Dear Senator Salazar, and Comgressional Representatives

I wish to specially thank my government officials who have worked so hard on this years farm bill for all the free giveaway and wasteful programs that you have managed to hide into this year's Farm Bill, it is appreciated. I am grateful for all the money and especially the pork that you are throwing at me. Lastly, thank you yet again for abandoning the drilling of our own domestic oil resources, and instead continuing the high government price supports on Ethanol. Ethanol manufacturing should again make my corn and wheat crop extremely profitable, hopefully even higher than last year, if that is possible. However, with my Senator's help, I'm sure the price for corn and wheat will be even more expensive in 2008. Feel free to keep sending all the money you wish to give away.

Sincerely,
Millet (Farmer)

Dear Senators and Representatives,

I'd like to go farming to get my fair share of taxpayers money.

Joe Real
(farmer wannabee)

Don't hold your breath, Joe.

We don't actually get that much government money, though the programs for ethanol certainly have had their impact. That's been more keenly felt this year because of droughts in Australia and Europe, however.

I'm making more money this year growing alfalfa than I could possibly make growing grains (program commodities).

Bob, let me know if you get a reply to your letter; I'd really love to read it!

Bob, I was just reading how the new bill reduces the corn ethanol tax credit and redirects it towards incentives for cellulosic ethanol. I would think that you thought that was somewhat positive.

I agree completely that these pork barrel projects are just crazy. I once attended a conference and we had a presentation from a lobbyist who described how the prior farm bill had developed (about 10 years ago). Each party kept making additions to it to buy even more votes than the other party and this went around several rounds. Pretty sad.

Crop prices compared to last year:

Cotton - Up - 105 Percent
Soy Beans - Up - 164 Percent
Corn - Up - 169 Percent
Wheat - Up - 256 Percent

When President Bush proposed to the Senate to limit farm welfare to those earning less than $200,000 per year he was laughed out of town. The Senate's version will give subsidies to farmers earning up to $700,000.00 but due to loopholes and marriage credits subsidy payments will actually be paid to farmers earning $2,500,000.00. If crop prices fall from the now high down to their norm, over the next five years farm payments will surge. For example, if corn prices return to $3.25 per bushel from today's $6.00, farmers will get $10,000,000,000.00 in support payments. If bean prices fall to their norm, farmers will get $4,000,000,000.00 in support payments. Thus if farm payments stay high, consumers face higher food bills, and farmers get rich. If farm prices fall, tax payers kick in the difference, and farmers still get rich. Sugar producers also make out like bandits, receiving the difference between the world price of sugar, (check this payment out) which is now $12.00 per pound, and the GUARANTEED price of about $21.00 per pound. This is a 75 percent subsidy for already wealthy Sugar Cain growers and a nice pay off for the $3 million that they contribute to house candidates each year. This Farm Bill entitlement expansion comes only days after the congressional budget office reported that paying the bills for already existing entitlements would require tax rates to climb to 80 percent in the future. The Farm Bill is certainly the ultimate lobbyist triumph, every special interest gets massaged. John McCain opposed the bill and gave a speech attacking it, Obama was not present in the Senate to vote on the bill, but says he is in full support of it. In closing, I do want to thank Mr. Texas for so kindly sending me some MORE of his tax dollars. I appreciate it Phil. Farming is better then public welfare, or are they the same? - Millet (Stop Ethanol, and Drill ANWR)

How much have farm production costs increased, Bob? One thing does help lead to another.

No, I don't think farming is becoming the same as welfare. Many California growers get little to no government entitlement, though the new bill does include some ways in which some fresh fruit and specialy produce farmers get a little bit now. I estimate about 1% of my farm income will come from the program. Woohoo!

oh, btw, do you really want to stop all ethanol? Is there some other replacement for MTBE or do you just like additives to your drinking water??

Harvey, some of my post is a little tongue in cheek, but the financial facts are accurate. Wheat growers have benefited rather better than the California farmers you speak of. - Millet (Sorry, I have to leave now to purchase my new Rolls Royce.)

Bob, we do have wheat grown in California as well and I have grown it in the past and there is still plenty grown around here. Still, with over 200 crops grown in California, there are many farmers that never see the light of day of a subsidy. High wheat prices have benefitted me indirectly in that some people have planted more wheat when some of them would have planted alfalfa. I believe alfalfa acreage in the Imperial Valley is down 10%, for instance. Some of this is also due to reduced irrigation water deliveries in those areas. Transportation costs is also a factor and provides an advantage to me since a concentration of dairy operations is only an hour away.

I find it somewhat amusing, in a strange way, how corn has gathered so much focus of attention. My father farmed corn for 50 years or so before he retired and I guess it's natural that he would pay attention to corn prices. He suggested earlier this year that I would have been better off growing corn than alfalfa while, in reality, it's not even close given the high fertilizer and seed costs of growing corn.

I had a career in agricultural lending for over 25 years and still do a bit of consulting in this area and also find it very odd that the agricultural real estate market is a stark comparison to the rest of the real estate market. There were several periods which I recall when it was the opposite but I don't recall a period of time in at least 30-40 years when it was like it is today. With our weak US Dollar, however, it's hard to imagine where all of this will leave us.

I forgot to ask, why did you make the reference earlier to collected payments from taxes paid by MrTexas?

Oh where is the wisdom???


http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080522/ap_on_go_co/congress_farm_bill_11

WASHINGTON - Congress enacted a massive election-year farm bill Thursday over President Bush's veto, sending new and bigger subsidies for farmers and more food stamps to help the poor with rising grocery prices.

The 82-13 vote in the Senate following a 316-108 vote Wednesday night in the House provided Democrats only their second veto override in Bush's presidency, but they harvested a constitutional controversy with it.

Not all of the bill that Congress passed last week is becoming law immediately. Due to a printing glitch, the version that Bush vetoed was missing 34 pages on international food aid and trade — a mistake that may require Congress to send the White House yet another bill.

The president claimed the legislation was too expensive and too generous with subsidies for farmers who are already enjoying record high prices and incomes.

The $290 billion bill increases food stamps by $1 billion a year. It also increases subsidies for some crops and for the first time subsidizes growers of fresh fruits and vegetables.

The printing error turned a triumphant political victory into a vexing embarrassment for Democrats.

The party's leaders in the House decided to pass the bill again, including the missing section in the version that Bush got. That vote was 306-110, again enough to override another veto from Bush should the need arise.

Democratic leadership aides said the Senate will deal with the problem when Congress returns in June from a one-week vacation.

House Republicans used the error to plead Democratic incompetence. They complained that Bush vetoed a different bill from the one Congress passed, raising questions that the eventual law would be unconstitutional.

The White House also seized on the error.

"Maybe it gives them one more chance to take a look and think about how much they're asking the taxpayers to spend at a time of record farm income," said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. "I think what this clearly shows is that they can even screw up spending the taxpayers' money unwisely."

Reid said the process is entirely legal.

"We have, under good legal precedent, going back to a case I understand in 1892 where something like this happened before, it is totally constitutional," he said.

Robert B. Dove, a former Senate parliamentarian, agreed.

"It really doesn't matter what Congress actually does, all that matters is what goes to the president," he said. "The courts don't really want to get into the workings of Congress and try to figure out what the Congress really meant to do."

But House Republicans continued to berate Democrats over the mistake, delaying action by forcing the House into a vote over whether the Democrats should be investigated for abuse of power. The motion was dismissed on a party line vote.

"The House should not gloss over an incident of this magnitude," Rep. Doc Hastings, R-Wash., said on the House floor. "It's a serious constitutional violation."

Bush has opposed the legislation from the start, threatening his first veto last July. A bipartisan group of negotiators on the bill made small cuts to subsidies to appease the White House, but Bush said it wasn't enough.

Congressional Republicans overwhelmingly abandoned Bush in voting to override the legislation, overlooking its cost amid public concern about the weak economy and high gas and grocery prices. GOP lawmakers are anxious about their own prospects less than six months before Election Day.

About two-thirds of the bill would pay for nutrition programs such as food stamps, about $40 billion is for farm subsidies and almost $30 billion would go to farmers to idle their land and for other environmental programs.

The farm bill also would:

_Extend and expand dairy programs.

_Increase loan rates for sugar producers.

_Expand a program to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to schoolchildren.

_Cut a per-gallon ethanol tax credit for refiners from 51 cents to 45 cents. The credit supports the blending of fuel with the corn-based additive. More money would go to cellulosic ethanol, made from plant matter.

_Require that meats and other fresh foods carry labels with their country of origin.

I've dealt with these subjects before in this forum, left the post up for a few hours or one day and then gone back in and deleted out much of the content, feeling it was too controversial. Being a "fish" I guess I am too sensitive after the fact.

Millet, for many years California growers were not eligible for set aside allotments. Nor Federal subsistence on our home grown crops when other states growing the same crops did receive price support payments, even to some extent with subsidized crops. Hell, we could not even apply to get Federal crop insurance for years for our perishable fruit and truck crops unlike other states could and many states still do (including Citrus I might add).

In 1992, 63% of all national gross cash farm receipts for Agriculture came back to 8 of the 10 counties in the Central Valley (Security Pacific Bank annual report). The above figure did not include turf grass (sod), aquaculture and nursery products (which can include Timber byproducts) either, as those commodities were factored in being horticultural crops, not Agricultural crops then.

We have counties around here that produce as much or more dollar volume proceeds than a few entire states do for Agricultural crops. Along with that 63% comes revenue from taxable profits that go right into the Food Stamp program and if we look close enough we will see a majority portion of the proposed Farm Bill comprises expected monies marshaled through cash farm receipts to help defray the total costs of the Food Stamp fund itself. In other words, now you can grow Wheat in Colorado at a profit and pay your fair share in taxes like we have been forced to that go right into the Food Stamp program to help that indigent mother of five with each of the five siblings having a different surname, living with a paroled state prison gangbanger getting SSI and then finally get to feel like we do about how we are supposed to feel sorry for them because their Cell phone charges, their Cable television charges, the price of Beer and the price for Tobacco have gone up to the point that their combined income of $1,500 in real dollars a month is not adequate for them to feed the kids. No mention that the kids are eligible for two free meals a day while attending school or that their medical costs are covered by the state taxpayers when they enter an ER (Emergency Room) for a headache or for the scratched finger that may require a bandaid.

I do not like the Farm Bill as all it does is attempt to buy off votes from people that do not have the ability to grow a crop at a profit or want government support for a crop they are growing so that the costs of their mistakes can be covered by someone else. It makes sense however that for those people that have been paying into the revolving fund of vanishing returns for many years may want to finally get a stipend back if and when they are allowed to receive a penny for all of the people they have been caring for, for all of these years. Who is funding whom is still the fundamental proposition here and it is about time that the growers, not the fat cats that do not need the money but are the more generous in contributing to political coffers, do get some return for their long term investment in feeding people and raising their own family at non government expense. The latter has to account for something at some time but it is not the people that matter that will reap the benefit of the government handouts just to bribe people off for expected votes come election time. "I did this for you", now I expect payback from you later and your vote alone is not enough to say thank you either!

I am surprised at you people not knowing the basis for the trickle down theory. It will be the entities that do not need the money that are already on government subsistence in some fashion that will want and expect the majority of the funds and by the time it all comes down to the people we want to help the most there will be just a mere pittance of money left for them. Where have you guys been? It is not the mom and pop farmers that will get a larger slice of the pie, all they really get are the pie crumbs but there are people, small towns with businesses that are reliant on that crumb money coming into them. So, Millet, go ahead buy that Rolls Royce, now no longer owned by the British and do it now and not pay a Luxury Tax as that corporate or big spender loophole may just disappear soon with this "it’s all about me" Congress!

Jim

Dear Jim,

It would be interesting to hear what you thought on these matters and were not a "fish" and a sensitive guy! LOL

Bob, I tried to find your name on the list of government payments at http://www.ewg.org/featured/8 but you must be hiding under some pen name.

To save you time, I'm #312 in my county for 2005! http://farm.ewg.org/sites/farmbill2007/top_recips1614.php?fips=06067&progcode=total_dp&page=15&enttype=indv . Corn was less than 50% of today's price when I received the Loan Deficiency Payments and that's not going to be paid on many commodities these days (though I think Bob says sugar is getting that form of payment).

Just a note.

Many recent credible scientific studies found that the spiraling price of food is primarily affected by the price of oil. The effect of Biofuel accounted for only a tiny portion of the total increase, and yet, here we are, the politicians seizing the opportunity to blame it all on biofuel.

Cost of production went up as most farming acitivities are powered by fuels from oil. Fertilizers, PVC pipes, asphalt roads are derivatives of oil, as an example. I've noticed it myself, the drainage pipes from Home Depot cost only $20 per 100 ft, that's about 3 years ago, today, it is $46, and that is the price when on sale!

Just the obvious, without even calculation, oil price increase equates to food increases all over the world. Why people are suffering from food price increases, it is not because of USA producing ethanol from corn, but it is due to the fact the the major OIL cartels are increasing the prices of oil and should take the majority of the blame. So many poor countries are currently suffering due to high oil prices, not due to biofuel production.

They said that there is ever increasing demands of oil by the US, but according to our very own Department of Energy, we have decreased demands for oil. Our gasoline demand have actually gone down by more than 1%. So somebody is manipulating the supply lines. It is true that globally there may be increase in demand, but that too is slowing down. So locally, we don't have increased demands for oil.

The sad fact is that in this era, information are almost instantaneously analyzed and can't help but speculate that the oil cartels instantaneously know how much they can squeeze the peoples of the world. They don't need discussions, just a simple program joining all of their production lines, all over the world, instantaneously they can project what the maximum price that the public could not escape with. So in effect, with the instantaneous information flow, there is no real competition in oil. In effect, we have the most modern fully functional oligopoly in action, squeezing us bone dry of our resources to benefit the very few people, those in the oil industry.

We need alternative fuel development, not farm subsidies.

Biofuels and food prices: Running the numbers
Posted by Martin LaMonica

Clean-energy research firm New Energy Finance has waded into the "food versus fuel" debate and finds that oil is a bigger factor in rising food prices than biofuels.

New Energy Finance, which will release its report Tuesday, also finds that changing food patterns around the world, growing population, and rising input costs, such as fertilizers, are contributing to upward pressure on food prices.

Biofuels production, too, is contributing to food price inflation, but New Energy Finance said that is "far from the dominant factor." It found that areas where biofuel productions have had a significant impact were due primarily to "overly rapid application of support schemes and protectionism."

Rising food prices have led to a sharp change in tone in the biofuels industry. In the U.S., a number of senators, including presidential candidate John McCain, have called for relaxing or suspending the ethanol mandates and subsidies that are fueling an industry boom.

There have been calls to review biofuels policies in Europe as well. In a report last month, the International Monetary Fund said biofuels, among other factors, are contributing to a food crisis.

It's clear that there are a number of factors affecting food prices. New Energy Finance, which tracks investments in clean tech, sought to quantify the relative impact of the various factors. From the report:

"In grains, during the period from 2004 to April 2008, global dollar prices increased by an average of 168 percent. The rising price of oil accounts for an increase of 32.5 percent and other inputs--such as land and labor costs--contributed 7.4 percent. Dollar depreciation accounts for a further 17.9 percent. Supply and demand imbalances account for the remaining 57.7 percent, with biofuels responsible for up to an 8.1 percent increase in global average grain prices (the impact on U.S. corn was clearly above average). The biggest issues were the failure to improve yields to compensate for global population growth, along with the failure of the Australian harvest."

In food oils, such as palm and soy, the higher price of oil contributed to 18 percent of the run-up in soy prices.

Just the beginning
Rising costs of grain have hurt biofuels producers as well. Profits in corn ethanol have shrunk, while some biodiesel plants that rely on soy have been mothballed because of the sharp uptick in soy costs.

Meanwhile, a farm bill in the U.S., already passed by Congress and vetoed by President Bush, would give a boost to biofuels makers if Congress can muster enough votes for an override. The bill would result in about $1 billion worth of research and development and subsidies for renewable liquid fuels, according to an analysis by United Press International.

Corn-based ethanol has come under fire because it does not significantly reduce carbon emissions when compared with gasoline.

Ethanol advocates, meanwhile, say that cellulosic ethanol, made from wood and agricultural wastes or even municipal garbage, is a better solution.

That technology, still experimental, will benefit from the infrastructure established by corn ethanol, they say. In a piece published earlier this week, high-profile investor Vinod Khosla struck back at a Wall Street Journal editorial on ethanol.

Given what's at stake--food and energy--the biofuels debate, hopefully informed by good analysis, is not likely to quiet down.


http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-9951108-54.html?tag=cd.blog