Most American historians with any sensitivity to the strategic significance of salt will recognize that Saltville, VA, in the far southwestern corner of the Old Dominion, was the scene for two major battles as the Confederacy fought to protect its sole source of this crucial mineral and the Union tried to tighten its economic blockade.
Retired Virginia Tech chemistry professor Jim Glanville has done more than any person to restore the luster of Saltville's rich heritage, including a steady publicity effort. His latest media foray appeared in today's Richmond Times-Dispatch, entitled "A similar tale predates Pocahontas " in which Glanville tells the story of an early Indian "chieftainess" who married a European (acually, one of two recorded).
As Virginia prepares to celebrate the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the Jamestown settlers in 1607, Glanville recounts the documented vist -- a full 40 years earlier -- of 15 Spanish conquistidores who sacked the fortified Indian village erected at Saltville to obtain salt from the saline springs there. The Spanish boasted of burning 50 huts and killling 1,000 defenders, though Glanville considers this hyperbole. In any case, the "first battle of Saltville" was 290 years before the Civil War clash.
Looking for a Christmas gift that's perfect for a young person who you'd like to know about salt? Consider The Story of Salt by Mark Kurlansky with wonderful illustrations by S.D. Schindler. It's a digestable version of Kurlansky's Salt: A World History. (No, we get no royalties; this is an unsolicited testimonial). Says the School Library Journal:
"Kurlansky uses salt as the lens through which to present a new perspective on history. [T]he author mixes science, history, and personal anecdotes, resulting in a fascinating look at this amazing substance. Schindler's humorously detailed pen-and-ink drawings with colorful washes enliven the narrative and help to convey the wealth of information in the text. A lively and well-researched title, with exemplary art."
Never we're John Donne's words more appropriate than in today's global village. Operating in an international environment can only benefit from broad-based relationships and a knowledge of what is going on around the world. Louis Pasteur, whose public health achievements I've described in two textbooks once said, "Chance favors the prepared mind." In keeping with that precept, the Salt Institute has maintained a close relationship with The Salt Science Research Foundation (SSRF) in Japan, exchanging technical information and new developments, whenever possible. On October 16, Mr. Hitoshi Kusume, President of the Salt Science Research Foundation, and Mr. Kiyoshi Kawabata, Associate General Manager, visited the Salt Institute and had an excellent meeting with Dick Hanneman who assisted them with visits to other venues in North America.
While on a private visit to Japan, I took the opportunity to return the visit and dropped by the SSRF offices in Tokyo where I was kindly received by Mr. Kawabata and the Managing Director, Dr. Tsutomu Ikeda.
The SSRF has significant funding from the Japanese government and is able to sponsor a significant amout of truly cutting edge research in a variety of salt-related areas. Among the projects we had an opportunity to discuss were genetic analysis being carried out on a range of hypertension and salt-sensitivity areas, as well as salt tolerance/acclimatization and taste response research using the latest DNA microarray analysis methods. Whenever possible, we will continue to share and exchange knowlege with colleagues in the salt sector on both sides of the Atalantic and Pacific to everyone's mutual benefit.
The accession of Congressional Democrats, Daniel Ortega's Sandinistas and Margaret Chan are big news this week.
Speaker Pelosi, and likely-Majority Leader Reid promise to push the U.S. government in an undefined "new direction" and the patience of incoming Democratic committee chairs will test civility in Washington. Only a dramatic gesture from President Bush such as replacing Sec. of Defense Don Rumsfeld (with former US Sen. Sam Nunn) and/or accepting V-P Dick Cheney's resignation (to be replaced by Colin Powell) can preserve the President's ability to set the agenda effectively for the last two years of his term. As the phone company Verizon advertises: "Can you hear me now?" The election underscores the importance of listening in our democratic government.
In Nicaragua, it's probably "head for the exits" time as Daniel Ortega returns as president with a plurality in a multi-candidate field. When the Sandinistas ran the country from 1979-1990, according to the International Monetary Fund, per capita income in the country fell by two-thirds.
Dr. Margaret Chan won nomination as the new Director General of the World Health Organization, the first woman and first Chinese national to hold the post. She had been in charge of public health in Hong Kong. Passed over, appropriately, was Finland's Pekka Pushka, who spearheaded WHO's unfortunate foray into publlic health nutrition with its Global Strategy embodied in Report 916.
The Salt Institute has been singled out as an example of nefarious behind-the-scenes policy manipulation in a story in yesterday's Chicago Tribune .
The subject is Emergency Evacuation Report Card 2006 , a new study funded by the American Bus Association and produced and publicized by the American Highway Users Alliance (AHUA). The study shows that many large U.S. cities have deficient emergency plans to evacuate their populations. Our involvement? I sit on the AHUA Board.
It turns out that the Salt Institute has a major interest in Chicago's plans to move traffic smoothly and safely in emergencies -- if a dozen or more snowstorms every winter are emergencies. Fortunately, the City (unlike the Trib) takes these "emergencies" in stride with one of the most effective winter maintenance programs in North America.
The Trib advises "take the (AHUA) study with a large grain of salt." Fortunately, Chicagoans know better: they take every winter storm emergency with lots of grains of salt.
The federal Office of Management and Budget has reported the final annual budget deficit was cut from an earlier-estimated $423 billion to "only" $248 billion. Where did the extra $175 billion come from. Not from spending cuts; from increased tax revenues.
What gives? Congress just extended many of the Bush tax cuts. The answer is of more than passing interest for U.S. manufacturers, many of whom have been able to cut their effective tax rates, especially when a voter decision on November 8 could well install Rep Charles Rangel (D-NY) in the key power role of chairman of the tax-writing House Ways and Means Committee. Rangel has pledged to repeal the Bush tax cuts, stating that he "can't think of one" that should be extended. Pres. Bush has indicated his continued intent to have his tax cuts made permanent . So the election will make a difference.
