Free Republic

Sen. Jon Tester was not allowed to bring an amendment inserting his Sportsmen’s Act of 2012 into the bill. That bill combined 20 Democratic and Republican bills for improving hunter access to public lands, funding shooting ranges, and supporting fish and bird habitat programs. It was among about 300 proposed amendments that Senate leaders pared down to 70. ... The bipartisanship seen in the Senate may be less evident in the House, where conservatives are certain to resist the bill’s costs, particularly for food stamps. Food stamp spending has doubled in the past five years, and beneficiaries have grown from...

The Senate on Thursday completed a five-year, half-trillion-dollar farm bill that cuts farm subsidies and land conservation spending by about $2 billion a year but largely protects sugar growers and some 46 million food stamp beneficiaries. The 64-35 vote for passage defied political odds. Many inside and outside of Congress had predicted that legislation so expensive and so complicated would have little chance of advancing in an election year.

Every once in a while, Democrats and Republicans can work together. Witness Thursday's 90-8 vote to bring a "bipartisan reform" farm bill before the Senate. In the expectation that the bill will garner the necessary 60 votes, the House Agriculture Committee has changed its schedule to allow a floor debate on the measure in July. The White House applauded. This is Washington's version of the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. There's just one little problem. Somehow, whenever the two parties work together, they end up spending a lot of other people's money. The Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act...

The 2012 Farm Bill comes amid an increasingly fierce public debate over food and farming. The industrial model of agriculture and food production is continuing a decades-long drive toward fewer farmers, more factory-style meat production and more processed food—largely to benefit a handful of powerful agribusiness and food companies. At the same time, support is growing for a fair and sustainable food and farm system based on a different set of values: paying and treating farmers and food workers fairly, providing enough healthy food for all, integrating environmental sustainability, and more closely connecting farmers with consumers and communities.In the U.S.,...

MADISON — Enjoy that Thanksgiving feast, taxpayers. Chances are, you’re going to pay for part of it twice. Federal taxpayer subsidies underwrite the costs in the production of some of the key commodities found on the traditional Thanksgiving table. The side dishes on the menu — the rolls and stuffing, the scalloped or cream-style corn, and the long-grain rice — all come from the five crops that remain heavily subsidized by U.S. taxpayers. Commodity kings Wheat, corn, soybeans, rice and cotton make up more than 90 percent of agriculture subsidies to farmers or investors, many of whom are drawing big...

The five-year $300 billion farm bill passed recently by Congress may be veto-proof, but it's not idiot-proof. Lawmakers let interest groups--an iron triangle of shipping companies, crop producers and antihunger groups--plow over plans to overhaul the way $2.5 billion in international food aid gets donated. They protected Cold War-era rules that require buying surplus crops from American farmers and then shipping them overseas via mostly U.S.-flagged ships--a system that costs taxpayers 21% more than if the same commodities were purchased overseas, estimates Christopher Barrett, who teaches agricultural economics at Cornell University. This cost breakdown of a recent USAid shipment of...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Congress on Thursday sent a $290 billion farm bill to President Bush for a second time in an effort to fix a printing error that has threatened the delivery of U.S. food aid abroad. To ensure that the aid continues amid a global hunger crisis, Congress and Bush were planning to pass, veto and enact the bill to provide farm subsidies, food stamps and other nutrition programs over the next five years. The Senate passed the bill 77-15, two weeks after the discovery that 34 pages of the legislation extending those aid programs were missing from the...

Lawmakers, including many Republicans, voted to spend more than half a trillion dollars last month - signaling what's in store for taxpayers if Democrats win additional seats in Congress this November. The spending spree included a whopping $300 billion farm bill, loaded down with subsidies for millionaire farmers and pork-filled provisions that won the support of 100 House Republicans who voted to override President Bush's veto. The squandering also includes a fat-filled $250 billion supplemental bill for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, plus $52 billion in tuition benefits for veterans and other domestic expenditures that passed the Senate by a...

Recently Congress sent the latest Farm Bill to the president. The bill features brand new federal programs, expansion of existing subsidies, more food stamps and more foreign food aid. This bill hits the taxpayer hard, while at the same time ensuring food prices will remain elevated. The president vetoed the bill, citing concerns over its costs and subsidies for the wealthy in a time of high food prices and record farm income. Nevertheless, this over-reaching, government-expanding Farm Bill will soon be law.

When lawmakers return to Capitol Hill this week, a group of House Republicans known as the FIT Force will unveil an effort to expose Washington waste. Led by Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-Mich.), this newly formed Fiscal Integrity Task Force wants to hold congressional spendthrifts accountable for their excesses. McCotter’s goal is admirable—and one that all Americans, regardless of ideology, should support. Unfortunately, the group’s timing couldn’t be worse. That’s because McCotter and half of the FIT Force members themselves abandoned fiscal integrity less than two weeks ago. That’s when they voted to override President Bush’s veto of the farm bill,...

