Posted on 02/11/2011 10:36:50 AM PST by Toddsterpatriot
Last month, when the conservative Republican Study Committee released its plan for $2.5 trillion in budget cuts over the next ten years, one enormous item of wasteful government spending was conspicuously missing — farm subsidies.
Perhaps that reflects the fact that 24 of the RSC’s 165 members sit on the House Agriculture Committee, the notorious overseer of farm-welfare programs. Total direct government farm payments to the districts of those 24 representatives alone costs taxpayers more than $1 billion per year. Numerous other RSC members hail from farm states, and therefore have a vested interest in protecting payments to their constituents. For example, RSC chairman Rep. Jim Jordan is not a member of the Agriculture Committee but represents an Ohio district that receives $30 million in direct payments annually.
We are also seeing the usual quadrennial pilgrimage of supposedly fiscally conservative Republican presidential candidates to Iowa, where they swear eternal fealty to farm subsidies generally, but, even worse, to ethanol subsidies in particular. Perhaps the most revolting example of this spectacle was former House speaker Newt Gingrich’s claim that opposition to ethanol subsidies and mandates stems from “big city” folks who just don’t like farmers.
But Gingrich is hardly alone. Mitt Romney defends farm subsidies as a “national-security issue,” because somehow if farmers don’t get an annual government check, al-Qaeda will hold our food supply hostage. Romney, of course, is also a big backer of ethanol subsidies, as is former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty, who once keynoted the annual convention of the American Coalition for Ethanol. Sarah Palin? Mike Huckabee? Sorry, they are on the farm-subsidy/ethanol bandwagon too. Indiana governor Mitch Daniels sounded promising: “Farm subsidies in general ought to go away,” he says. But he too can’t break the ethanol addiction. A “national-security issue,” he says.
Incidentally, ethanol subsidies were extended as part of the lame-duck session’s compromise tax agreement in December. It was pushed in large part by six Republican senators, including John Thune, another putative presidential candidate.
The level of hypocrisy is breathtaking. For example, conservatives rightly denounced government subsidies to business when the auto industry was at issue. Why, then, are subsidies a good idea when directed to, say, Archer Daniels Midland?
Similarly, since the rise of the Tea Party, many Republicans have rediscovered fealty to the Constitution. Witness the cheers for Judge Vinson’s decision striking down Obamacare on constitutional grounds. One might ask, therefore, where these “constitutional conservatives” find constitutional authority for farm programs?
And it is hard to see how anyone can claim to be a fiscal conservative while supporting $15–35 billion per year in government spending that largely goes to a group of people with incomes above the national average. Farm income for 2010 exceeded $92.5 billion. That’s a 34 percent increase from 2009, and — even if you subtract payments from the government — 28.8 percent above the previous ten-year average. While conservatives often mythologize small farms, most farm subsidies go to large and corporate farms. In fact, the largest 10 percent of recipients receive 73 percent of all subsidy payments.
As for ethanol, this is a program that cost taxpayers $7.7 billion last year while driving up food and gasoline prices — and that causes more environmental damage than it solves. The national-security argument is far more slogan than reality. Ethanol’s impact on oil imports is minimal, less than 1 percent according to some studies. We could plant subsidized corn on every square inch of available land, and we would not significantly reduce our reliance on imported oil (most of which actually comes from such hostile countries as Canada).
Unsupportable as farm subsidies are, they are part of a larger context that will continue to bedevil Republicans as they try to cut federal spending. It is always easier to cut the other guy’s subsidy. And some of the most deeply “red” states are among the biggest collectors of federal largess. In 2010, solidly Republican states such as Alaska, Kansas, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Virginia were among the largest recipients of per capita federal spending. That means any serious attempt to cut federal spending is going to require Republicans to take on their own constituencies.
Farm subsidies will provide an early test of whether Republicans can do this. So far, the results are disappointing.
— Michael Tanner is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and author of Leviathan on the Right: How Big-Government Conservatism Brought Down the Republican Revolution.
Ping!
Unfortunately many “conservatives” become flamingly liberal on issues like these. It is time to end farm subsidies. Let a given crop stand or fall on its own merits.
surprise, surprise!
rinos.
this should be like banks and car companies
let them live or die on their own abilities....
(’one world Bush’ did not know what conservativism meant either)
For every 2 dollars theycut in Farm Subsidies they shoudl cut 1 dollar in taxes that affect farmers.
That extra 1 dollar will be saved in the extra overhead the farm subsidies require via government jobs.
I doubt the GOP will do anything. Even their “cuts” are more for show than anything else.
In theory, there should be NO farm subsidies.
But, in practice politicans set sales and contracts/embargos that prevent the free market from operating when it comes to agriculture.
We import beef, when we have more than enough here. We withold selling to various countries we do not approve of. The farmers are quite literally the pawns in this whole mess.
The Gov’t creates the mess; then the Gov’t tries to fix the mess they created.
Good!
Pawlenty signs bill increasing ethanol content in gasoline by Laura McCallum, Minnesota Public Radio May 10, 2005
http://news.minnesota.publicradio.org/features/2005/05/10_ap_ethanol/
If we start listing areas where Republicans are weak, we won’t have time for dinner. Can’t we just list where Republicans are strong? That shouldn’t take long at all.
‘Free market’ chickens?
They know the data and understand that deep down the costs outweight the advantages of ethanol. The market will not support this product.
Why should one group of people enjoy cuts in taxes when others don't? Cut taxes for everyone.
LOL!
We are spending 100 billion a month more than we are collecting in taxes. Everything is going to be cut.
If our politicians can’t handle it, someone will.
It was nice if you had a spot at the trough, for the rest of
us - enough is enough.
[ Unfortunately many “conservatives” become flamingly liberal on issues like these. It is time to end farm subsidies. Let a given crop stand or fall on its own merits. ]
What the Republicans need to do is to pound into the head of every farmer out there that they will cut Farm Subsidies proportionally to cutting taxes that affect farmers most.
They need to OWN this issue and take it away from the democrats and come up with some examples of real life farmers and how much more they would save per year by having taxes AND subsidies cut at the same time!!!!
Cut the corporate and top individual rate to 25%.
I can't even begin to express how "mad as hell' I am with ethanol crapping everything it touches!
Now it's cold and my car doesn't put out the heat it used to because cornwhore juice burns cooler.
If you notice you temp gauges sages a little lower than the normal needle position when burning water & gook absorbing cornwhore juice.
I agree, and after we go after subsidized ethanol, we then go after subsidized meat, the original ethanol. I like meat as much as the next guy, but subsidy is subsidy.
Let’s have real freedom to farm.
Because we allow imports and only occasionally ship food to North Korea, we need to spend hundreds of billions on farm subsidies? Pshaw!
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