Farm Bill -- Still Plenty of Corporate Welfare

It's always nice to see some South Dakota conservatives and liberals finding common ground. Lake County organic farmer and ag activist Charlie Johnson submitted the following comment to Rick Knobe's Viewpoint University the other day:

I wonder if you share my opinion that the 2007 (or better put) 2008 Farm Bill is a legislative vehicle for personal greed not good policy.

Also I'm sure that you agree, we don't need to be developing a "means test" for receiving farm payments. Just implement a hard cap that no individual will receive assistance beyond the cap regardless of how large they want to get. Or if you can't swallow that, just eliminate the subsidies. When farmers and farm groups lobby from a position of greed rather than focus on issues like beginning farmer, nutrition, conservation, credit policy, the only people they continue to convince (or fool) is themselves.

Charlie tells me that Rick Knobe, a good conservative, agreed. Charlie also notes that the Center for Rural Affairs would like to see this farm bill vetoed. (See CFA's Dan Owens on what happened when President Eisenhower vetoed the 1956 farm bill.)

Both Obama and Clinton support the pending farm bill: Obama says "The bill is far from perfect, but with so much at stake, we cannot make the perfect the enemy of the good." Clinton takes the same line and chides McCain and Bush for wanting the bill vetoed.

Is a rotten farm bill better than no farm bill? Obama supporter Dennis Wiese spouts the corporate line that subsidies to rich farmers are good for small-town economies and suggests that Obama "would not believe that the funds that have been spent have been wasted." The compromise necessary to crank out a politically viable farm bill producing more handouts for the rich ag-industrial interests, which Professor Schaff helpfully enumerates. Ugh. It reminds me how much I miss Dennis Kucinich, who, by the way, showed his unflagging support of the little guy by voting against the farm bill.