Great story on the cooking of pork, and as a confirmed barbecuer, I've smoked my share.

Here in Iowa, though, the #1 problem is CAFOs, Confined Animal Feeding Operations, or as they're popularly known, hog lots.

These operations confine, as their name suggests, several hundred animals at a time. Apart from the appalling treatment of the animals, who are barely able to move for their entire lives, the pollution runoff is about what you'd imagine.

One of these CAFOs can kill an entire community. Neighboring houses become unlivable, first because of the stench and flies, then because of the water and soil pollution. There are no statistics on declining property values because statistics are based on sales figures, and houses become unsaleable. So your home goes, almost overnight, from being a nice little place in the country to something you can't live in and can't get rid of. Who would you sell it to? If you're lucky, the hog lot operator, for expansion, at bottom dollar. Otherwise, it's simply abandoned, the investment lost, often by those who can least afford it.

CAFOs are sprouting everywhere in this state, next to urban bedroom communities, vacation destinations and tourist attractions (there actually are a few). The lack of a local control option, which would allow citizens in a county to vote new CAFOs up or down, means that the only defense is publicity and community action that, understandably, can sometimes border on vigilantism.

After a long hard campaign, Democrats won control of both houses of the Legislature and the Governor's office in the last election, largely due to this issue. Because of the strength of the agricultural lobby, a bill to institute local control never made it out of committee.

That's where your pork is coming from, and why it's so cheap. During the long gone "other white meat" era, the animals were exercised to keep them lean. CAFOs took over when it was realized that the meat from a too-lean pig was dry and tasteless, and a pig that never moved was cheaper to manage, making the meat cheaper to produce. The effect on the land, air and water is never figured in, making this a particularly vicious form of slash and burn agriculture.

If you have to eat pork (and I confess, I love it), opt for cuts that come from the "Neiman Ranch" type of production -- free range animals raised in clean, nonpolluting operations. It's more expensive, but healthier meat, and far better for the land.

Neiman Ranch's unofficial slogan is "These animals have only one bad day in their lives."

After that, have I got a sauce recipe for you.

It was Dean. And the times.

Most of Emanuel's candidates lost, using the old Democratic Machine power strategy, a point that isn't mentioned in the article. After years of being fooled, the electorate is rightly suspicious of no-issue machine politics. There couldn't be a more satisfactory epitaph for it than Emanuel's parting shot.

Dean had the wisdom to build the party throughout the country, and to engage the issues that caught the people. For the first time, intelligent policy is winning in this country, at the state and national level. There's a lot more to be done, but it's the first time we've known hope since 1978.

Emanuel has already been kicked upstairs, and his ex-colleagues at the DCCC speak of him with admiration, but in the past tense. The future belongs to those who speak to the issues, and nobody does it better than Dean. No corruption, no machine. Just the facts.

I hope, out in Hollywood, Jack Webb is turning over. His heroes, with no thanks to Chicago, are about to be barbecued.

something I can almost agree on with Traister.

"Silver Palate" and its sequel were great books; good writing about fine food with achievable recipes, and the underappreciated precursor to all that's followed. It wasn't about class achievement, though; in fact, it was anti-class.

Its theme was that anyone can eat well, with taste and intelligence, regardless of pocketbook. It was revolutionary, and not only in cuisine. If you can eat well, what else can you achieve?

Call it nouveau bohemian intellectual.

Tom, is that you?

Dean would be the first to agree with you. Early on, he said that he was a better irritant than candidate. Worst news of 2007 is that his former manager is now working for John Edwards.

This has nothing to do with Emanuel's failure. Like the Bush machine, his first rule is to give everyone a medal and proclaim victory. Then announce it to the hometown press.

Yes, you are a prude, Walsh. And you give feminists everywhere a bad name. Buy yourself a sense of humor--I hear they're cheap on eBay.

Heartland Woman, courtesy Eric Free

His sign read "Will do anything, say anything, for money and power."

One doesn't have a cowboy hat.

That's the Secret.

The "tired rehash" posting from nabalzbbfr, or however you spell it, mentioning "another spasm of Bush Derangement Syndrome," was so out of character with the justifiable outrage shown by the rest of the thread that I checked back and found this over the same signature, from April 28:

"This is all Bush derangement syndrome. Like Abraham Lincoln and Harry Truman, George W. Bush is mocked and reviled by the mobs and the demagogues during the latter part of his term in office. As Jesus said, "A prophet is not without honor, save in his own country, and among his own kin, and in his own house". And President Bush will be seen in hindsight as a great Prophet, who set in motion the forces of freedom and prosperity both here in the US and throughout the world."

We know Bush hasn't been seen much lately, limiting himself to conducting bands, dancing or insulting the Queen. Seems the burden of the office has driven him to more relaxing activities, like posting on Salon.

I guess somebody has to defend him.