Farm Subsidies

The farm bill which oddly enough addresses both farm subsidies and food stamps is up for renewal. The Farm Subsidies are arguably the easiest fix to make a huge change in deficit spending. It is the easiest fix that no one wants to perform because politician are beholden to special interests, lobbyists, and communities who cast their votes with the hand outs.

There was a great piece on public TV this past Sunday about the complete dysfunction and corruption that makes up the Farm Bill legislation. Part of the discussion was devoted the irony that subsidies to wealthy corporate farmers, and land owners tend to increase each time this bill is renewed, while food stamp programs increase marginally if at all, in spite of increasing poverty. Apparently 2008 appears to be no exception in this trend.

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My favorite example of the corruption is the following: "A 2002 program aimed at helping those facing a serious drought gave $635 million to ranchers and dairy farmers who had moderate or no drought. Some ranchers got money because they lived in counties declared disaster areas after debris fell to earth from the space shuttle Columbia."

Supposedly the post workers had interviewed people who had sought out their representatives to complain about the broken Farm Bill. Universally people are met with "There's nothing we can do" when questioning why this Bill isn't seriously reformed.

More: The Farm Bill Debate

Not surprisingly the Democrats tend to treat the Farm Bill and it's historical composition as their baby. The Republicans have tried unsuccessfully to reform it in the past. The reality is the special interests are pulling the strings of both parties. Despite more opposition from the right it still has not been significant enough to topple hand outs to wealthy land owners, corporations, and people who just happen to reside on farm land. Talk about the ultimate hypocrisy... the Democrats constantly berate the GOP for supporting what they call tax cuts for the rich (which in reality are just flatter tax brackets based on more graduated increases in the % paid to the feds... still not "fair" or "flat"... but more so...) when they are giving tax revenue away to wealthy campaign donors for doing absolutely NOTHING.

People investigating this in the PBS documentary seemed to believe Americans were aware of this. I beg to differ. I was aware of subsidizing farmers not to grow crops, however I was not aware that they can collect hundreds of thousands of dollars ever time there is a blizzard. Not to mention some people who just have a house on land zoned for farming can and are collecting... even though NO farming has occurred for years!

I think this really puts into perspective some of the other hot button topics. This is just out of control greed, and yet it flies under the radar and instead people are demonizing immigrants who struggle to put food on their table. Well I suppose it is human nature to make scapegoats out of the people who seem superficially different, before we are willing to stop the corruption within our own ranks. Priorities are messed up... what's new?