Corn has nearly tripled in price in the last year? Does it matter if their numbers are 3 or 5%? (Yes)

Its quite possible that this low number is leveraging the price of corn. However, food processing companies can absorb the added cost. (Big big point here)

Eventually they may stop selling processed food altogether, (deflation means product is not going to market, and todays crude oil inventory report is bad, a build in supply and lower capacity utilization). Remember when Alcoa shuttered its biggest aluminum plant, and sold the energy contract, and made a profit?

However rather than collapse the economy, food production will head offshore, (but protectionism, and lax regulation pose a real problem. The Bush people killed the dollar hoping it would revive American manufacturing. It didn't. Eventually the rush offshore will stop, and then what?

In the corn for ethanol debate, diverting corn for fuel is the equivalent of closing down a factory, and selling back the energy that factory was going to use. (After Alcoa we started buyng Aluminum from overseas) Will all your cornflakes be made in China in ten years? Probably. The food industry is going to get the Walmart challenge; lower your prices, your profit margins, or move offshore. (Just more of the same)

As has been duly noted by many, the actual value of corn in a box of cornflakes is only about a nickel. Where's the rest of the $4 coming from? (Jack knows, Jack in those Jack-the-Box commercials says, "why is oil so expensive, it's just laying there in the ground?")

what we need is the energy equivalent of the 99 cent taco..

the ethanol boondoggle will squeeze the foodmakers, and provide more energy. (Where does it end, now that even our government has gotten into the act? specifically the ANTI-TRUST ACT, but will the American people complain? Not if means lower prices..)

The Republicans in California (LA Times) have always drawn a lot of voting power from independents. When Ron Nehring took over the state party, his first move was to block independents from the Republican primary in this election cycle. Maybe the independents took it personally. When the governor was trying to defeat the Public Unions Initiative, he chose stealth campaigning, meeting privately in the homes of core party supporters. This may be the downside of small tent politics.

Most Bric countries are building storage, and the US is considering adding storage. The cost of above ground storage can add a couple dollars to each barrel of oil. Note that even as oil prices were rising the Bush administration was adding oil to the SPR. Sometimes these purchases take on a desperate quality, which only acerbates the problem.

I know its unreasonable to expect a coherent policy out of SCOTUS or POTUS for that matter, but the gun ruling should be part of a larger effort to remove all prior restraint laws. Drinking and driving? Drugs? Homeland Securities No-Fly list? The general trend toward greater government intrusion into private lives, at the expense of our Constitutional Rights, doesn't begin or end with gun laws. To wit no voter initiative should have the legal basis to overturn Constitutional Rights. Is SCOTUS suddenly going to take a Libertarian turn?

The suggestion that this might become the wedge issue Republicans desire, is completely misguided, the wedge issue is Gay Marriage, and it is already on the ballot in California. There cannot be two wedge issues. The collision between Libertarians and Law and Order (Terrorism fighting) Republicans promises to do McCains campaign more harm than good.

The stage is being set for President Obama to use his bully pulpit to deride the court, and rail against its recent decisions, from the 2000 election debacle, to Imminent Domain. Now this works in the Democrats favor. SCOTUS could become a Libertarian political body. Handguns in DC? How about Cocaine? Prostitution? The door is open.

You miss the forest for the trees, Glenn. A lot of Democrats are in trouble. I write my (one) Democratic Senator, Boxer, and she is desperately raising money to fight off the Right Wing challenge. Why is that? The Republicans have Feinstein in their pocket, divide and conquer.

The Right defines the center, and until the Democrats define the center, they will be the understudy.

The first thing Obama needs to do is give back the campaign contributions he has taken from Wall Street. The market is tanking and THEY are already blaming him. Let the dogs loose, Wall Street and Main Street are on very different realities. (Bob Novak said once, that George Bush should run the economy for the benefit of American Business, and not a bunch of Liberal stockpickers.) Novak is now the media outlet for the Federal Reserve, as they leak news about interest rates directly to him.

Second thing, put Bernanke on notice.

Third, use the bully pulpit to rail against Congressional acquiescence on the Iran spending bills. Stand up to the Democratic Congress, and Pelosi.

Fourth, negotiate directly with Iran. NOW. THe rumor mill has it that Bush plans to bomb Iran after the elections. Let Bush complain, he has less than a 1/4 of the American people behind him, and none of his Congressional Republicans.

Fifth, make appeareances with Democratic voices against Bush, like Kuchinich, and promise him a cabinet post.

So far there is no real change in Obamas rhetoric. and the move to the center is probably already underway, after that lovefeast with Clinton, its a done deal.