David was chastising me yesterday for being an economic neg - though I think I am the voice of vibrancy when it comes to the economy as opposed to botched economic policy - yet in order to placate him and those who see the sunshine behind every thermo nuclear cloud I give you...Iowa!

What is it like to work in a state that is creating more jobs than workers? He was sitting in the lobby of a new hotel in downtown Des Moines, part of an extensive redevelopment investment to attract workers to Iowa. "It is noticeable," Mr. Tew, a computer programmer at EMC Insurance Companies, said of the jobs surplus. "You’re a hot commodity. Salaries go up just because companies are fighting to retain the talent they have."

The funniest thing about this recession, if it is one, is how localized it is. The other day there was a piece on NPR about how suburbs in Cleveland are being abandoned holus bolus¹ while Iowa has 48,000 job vacancies. By comparison, Canada's Prairies and Newfoundland, relieved of Ontario's apparently singular obligation to support its fellow provinces, are storming ahead while the majority of the economic force of the land - Ontario and Quebec - suffer, making for confusion in the mind of the nation's bookkeeper.

So why can't Ontario be more like Iowa, where boom is caused in large by habitual departure of the young and the fact that no one wants to immigrate to it? Because people like it, apparently. Like the Prairies and Newfoundland, Iowa is a place that people have historically rejected. A loser sort of land. So is this economic phase something like the revenge of the nerds or maybe the revenge of the drawers of water as it's the commodity producers, farmers and new energy producers who are doing well?

Recently, German-made turbines destined for our neighbouring jurisdiction Wolfe Island landed in nearby New York on a boat registered in Newfoundland - Ontario did not build, ship over even land these things. Seems to me Ontario needs to get selfish if its going to be more Iowa than Cleveland. A producer of raw resources and energy, a maker of clever things made by clever people - and an exporter of money to those who can now take care of themselves: isn't it time for Ontario to give notice that it wants to go it alone or at least less encumbered by those who both gloat and take? Is that not the best way to get through the economic gloom?

¹[Ed.: Likely the first use of "holus bolus" on this blog. Potentially even a correct use.]