Jobs returning to the U.S.?

I happened to watch a Rock Center episode (with Brian Williams on ABC)where they were airing a program about a small town furniture company 'bringing back' jobs it had once offshored to China. In a nutshell this was the story -

Lincolnton, NC - Williams begins with "We are just starting to see the first glimmer of evidence that some of the jobs that were offshored to China are coming back. A factory owner who years back closed his furniture making business and sent it to China, has brought his factory back home. Lincolntown, NC, is home to Lincolnton Furniture once again.

It seems Bruce Cochran had sold the long time family furniture making business 25 yrs ago when he could no longer compete with the Chinese market. The company was offshored to China. Over the last two decades, after witnessing what was happening in America, stagnant wages, unemployement Bruce Cochran began to realize he was a big part of the problem, so he came out of retirement and reopened his factory in the very same warehouse it once was housed. He says it's about the people, and it has weighed heavy on his mind. The new factory has created 130 new jobs, some of the employees worked for the original company 25 years ago. In effect while Mitt Romney was busy outsourcing jobs to China, Bruce Cochran did just the opposite, he began "INsourcing" fine furniture manufacturing jobs into the US.

Hal Sircum is a senior partner at Boston Consulting and he sees Bruce as part of a new and dramatic shift. Sircum says gone are the days of China having a "cost advantage" over american made products, that China is not the bargain it used to be. He states the average chinese worker is about 1/4 as productive as the average US worker. That wages in China have gone up, shipping charges have more than doubled. The days of China so often having a cost advantage over U.S. producers is about to come to an end. "We're looking at the tipping point right now and by as early as 2015 many expect we'll be at the same level as the chinese cost wise. This encompasses varied products, televisions, computers, electronics in general, and industrial good like rubber and machinery. And that would mean millions of new american jobs in the next few years."

When asked how big an impact this will have on the US, Sirkin says its going to be huge, when you take the mfg jobs and the service jobs that will be created. We will add two to three million jobs to the workforce. And that is no small thing. Bruce Cochran feels personal redemption in his actions, a living parable about people and profits and priorities.

"To make no mistakes is not in the power of man; but from their errors and mistakes the wise and good learn wisdom for the future."

CAFO'S

Every time we head back to Washington, once every spring and once every fall, we pass by Harris Ranch CAFO. CAFO stands for Confined Animal Feeding Operations and there are far too many in California, to my way of thinking, even one is one too many. CAFOs often confine several thousand cows, in long steel barns, year-round. CAFO cows never graze. CAFOs look like factories, and they are -- animal factories. Miles before we even see the feedlot close to Stockton we can smell the horrific odors that eminate from it. The disgusting odor of manure from thousands of cows, standing, eating, and sleeping in their own rotting feces. I understand it is common practice to send cows raised for their meat, to lots such as Harris Ranch, for the final weeks prior to slaughter, to be fed a totally grain diet, it adds "marbelization" to the meat.

I don't know about most who pass by these types of lots, witness the horrific circumstances the animals are placed in, but I for one find it extremely difficult to eat beef anymore and only on the rarest of occasions do. I understand chickens are raised from birth in even worse (if possible) conditions for their meat, yet I still eat chicken, but imagine were I to visit a chicken farm I wouldn't be eating chicken anymore either, and its a sad statement that this is the best America can do to provide meat for our table. The torturing of animals on a massive scale, when surely there are alternatives that would be easier on the animals themselves and healthier for all of us to consume.

Our last trip "home" to Washington I found myself constantly snapping pictures of cows in open beaucolic fields and meadows, when Rod asked what was I doing I replied I was taking pictures of cows "as they should be".

I've read articles of the horrors CAFO's have brought to the state of Michigan, and the activist groups that have risen up to fight these huge corporations. The stench and sight of the farms is bad enough, but the toxins that result and seep into community drinking water, and the rotting cow manure that they liquify and spray on the fields of grain grown to feed these animals pollutes the very air.


When we bought this house in south Bakersfield we loved it was in the 'burbs, that just a mile away were miles and miles of agricultural fields. We noticed the large, what we had thought was a dairy farm, just beyond the corn fields, and at that time, just 3 years ago, didn't detect any smells whatsoever wafting from that farm. This past summer however, for the first time, we are smelling on a more and more regular basis, the same stench in the morning air, as that we pass at Harris Farm. On clear sunny days its often not noticeable, but on overcast days, when cloud cover keeps the toxins and smog closer to the ground, it gets pretty bad. But I fear this is just the beginning, and I don't know that most Bakersfield residents are yet aware of where this could lead. I have searched websites re CAFO's in the Bakersfield area but so far have not come across any or any complaints directed at them. I will keep looking, surely I'm not alone in noticing this new undesireable element in our community.

The Long Hot Summer

Another long hot summer in Bakersfield. We are 3 months into what seems (to me!) the longest and hottest summer since we made our move to California back in the early spring of 2005. for the first time ever, my poor vegetable garden couldn't keep up with the suns relentless blaze. It died a slow death by the beginning of this month despite all my efforts to save it. For the past month of August alone, here in Bako, we've experienced, suffered through, 105 - 110 degree days, with little respite. Filling the pool the 4 or 5 inches of water it loses each day due to evaporation, has become a daily to-do. In fact, adding cold water to it is the only thing that has made it a refreshing experience, rather than a bath!

The last time I felt this oppressed by the heat was our very first summer after moving to Taft, from the moderate, 4 seasons, weather of the northwest. It would be 5 years before we'd purchase our current home with a pool in Bakersfield. That first summer in Taft was especially memorable, enduring temperatures far higher on a daily basis than we'd EVER experienced. The swamp cooler in our little bungalow rental could just barely keep up...well in effect it didn't...we just adapted the best we could. I had purchased a small, round, above ground pool that fit perfectly on my front patio (the landlord didn't want me setting it on the backyard lawn as it would kill it) and every day thats where you'd find me!

Happily the pool at our new home is slightly larger!

Gosh, as I look back its' hard to believe 7 years have passed in this chapter of our lives. Back in 2004 when faced with our sons 12 1/2 year sentence, it seemed a lifetime would pass before we would see him walk out of prison. Now that almost 8 1/2 yrs have passed since Coreys arrest leading to his encarceration in a southern California prison, these past years seem a blur, it's like they slid by in the blink of an eye. But when I think to myself "really?", I know thats simply not true. It feels great mind you, to be at this point in time on this journey, where the road behind is far, far longer than the one ahead, next fall of 2013 Corey will walk out of prison.

This will be our last Thanksgiving and our last Christmas spent in a Federal prison visitation room. We'll share one more New Years Day, one more birthday each (mine, Rods, and Coreys), one more Daylights Saving period, one more Mothers Day and one more Fathers Day and one more July 4th in a prison visitation room. My good friends, the Santos, experienced the joy of freedom two weeks ago, on Monday, August 13th, when Michael walked out of prison a free man after a 25 years sentence for a first time, nonviolent drug conviction. We've shared many experiences and stories over these past 8 years, since I first met Carole online as I frantically searched to educate myself, and my son, on what to expect of the prison "experience" upon learning he'd actually be sent to Prison. Seeing Michael and Caroles happy post-release pictures on his Facebook page (go to http://www.facebook.com/pages/Michael-G-Santos/101936186518234) and talking with Carole as she describes the experience of release, and Michaels new and exciting adventures in the world fills me with optomism. Our turn is next.

"The realist sees reality as concrete. The optimist sees reality as clay." ~ Robert Brault