Billionaire Stewart Resnick Expands Almond Acreage as Cities Forced to Slash Water Use

[handmade34]

3. and... interesting

tied to great move to dishonor Obama Whitehouse treaty with Iran?

older article but very interesting...

"...Pistachios are very important to the Resnicks, bringing in at least 20% of their agricultural revenue. Economic sanctions (against Iran) are what have allowed the Resnicks to create their pistachio empire, which would suffer a severe blow if relations with Iran were ever normalized.

Iran’s pistachios are considered to be superior to America’s, so much so that Israelis still buy Iranian pistachios shipped in through Turkey. Surely the Resnicks would never be able to compete with Iran on the pistachio free market. And so the Resnicks did what any smart and ruthless American would do: they made common cause with oil companies, Islamophobes, neocons and Likudniks, and began funneling money to think tanks and political advocacy groups that take a hardline approach with Iran.

Economic sanctions, sabotage, vilification—all these things worked in the Resnicks’ interest. Bombing some of Iran’s pistachio fields wouldn’t be so bad, either…"


http://mondoweiss.net/2013/07/oligarch-valley-how-beverly-hills-billionaire-farmers-lynda-and-stewart-resnick-profit-from-the-iran-sanctions-they-lobbied-for