I will not cease talking about this

Good McCain:

Through his lack of support for ethanol, a fuel made from corn that benefits Iowa's farm economy, McCain, who has not campaigned in Iowa, made it clear he would take a stand for his issues. This was true whether or not the issues favored Iowa--making him look as if he was trying to appeal to his New Hampshire supporters more than gain the support of Iowans.

"I'm here to tell you that I'm going to tell you the things that you don't want to hear, as well as the things you want to hear, and one of those is ethanol," McCain said. "Ethanol is not worth it. It does not help the consumer."

And over time, he has gotten worse. Click that link. Read it.

No really, read it. And here is McCain being flat out hilarious.

But here's what's frightening: I agree with Jeff Sachs.

The issue of spiralling food and energy prices is also fueling an emerging debate over how much the rising prices can be blamed on ethanol production. The basic argument is that because ethanol comes from corn, the push to replace some traditional fuels with ethanol has created a new demand for corn that has thrown off world food prices.

Jean Ziegler, United Nations Special Rapporteur On The Right To Food, has called using food crops to create ethanol "a crime against humanity".

"We've been putting our food into the gas tank," Sachs of Columbia University said.

I mean, damn. I don't buy the right to food thing, but crime against humanity isn't so far off. Here's some of the details from a great editorial by David Ridenour.

Never mind that ethanol is helping spike food prices. Corn prices have already increased by 70 percent since 2005, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture projects they will rise an additional 10 percent to 20 percent this year.

But that's not the half of it. Corn-dependent livestock are also increasing in price. The USDA estimates that corn feed price increases added nearly 9 percent to the price of beef last year. But this doesn't include the indirect costs. U.S. beef cattle herds declined by 338,000 in 2007, increasing beef prices further, in part due to higher prices for feed, according to the American Farm Bureau Federation.

Ethanol advocates claim that rising corn costs have contributed only modestly to the overall increase in food prices. They're not being entirely honest, as they're only counting the direct costs of ethanol. They don't count, for example, increases in soybean prices resulting from farmers switching to the more lucrative corn crop. Soybean crops dropped by 11 million acres last year — much of it used to produce corn.

Here am I discovering an initial supply shock and one of the problems of ethanol - it takes fuel to transport ethanol since you can't pipeline it. Here I note congress tries to punish gas makers for charging more with the new ethanol regulations. And finally, I play the role of the silly optimist, thinking that since these problems are so simple, why not just fix them like this? You could even pay the corn growers a subidy if you'd feel better, because at least it wouldn't screw with world food prices as much. Is that too much a price to pay to make food more affordable?

Schools

So a charter school in Minnesota drew fire because it's basically a Muslim school. From the local news (HT Drudge):

Being a charter school Tarek ibn Ziyad Academy, or TIZA, is supported by tax dollars. The teacher told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS the presence of religion she observed at the school took her b surprise.

TIZA Executive Director Azad Zaman insisted the school follows with state and federal laws.

"TIZA does not endorse any religion," he said.

However, TIZA Academy is sponsored by Islamic Relief USA, based in California.

Based in California! Gasp! The story gets interesting here:

The questions came after substitute teacher Amanda Getz taught at TIZA last month and told the Star Tribune about things she observed that day that shocked her.

"I've been in a lot of schools and I've never been in a school where they had washing rituals, or they had prayer, or where they had a room where you had to take your shoes off," Getz said.

"It is most likely that this substitute teacher was sadly mistaken," said Zaman.

He said the school follows state and federal guidelines when it comes to religion.

Granted, one can certainly argue the merits of the word ritual, especially since this is a TV news story so there is very little content. And rituals are a good way to make sure kids actually to remember to wash their hands, to be fair (maybe they should do something similar for doctors) But the blanket denials by Zaman (whose full name, Azad Zaman, is worth 31 points in Scrabble) are just plain hilarious. 'What? Washing rituals? This teacher is mistaken.' My favorite part:

State law requires the school to fly an American flag during school hours, however no flag flies outside of TIZA Academy.

Zaman told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS he didn’t know how to work the flagpole.

THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE A SCHOOL! If you don't know how, you learn how. Any 8 year old cub scout could tell you how. You hook the flag on and pull the rope. Not hard.

But speaking of learning, I figured I'd actually look this school up on Wikipedia, to see what I could learn. It's not that controversial, because no Wikipedia entry exists, so I went to the school's website. The school lunch menu doesn't contain any bacon, ham or pork. The school does not have a week long spring break, just the Thursday and Friday before easter, although it does offer a week long break during Ramadan. There is a break for Christmas as well as Eid-al-Adha (Abraham's willingness to sacrifice his son). They also teach the kids Arabic.

But really, this is not a religious school. The school is designed to cater to Muslim Students, who then make up more of the student body. Nothing wrong with that. But regardless, I'm still laughing at Zaman.