But no matter how many times Ryan or his allies scream “I get it” from the mountaintop and vow to do the right thing if returned to power, the voters will not believe them until they believe his colleagues are capable of acting in a way that is consistent with conservative principles and contrary to their parochial, political interests. The voters seem to be saying: do something out of character. Admit you were wrong about something. Give me a reason to pay attention to all those 10-point action plans you’re waving around. Imagine the public’s reaction if 50 or so...

Here is what the Center for Rural Affairs, a nonprofit rural advocacy group, said about the federal farm bill: "This farm bill primarily serves the vested interests of mega farms at the expense of family farmers and ordinary rural Americans. " That's an apt description of the outdated $290 billion bill, bloated by subsidies and pork, which three members of Wisconsin 's House delegation and both of the state's senators supported. President Bush tried to stop this legislative mistake with a veto, but Congress quickly overrode it.The infliction of the costly, misdirected farm bill on the American public highlights how...

CAPITOL HILL (AP) -- Brushing aside a veto by President Bush, Congress today enacted a massive election-year farm bill. The 82-13 vote in the Senate followed a 316-108 vote in the House last night. However, not all of the bill that Congress passed last week is becoming law right away. Because of a printing error, the version that Bush vetoed was missing 34 pages on international food aid and trade. That mistake may require Congress to send the White House yet another bill. House Republicans called the error a sign of the Democrats' incompetence, but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid...

WASHINGTON, (AP) -- Democrats moved forward with plans to override President Bush's veto of a $290 billion farm bill Thursday despite a printing error that has turned a triumphant political victory into a vexing embarrassment. It seems that no one read the bill after it was printed on parchment paper and sent to the White House, where Bush vetoed it Wednesday. Missing was a 34-page section on international food aid and trade. Democratic 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...

WASHINGTON (AP) — The House overwhelmingly rejected President Bush's veto Wednesday of a $290 billion farm bill, but what should have been a stinging defeat for the president became an embarrassment for Democrats. Only hours before the House's 316-108 vote, Bush had vetoed the five-year measure, saying it was too expensive and gave too much money to wealthy farmers when farm incomes are high. The Senate then was expected to follow suit quickly. Action stalled, however, after the discovery that Congress had omitted a 34-page section of the bill when lawmakers sent the massive measure to the White House. That...

The House overwhelmingly rejected George W. Bush's veto Wednesday of a $290 billion farm bill, but what should have been a stinging defeat for the president became an embarrassing episode for Democrats. Only hours before the House's 316-108 vote, Bush had vetoed the five-year measure, saying it was too expensive and gave too much money to wealthy farmers when farm incomes are high. The Senate then was expected to follow suit quickly. Action stalled, however, after the discovery that Congress had omitted a 34-page section of the bill when lawmakers sent the massive measure to the White House. That means...

WASHINGTON — The House quickly rejected George W. Bush's veto Wednesday of a $290 billion farm bill and the Senate was poised to follow suit, a stark rebuke of a president overridden only once in his two terms. Only hours before the House's 316-108 vote, Bush had vetoed the five-year measure, saying it was too expensive and gave too much money to wealthy farmers when farm incomes are high. The legislation includes election-year subsidies for farmers and food stamps for the poor — spending that lawmakers could promote when they are back in their districts over the Memorial Day weekend....

WASHINGTON (AP) -- President Bush vetoed the $300 billion farm bill on Wednesday, calling it a tax increase on regular Americans at a time of high food prices in the face of a near-certain override by Congress. It was the 10th veto of Bush's presidency. But since it passed both houses of Congress with veto-proof majorities, his action will likely be overridden. The president believes the legislation is fiscally irresponsible and gives away too much money to wealthy farmers, yet his criticism rang hollow with lawmakers from both parties who voted for increased crop subsidies, food stamps for the poor...

The Republicans in Congress continue to baffle me. They are spending all of their time trying to use the marketing tool of “re-branding” the party, while at the same time they refuse to vote against terrible public policy. The most recent example is the disastrous farm bill that the Senate passed overwhelmingly. The House has already passed the bill, and although President Bush will veto it, Congress will likely override the veto. As long as the Republicans in Congress pay lip service to conservatism while voting like liberals, they deserve to lose in November. Those leading the Republicans down the...

Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, at age 38 and having served less than five terms, did not leap over a dozen of his seniors to become ranking Republican on the House Budget Committee by bashing GOP leaders. But an angry Ryan last Wednesday delivered unscripted remarks on the House floor as the farm bill neared passage: "This bill is an absence of leadership. This bill shows we are not leading." Ryan's fellow reformer, 45-year-old Jeff Flake of Arizona, in his fourth term, is less cautious about defying the leadership and has been kept off key committees. On Wednesday, he said...