An Urban's Rural View

Do both yourself and your heirs a favor. Write a brief, (or lengthy, if you prefer) autobiography -- or at least your own obituary.

To maintain the current level of ag exports, much less expand them, Uncle Sam must do more than just basic blocking and tackling.

Americans will probably always be polarized, but they can still deal with each other as people rather than ideological stereotypes.

The Federal Reserve is warning interest rates will go higher and stay higher longer. Financial markets aren't convinced.

In a war with China over Taiwan, war games suggest the U.S. could run out of munitions in a week.

A new book makes a compelling case for preserving the world's big five megaforests and 2,000 intact forest landscapes.

Americans don't wait for the government to do everything. We roll up our sleeves and do some of it ourselves. Be thankful for that.

Finding reason for hope in two election-week events that some might view less sanguinely.

The National Aeronautics and Space Administration's success in knocking an asteroid off course is, as NASA's director says, "a watershed moment for planetary defense and a watershed moment for humanity."

China's president professes a fondness for Iowa but U.S.-China relations have spiraled downward on his watch nonetheless. With relations getting chillier, the U.S. and China need a crisis-management mechanism.

Farmers are always free not to use conservation easements, but there's no reason to demonize them.

U.S. companies sell a lot of semiconductors but increasingly make them overseas. The government is spending big bucks to encourage more domestic production.

The techno-optimists have been right (and the Malthusians wrong) about agriculture's ability to keep up with population growth, but a new book challenges techno-optimism on the decarbonization front.

To avoid having to raise interest rates into the stratosphere in the long run, as the Federal Reserve did in the early 1980s, today's Fed looks likely to continue to impose unusually large increases in the short run.

The U.S. has a Labor Day, not a May Day, even though the May Day in many other countries commemorates an 1886 incident in Chicago, the Haymarket Riot.

Speculators have wound down their collective long position in ag futures. The strong dollar was one of the reasons.

Speculators have wound down their collective long position in ag futures. The strong dollar was one of the reasons.

In 2020, when the pandemic was at its worst, the Newport Farmer's Market in Newport, Oregon, was a shadow of its former itself. Now it's back.

Sri Lanka's president mandated an overnight switch to organic agriculture and crop production plummeted.

There's more government money available for rural broadband internet, thanks to last year's $1.2 trillion infrastructure law. Now the challenge is to make sure it's spent where it's needed.