Economically painful consumer sandwich…Americans and Brits in the same sinking boat. No coincidences in oil production, comrade…prices that wear booster rockets. Could Skodas make a play in the United States…the high price of food riots…and more!

I received an invitation this week asking me to go protesting outside Downing Street last night… but shouting slogans with vegans is not really my thing.

I’ve been kicking an idea around for a while. It’s one that I am now convinced requires action. If you are holding stocks in a pure-play ethanol company – dump them now, while you still can get something out of them.

The world could be “one crop failure away from an actual food crisis”, said George Wehrfritz and Jason Overdorf in Newsweek. Driven partly by speculation, the per-ton cost of rice, wheat and corn has surged 50% or more since mid-2007; Thai white rice prices are up 40% since the start of the year and world rice stockpiles are at their lowest levels since the 1980s.

On April 1 — April Fool’s Day, appropriately enough — Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) held a nearly 3-hr hearing before the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming. One of the participants was Chevron Corp. Vice-Chairman Peter J. Robertson, who made some excellent points.

Major spikes in rice prices and other staples have kicked off food riots in Yemen and Morocco and hoarding in Hong Kong, reports The Washington Post.

As a result of the price hikes Egypt, Cambodia, India and Vietnam have restricted export restricted the export of rice.