Juuni Kokki #39

I've seen the end of the second Youko arc like four times, and I still wanted to applaud. And I'm not the only one who finds it surprisingly dense, in the good sense of "so much has happened surely this was 40 minutes, not 20?" Though as someone noted, in a sense nothing *happens*, action-wise; it's all talking or declarations or arrests. But awesome talking.

2 million farmers, 3 million Chicagoans, 4 million WoW players

What's an American? The real meat is in the first blog James links to, but I'm lazy and using his summary.

But I'll add a comment. One opposing comment on the original blog said basically "but you city types need farmers, while farmers don't need you." I'd dispute that: the way modern farmers actually work, not to mention live, they do need cities. Where do the tractors come from, not to mention the oil to run them? The fertilizer, pesticides, planes for distributing pesticides? The genetically engineered seeds? Not to mention all the lifestyle stuff of medicine, clothes, electronics, cars. Yes, in the event of the collapse of civilization, more farmers could survive by converting to subsistence farming than New Yorkers could, but this proves what, exactly?

I also liked a handful of other comments, which noted that if proximity to the soil is the soul of America, then the purest Americans are largely illegal immigrants.