Why Organic?

I find myself pondering this question more and more as I read books like The Omnivore's Dilemma and Real Food and Twinkies, Deconstructed. Meat, milk and eggs is easy, I'll gladly pay more for raw milk from grass fed cows, eggs from pastured chickens and meat that isn't jacked up on antibiotics, hormones or feeds that those animals were never designed to eat. I love my Wheat Montana flour, and not just because of my natural affinity for the state, and am totally sold on organic ketchup because it's the only kind that I can find that's not so syrupy sweet that it would work better on a waffle than a waffle fry. But the more that I read, the more that I ponder organic produce. I really like the idea of no pesticides or chemical fertilizers on my food, but is industrial organic stuff really any better? For now I think I'll use my organic dollar a little higher up the food chain and pay the big bucks for real meat, milk, eggs and dairy products. I do find it ironic that our sweeping love of all things whole and organic came just as the farmers market is closed for the winter, sensibly as there is snow and ice everywhere and obviously nothing growing, but I can't wait for it to open this spring and find out what we can eat that's local and in season. I do find it rather interesting that this desire to get back to real food brings us into contact with so many people whose politics are so far flung from ours as to be other worldly feeling, it does kinda make us smile that wry smile when we wonder if the health food store people realize that they are being invaded by right wing nutjobs :)