Empty Fields Empty Promises

The right to farm is essential to everyone's survival. Since the late 1970s, states across the nation have adopted so-called right-to-farm laws to limit nuisance suits loosely related to agriculture. But since their adoption, there has yet to be a comprehensive analysis of what these laws do and who they benefit. This book offers the first national analysis and guide to these laws. It reveals that they generally benefit the largest operators, like processing plants, while traditional farmers benefit the least. Disfavored most of all are those seeking to defend their homes and environment against multinational corporations that use right-to-farm laws to strip neighboring owners of their property rights. Through what the book calls the "midburden," right-to-farm laws dispossess the many in favor of the few, paving the path to rural poverty. Empty Fields, Empty Promises summarizes every state's right-to-farm laws to help readers track and navigate their local and regional legal landscape. The book concludes by offering paths forward for a more distributed and democratic agrifood system that achieves agricultural, rural, and environmental justice.

Wilson explores the empty promises of the "good life" that include the seduction of achievement, addiction to approval, attraction of wealth, and perils of power. He shows how to replace those idols by turning focus and worship toward God.

Most of us live with the stubborn idea that we'll always have tomorrow. But sooner or later all of our tomorrows will run out. Each day that you postpone the hard work and succumb to the clutter that chokes creativity, discipline, and innovation will result in a net deficit to the world, to your company, and to yourself. Die Empty is a tool for individuals and companies that aren't willing to put off their best work. Todd Henry explains the forces that keep people in stagnation and introduces a three-part process for tapping into your passion: Excavate: Find the bedrock of your work to discover what drives you. Cultivate: Learn how to develop the curiosity, humility, and persistence that save you from getting stuck in ruts. Resonate: Learn how your unique brilliance can inspire others. Henry shows how to find and sustain your passion and curiosity, even in tough times.

Revival Road: Poetic Memoirs Of A Broken Spirit By: Matthew Tringali Matthew Tringali hopes his book of poems, Revival Road: Poetic Memoirs Of A Broken Spirit, will bring hope to others. The collection is arranged chronologically, sharing his earliest experiences through the current day. This eloquent collection shares his journey from despair to hope. Matthew Tringali credits his family and pastor for helping him through his struggles to a place where he could bring his message to the world. He is learning to read and write music, trying his hand at singing and guitar, and hopes to set his poems to music someday.

A fascinating sociological assessment of the damaging effects of the for†‘profit partnership between government and corporation on rural Americans Why is government distrust rampant, especially in the rural United States? This book offers a simple explanation: corporations and the government together dispossess rural people of their prosperity, and even their property. Based on four years of fieldwork, this eye†‘opening assessment by sociologist Loka Ashwood plays out in a mixed†‘race Georgia community that hosted the first nuclear power reactors sanctioned by the government in three decades. This work serves as an explanatory mirror of prominent trends in current American politics. Churches become havens for redemption, poaching a means of retribution, guns a tool of self†‘defense, and nuclear power a faltering solution to global warming as governance strays from democratic principles. In the absence of hope or trust in rulers, rural racial tensions fester and divide. The book tells of the rebellion that unfolds as the rights of corporations supersede the rights of humans.

“This is not only the best environmental sociology text I’ve used, but it is the best text of any type I’ve used in college-level teaching.” –Dr. Cliff Brown, University of New Hampshire Join author Mike Bell and new co-author Loka Ashwood as they explore “the biggest community of all” and bring out the sociology of environmental possibility. The highly-anticipated Fifth Edition of An Invitation to Environmental Sociology delves into this rapidly changing and growing field in a clear and artful manner. Written in a lively, engaging style, this book explores the broad range of topics in environmental sociology with a personal passion rarely seen in sociology books. The Fifth Edition contains new chapters entitled “Money and Markets,” “Technology and Science,” and “Living in An Ecological Society.” In addition, this edition brings in fresh material on extraction between core and periphery countries, the industrialization of agriculture, the hazards of fossil fuel production, environmental security, and making environmentalism normal.

Over the Texan landscape lies the bloody stain of a forgotten defeat. Commemorated only by a lone monument is the death of Cherokee Chief Duwal’li executed on July 16, 1839 while leading a pan-tribal resistance of 800 warriors. The fight that took his life is called the Battle of Neches but to those who know the full story, it was truly a massacre. Duwal’li’s troubles with foreign settlers began in 1773 with the slaying of his father. It ended in his heroic attempt to secure land titles for the Cherokees and the associated tribes he represented. Faced with deceit and bigotry at every turn, Duwal’li’s struggle turned to tragedy when he was forced to confront the army of the newly formed Republic of Texas. Turning her perceptive eye to this overlooked moment in history, celebrated author, Sally McClain, sets the record straight with meticulous research and sweeping historical vision. Hers is a damning look at the harmful philosophy called Manifest Destiny and the devastation of westward expansion. Yet, A Taint on Texas seeks not only to condemn but to heal. For ultimately, this history is a renewed monument to the life of Chief Duawl’li so that his life and struggle may stand as an inspiration for the ages. It is an important book that will be welcomed by Native Americans, history buffs and truth seekers everywhere.