With lower rates, Congressional budgeteers calculate, tax revenues will be reduced reflecting the lower marginal rates. "Static scoring" is the technical term. Contrast that to the alternative economic model, "dynamic scoring" whereby the model is tweaked to accept the possibility that reduced RATES will stimulate additional economic activity and generate new, additional amounts of revenue.
Well, if today's deficit news proves anything besides the fact that economics is still an inexact science, it is that dynamic scoring needs to become the operating procedure of the Congressional Budget Office.
The news of discovery of four salt men in Chehr Abad mine was last reported on July 27 in SaltSensibility . They are among the very rare mummies formed as a result of natural conditions. Samples of these salt men were sent to Oxford and Cambridge for genetic studies and DNA analysis. Today, the director of the archaeological team working at the Chehr Abad Salt Mine announced that a group of Oxford archaeologists expressed interest in being part of the study team working at the mine site.
There are 14,000 known uses of salt and I've just run across one I hadn't heard before, but it may be on the list already. I'm in Prince Edward Island for the annual meeting of the Transportation Association of Canada and here learned among the local lore of a means by which the Prohibition-era bootleggers avoided interdiction of their off-shore deliveries: by using salt. The bootleggers would weigh-down barrels of rum with blocks of salt and pitch them over the side of their ships at the appointed delivery point; then, depart, perhaps hotly pursued by the Coast Guard. Their land-based confederates would wait until the salt blocks dissolved enough to release the buoyant rum barrels and then row out and retrieve them when no Coast Guard was around. Let's hope someone has developed a means to thwart this tried-and-true method of clandestine "importation."
It seems everybody wants to visit a salt mine. Small surprise, that. Cargill Deicing Technology is capitalizing on that interest to earn some valuable industry PR as this article in today's Cleveland Plain Dealer shows.
The July/August issue of The American Enterprise has an insightful story by Dave Cloud on "Missing Factory Jobs ".
He leads with this: "Since 2000, over 4.5 million manufacturing jobs have been lost nationwide." Later in the story, he drops the fact that this country lost 15 million manufacturing jobs between 1995 and 2002. You've probably heard similar number batted around during the 2004 US presidential campaign as Democrats sought to downplay the economic recovery that has been underway for most of the Bush Adminstration. The jobs have been "off-shored" they say, shipped off to such low-wage countries as China which are, thus, responsible for unacceptably high unemployment in the U.S., particularly in manufacturing industries.
But, Cloud has a surprise. The country ISN'T the U.S. at all. It's China. China has lost 4.5 million manufacturing jobs since 2000. And in the years 1995-2002, China lost fully 15 million factory jobs (compared to 2 million in the U.S.).
"Off-shoring"? To where? Where are our manufacturing jobs going and, even more fascinating: where are Chinese manufacturing jobs going? Answer: away. They're not being re-located at all; they're disappearing entirely as productivity advances squeeze inefficiencies out of manufacturing processes.
Obviously, China is growing rapidly, including its manufacturing sector. U.S. manufacturers, too, are growing. As Cloud points out: "Total manufacturing output in the U.S. is actually at its highest level ever. What we are seeing is a continuation of a healthy productivity trend…."
What? Didn't that "good news" make your newspaper?
The NAM's blog headlines "Margarita Lovers, Rejoice " and their story reports agreement by Mexico to allow bulk imports of tequila into the U.S., concluding: "Searchin' for my lost shaker of salt..." The mararita-rim market may not be pivotal to the salt industry, but we appreciate the business. Hooray for free trade!
The salt industry shares with other engines of the economy the role of adding value to our common enterprise -- our products, jobs/wages, and the taxes we pay (there, that validates a salt connection for these thoughts).
This past week, the Dow Industrial Average reached 11,000 for the first time since 9/11. It has risen from 8,601 since May 2003 when the Bush Administration's tax cuts became effective. Since May 2003, then, the growing value of equities reflected in the Dow has added $5 trillion in shareholder value.
The increase in shareholder value is equivalent to all federal spending in the same period, by my calculations; I haven't seen any commentary to that effect.
If my numbers are right, they illustrate a larger point beyond the value of low tax rates: federal spending is the "tail" of the economy's "dog." It is the private sector that adds value to our common enterprise. Swings in the health of the private sector have consequence far beyond the allocation of $2 trillion a year in federal spending (about half of it for just three programs: Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security).
I couldn't resist. This isn't salt-related at all unless you stretch and say that everyone "worth their salt" gives gifts during the Christmas season. For years, PNC Bank has been calculating the cost of providing the "partridge in a pear tree" and other gifts of the "Twelve Days of Christmas" and if you're ready for a short break from shopping, partying and family get-togethers, I hope you'll enjoy their Christmas Price Index .
For millenia, until the dawn of refrigeration a century ago, foods were salted for preservation because massive dosage of salt will kill bacteria. A blog December 3rd, reports that, using funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and National Science Foundation, researchers have now sequenced the genome of a bacterium from a Spanish solar saltworks that has adapted and exchanged genes with another organism to survive. USDA has an extensive research program to develop salt-resistent crops suitable for harsh desert horticulture like the U.S. Southwest and western Australia.
Last week, Democrats in the U.S. Senate garnered only 34 votes in favor of punitive measures against alleged excess profits by oil companies. In his Dec. 4th column , commentator George Will observed that gasoline prices have declined from $3.07 to $2.15 (in the DC area, they are lower than that and still declining). Will compared gas prices with the $185.60 that he calculates consumers pay for a gallon of Starbucks espresso. As much as we'd agree that many consider gas and coffee as staples, the real bargain is salt. Table salt is about 30 cents a pound and less-pure highway salt only 2 cents a pound.
