Congress's Farm Bill Looks Vetoproof

the crop price myth

unsurprisingly, most of the analysts of the farm bill appear woefully ignorant of the actual practice of farming.

near record crop prices? yes (for some; try to tell a delta cotton farmer that). does that equal record profit?

for some. but not for all. crop input prices are obliterating records. seed and fertilizer costs have never been this high and are only going to increase - demand is sky high, with Asia and S. Am growing by leaps and bounds, capacity is hitting its breaking point, and raw material costs are exploding for fertilizers as well as crop protection. The main supply of less expensive off-patent pesticides has been decimated at the raw material level b/c of China's environmental crackdown, and the available arable land continues to shrink to development and lack of labor. yet not only are there more people in the world to feed and clothe, there is the govt-propped ethanol movement demanding corn and soy.

don't think that high commodity prices = a bunch of farmers in tuxedos and monocles cruising around in bentleys full of big bags of money with dollar signs on them.

Hillary's Women Supporters

I can't get into the above ADD YOUR THOUGHTS posting, so I'll just use this one:

Geraldine Ferraro, a Fox News analyst, said today that Obama made a tactical error in judgment by calling attention to himself in the foreign policy arena, which is not his strongest suite. Whether or not President Bush was singling out Obama as the historical 1939 Republican Senator who wished he could have spoken with Hitler is unclear.

It's only May 15 – the Florida and Michigan delegate issue is to be decided upon in a few weeks and the last primaries aren't until June. Hillary has amassed a vast constituency. Why would she get out? Why can't the Democrats have a good old-fashioned floor fight in August?

I'm a fiscally-responsible, Republican-leaning Independent and I would put money on Mrs. Clinton to win in a heartbeat. It looks like a ballgame to me.

PRESIDENT DUMBASS

I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW WHY JENNA IS NOT OVER THERE IN IRAQ FIGHTING THIS WONDERFUL WAR PRESIDENT DUMBASS IS ALWAYS TELLING THE AMERICAN PUBLIC ABOUT. AND WHAT ABOUT JENNA'S HUSBAND ??

WHY IS'NT HE OVER THERE ?? IS HE A FU_ _ _ _ _ COWARD ??

MAYBE IT'S JUST THAT THE RICH BASTARD IS SO MUCH BETTER THAN THE AVERAGE AMERICAN .

PRESIDENT DUMBASS

PRESIDENT GEORGE W DUMBASS HAS BEEN NOTHING BUT A Embarassment

TO THIS COUNTRY.A MAN OF IGNORANCE AND ALL THE STUPID ASS REPUBLICANS THAT STAND WITH HIM.

Senate Committee Passes Amnesty

On a 17-12 vote this afternoon, the Senate Appropriations Committee added Sen. Feinstein's ag amnesty to the Iraq supplemental spending bill. This bill could come up for a vote before the full Senate tomorrow. They have done this in total disregard of the overwhelming majority of the people.

This is an outrageous act of disrespect for our men and women in uniform and to the citizens of this country by attaching an illegal-alien amnesty to the Iraq spending bill. Senators should be encouraged to vote and work to strip the amnesty from the Iraq spending bill on the floor.

Your Senator can still vote NO and send the bill back to committee if the amnesty is NOT stripped. This is typical of how the Democratic Congress has traded lives for their pet projects. Every phone of every Senator should be ringing off the hook. 202-224-3121

There is no need for an amnesty to provide growers with workers. There already is an H-2A foreign ag worker program that provides growers with an unlimited number of temporary workers if the growers agree to pay a decent wage and ensure that they go home at the end of the season. Feinstein is just trying to protect the abysmally low wages and bad working conditions that farm workers labor under.

It failed to mention...

The article failed to mention one important feature of the bill: the Close the Enron Loophole Act. It will close a loophole Enron snuck in a commodity trading bill back in 2000 that allowed speculators to operate without any oversite- the record-high food and energy prices you see today are a result of the rampant speculation on the gas and oil market. And this legislation will force the speculators to adhere to much more strict standards, causing the false inflation that they've been hyping up to fizzle.

Farm Bill

The agriculture sudsidies should be given out by commodity. The money given to corn farmers would be better spent on sorghum for animal feed. I believe sorghum can also be used in (current technology) ethanol plants, with a slight modification.

Such Hypocracy

The Democrats talk of raising taxes on wealthy Americans to pay for thier agenda, yet provide taxpayer dollars to the same individuals in Bills like this. President Bush never Veto'ed anything when the Republicans controlled the Congress/Senate and were spending our money like water...and now he is concerned. They are all spineless cowards pandering to the Dumbmasses.

Poor Farmers?

Pork abounds for sure. When an Iowa seed farmer can buy a 1.6 million dollar motorhome for recreation purposes something is fishy in denmark. Not to mention all the politicians who own farms and benefit from this. The small family farmer is at a disadvantage.

Pork with a capital P

This is a prime example of pork and earmarks out of control. This is mostly Dems catering to their rural state constituants who already are very well off. This is not a bailout because these are people who don't need a bailout. They are already getting record prices for their crops. This is just a vote getting scheme that is crass political power games at it's worst. We are spending money like drunken sailors. At a time when we should be austere, the congress keeps spending like there's a money orchard out back. Would any of us spend money we don't have and give it to people who don't need it? I would hope the people would flood the offices of congress like they did over illegal immigration. This is an outrage.