>> I think people are wildly overstating the importance of supporting ethanol subsidies among farmers.
Maybe, but I have run into some pretty rabid pro-methanol big farmers, in person as well as right here on FR. I think there are a lot of them that have built their farm business model on the demand guarantees of mandated ethanol.
The Corn Belt grows corn because it is ideally suited to the former Tall Grass Prairie, as corn is a tall grass. Iowa is going to grow huge amounts of corn regardless of ethanol.
Marginal areas outside of the Corn Belt, as well as pork and chicken producers are among the beneficiaries of corn-based fuel ethanol.