed the bugs’ because they like it warm too.

So, what is ‘really’ driving the uptick in poverty across the ‘sunbelt’ states?

It is, without doubt, the desertification of the nation’s heartland/economy.

And no amount of ‘education OR investment’ is going to alter that.

The only force capable of making ‘the (economic) desert’ flower once again is the LAW.

(But from a sustainability point of view it is probably a good idea to shift most of the population as far south as possible, if only for the energy savings.)

But, as things are shaping up, it is unlikely there will be a ‘resource shortage’ in the mid-distant future, after much of the ‘surplus population’ has succeeded in eliminating itself.

(No irony should be lost on the fact that by attempting to wipe out the poor, the rich will only succeed in wiping themselves out.)

How odd is it that they are currently sitting as good as it is ever going to get?

But this isn’t about them, it’s about US!

This whole shooting match takes on a different perspective if we view ourselves as the current ‘version’ of the original ‘Native population’.

Cowboys and Indians, a game they seem to never tire of…although the Cowboys never did very well against the Indians, it was the Army (an especially robust one after the civil war) that put an end to the Native’s ‘self-determination’.

No irony should be lost on the fact that your power to ‘choose’ has been lost as well.

The ‘ballot box’ only works for the (very well-connected) Cowboys, you Indians get to play the ‘fuckees’ again.

Thus are the chronicles of Genesis ‘never-ending’.

Same as it ever was…(although I think this time the Cowboys have bitten off more than they can chew.)

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner