By: U.S. Senator Max Baucus Standing Up For American Agriculture Over the last few years, major newspapers and special interest groups have been busy demeaning our nation’s farmers and ranchers. The articles come with some pejorative titles, such as “Farmers at the Trough,” “Hungry Kids, Greedy Farmers,” “Farm Subsidies: Necessary Evil?” and “Agriwelfare: The expiring…
By: U.S. Senator Blanche Lincoln “Our farmers deserve praise, not condemnation; and their efficiency should be cause for gratitude, not something for which they are penalized.” Those were the words of President John F. Kennedy, and they still ring true today. Unfortunately, all too often you can open up a newspaper to find at least…
WASHINGTON (August 29, 2007)—SpongeBob Square Pants, Curious George and Thomas the Tank Engine last week became the latest lead-based casualties in the Chinese toy saga, putting parents on high alert about the quality of imports. These high-profile product recalls landed on the front page of most major newspapers and remain in the news. But today…
WASHINGTON (August 17, 2007)—Much to the delight of farmers and ranchers in rural America, members of the Senate Agriculture Committee have repeatedly praised the agricultural provisions of the House farm bill during Congress’ August recess. “It’s pretty hard to argue against the House-passed farm bill,” Republican Sen. Norm Coleman (Minn.) said via conference call last…
CALIFORNIA (August 8, 2007)—At the American Sugar Alliance’s 24th International Sweetener Symposium, farmers from across the country came together to pledge a common goal of supporting a strong 2007 farm bill. The bill passed the House of Representatives on July 27. With the Senate slated to take up the legislation in September, key agriculture groups…
WASHINGTON (July 31, 2007)—In a victorious moment for America’s farmers, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly rejected the Kind-Flake amendment last Thursday night by an astonishing vote of 309 to 117. Thanks to the support and persistence of the House Agriculture Committee and Chairman Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), as well as various coalitions and associations representing America’s…
WASHINGTON (July 27, 2007)—After an intense buildup to what most Washington insiders thought would be a bloody battle, the much-anticipated Kind-Flake farm bill hit the House floor with a thud late last night. The plan offered by Reps. Ron Kind (D-Wis.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) was swiftly and soundly defeated by a vote of 309…
WASHINGTON (July 25, 2007)—In a Dear Colleague letter to Members of Congress today, Congresswoman Nydia M. Velázquez (D-NY) joined the growing voices of legislators supporting a strong farm bill and called upon her colleagues to “Please oppose any attempts to weaken this important measure…and support H.R. 2419.” In her letter, Velázquez—who serves as Chairwoman of…
WASHINGTON (July 24, 2007)—Farmers from across the United States are descending upon Capitol Hill in anticipation this week’s floor vote on H.R. 2419 in the U.S. House of Representatives. Those farmers are actively working to have their voices heard. In a letter sent to all members of Congress today, major national, regional, and state agriculture…
WASHINGTON (July 23, 2007)—The farm bill plan introduced by two extremist members of the House of Representatives, Ron Kind (D-Wis.) and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.), would devastate rural economies and farms across the country, according to a study released today by the Agriculture and Food Policy Center at Texas A&M. All crop farms and nearly all…
By now, the opponents of farm policy sound like broken records. The Senate Agriculture Committee had not even completed its markup of the farm bill, and these naysayers were already attacking the bill and Committee members for not making reforms. It seems like no matter how many concessions the agricultural community makes, they will never…
All too often we hear from self-anointed advocates who claim that U.S. farm policies contribute to poverty around the world. Yet they consistently ignore the real experts on global issues calling for the very same policies those naysayers are predisposed to reject. Moreover, rarely, if ever, does the media focus attention on the international organizations…
The last vote had barely been cast on the House farm bill when the spin machines for groups from the far right and far left started whining in overdrive. Oxfam America—a group that invested considerable resources promoting the Kind-Flake farm bill that was swiftly and soundly defeated by a bipartisan vote—issued a press release entitled…
WASHINGTON (July 18, 2007)—U.S. agriculture is under siege and the farm policies on which so many depend are close to being gutted. Rural America must stand up and be heard. That is the startling message being delivered to growers across the country by their leaders in Washington. “An amendment or series of amendments to eliminate…
By Farmer X WASHINGTON (July 17, 2007)—According to the Environmental Working Group (EWG), my operation received about $110,000 in farm program payments in the 2005 program year—a lot of money by many standards. The insinuation of this is that we are rich farmers, rolling in the dough provided by hardworking American taxpayers. Nothing could be…
By: Jeff Nunley Recently, one of my neighbors in town was complaining about our U.S. farm program. He made the statement that he wished the government would subsidize his income, like it did for farmers. My response was that our farm program did subsidize his income. How? By keeping food costs low. This frees up…
WASHINGTON (July 11, 2007)—The German Marshall Fund put out a press release on May 3 that proudly proclaimed, “Dan Morgan, former staff writer for the Washington Post, has joined the organization as a Transatlantic Fellow.”1 Morgan was quickly listed on the German Marshall Fund’s website as an ag policy expert2; he started writing a column…
WASHINGTON (June 19, 2007)—An investigation by FarmPolicyFacts.org into the new Environmental Working Group (EWG) farm subsidy database has uncovered a dirty little secret that radical environmental groups likely hoped would never surface. Former Chicago Bulls star Scottie Pippen, mega-lobbyist Gerald Cassidy, and many other wealthy subsidy recipients in EWG’s database are only there because they…
WASHINGTON (June 7, 2007)—Every member of the U.S. Senate today received a handbook highlighting the billions of dollars in subsidies foreign agricultural producers receive around the world. The research, compiled in the Guide to Foreign Crop Subsidies and Tariffs, shows that compared to other major global producers—developing and developed alike—the U.S. ranks near the bottom…