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It started out as a hobby, a way for the Dollarhite family in Nixa, Mo., to teach a teenage son responsibility. Like a lemonade stand. But now, selling a few hundred rabbits over two years has provoked the heavy hand of the federal government to the tune of a $90,643 fine. The fine was levied more than a year after authorities contacted family members, prompting them to immediately halt their part-time business and liquidate their equipment. The Dollarhite’s story, originally picked up by conservative blogger Bob McCarty, has turned into a call to arms for critics of the government’s reach...

That’s right. I’m putting this right at the feet of the president himself. A family in Missouri has been fined more than $90,000 by the US Department of Agriculture for selling more than $500 of the furry creatures in less than one year. The families profit was a whopping $200 for the year.

Shirley Sherrod, the U.S. Department of Agriculture employee who was forced out after a portion of a videotape was misleadingly used to show her making a racially insensitive remark, will start working for the USDA again, the department told POLITICO Friday. But she’s not getting her old job back. Instead, Sherrod will help the USDA improve its dismal civil rights record.

Smile, schoolchildren. You’re on calorie camera. Health officials trying to reduce obesity and improve eating habits at five San Antonio elementary schools unveiled a $2 million research project Wednesday that will photograph students’ lunch trays before they sit down to eat and later take a snapshot of the leftovers. A computer program then analyzes the photos to identify every piece of food on the plate — right down to how many ounces are left in that lump of mash potatoes — and calculates the number of calories each student scarfed down. The project, funded by a U.S. Department of Agriculture...

Minority farmers have complained for decades that the U.S. Department of Agriculture denied or delayed giving them farm loans because of their ethnicity or gender, costing them their crops and land. Now, the USDA has acknowledged the discrimination. It is urging Hispanic and female farmers who can prove they were wronged to apply for settlements of up to $50,000. Frederick Pfaeffle, the department's deputy assistant secretary of civil rights, recently met with farmers and ranchers in Kissimmee and South Florida to promote the program. The settlement, which some Hispanic farmers have criticized for offering too little and placing the burden...

MIAMI -- U.S. Department of Agriculture officials are in Florida publicizing a new program to address discrimination claims by women and Hispanic farmers. Deputy Assistant Secretary for Civil Rights Fred Pfaeffle (FEF'-ell) spoke Friday with farmers in south Miami-Dade County about the program. The effort follows the federal government's agreement last year to provide $4.6 billion for black and American Indian farmers' class action claims of discrimination. Pfaeffle said the women and Hispanic farmers who have filed claims have not been able to get class action status.

Chefs from five-star hotels across China soon will descend upon the U.S. to learn more about western-style menus, management and products — and U.S. taxpayers will be footing most of the bill.

By: Mark Joppa (Mark is a tea party enthusiast in the Hudson Valley, New York) The United States Department of Agriculture (“USDA”) in fiscal year 2010 had a combined budget of $134 billion (this alone is insane!). Just three years prior, in fiscal year 2007 the USDA had a lower budget of $88 billion. No one really knows how or why the Department of Agriculture spent $88 billion in 2007, together with an additional $46 billion in 2010, but let’s examine USDA’s 2012 budget. President Obama has proposed $145 billion. In these tough times with high unemployment and the historically...

WASHINGTON -- The Obama administration is offering more than $1.3 billion to settle complaints from female and Hispanic farmers who say they faced discrimination from the Agriculture Department. The Agriculture and Justice departments announced Friday that farmers who could prove discrimination could receive up to $50,000. The proposal comes after the government settled with American Indians over similar discrimination issues last fall and Congress provided money for the second round of a black farmers settlement. The government first announced its intent to settle the complaints in May. The more detailed offer announced Friday does not cap the amount of money...

One unhappy night in 1992, 40-year-old Timothy Pigford, a fourth-generation black farmer having a terrible time of it trying to grow soybeans in North Carolina, sat in the living room of the house he was barely holding on to and drew up the outline of a lawsuit against the federal government. It was a decision more than 15 years in coming, ever since the first of the many times he’d been denied a USDA loan because — he was convinced — of the color of his skin. Before all was said and done, he would spend 20 years of his...

(Credit: CBS) Shirley Sherrod, who was forced to resign from the Department of Agriculture after an out-of-context video of remarks she made were published on a conservative website, is still considering the formal job offer she received from the USDA, she tells CBS News Producer Daniel Steinberger. The department has offered Sherrod a position titled Deputy Director of the office of advocacy and outreach at the USDA, she says. The offer was delivered in a draft that puts into writing what Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack offered her on the phone last week. Sherrod said she sat down to read...

Washington (CNSNews.com) – Ag Secretary Tom Vilsack says he welcomes the extension of the energy policy requiring the extension of tax credits and protective tariffs of corn ethanol and is not worried in the long term about the U.S. economy’s capacity to produce corn for food, fuel, feed, and exports because of it.“I’m certainly not worried in the long term about our capacity to produce enough corn to meet our food and feed needs as well as our fuel needs,” Secretary Vilsack said Wednesday in a news conference with Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Energy Secretary Steven Chu held...

According to research from the Chicago Board of Trade, futures markets for corn in March spiked 3.6 percent, or 24.25 cents per bushel. Currently the price of this commodity is hovering around $6.98. The core futures markets of corn, wheat, and soybeans, have jumped 97 percent, 107 percent, and 56 percent respectively. The outlook for international food and grain supplies are looking more uncertain after the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) reported its expectations that corn supply would decrease to lowest level in 15 years, the Wall Street Journal reported. The supply of corn has been depleted for a...

I got this e-mail today from Honeyville Farms: As many of you know we have been out of stock on our #10 cans of Powdered Whole Eggs and Egg Whites for about 3 months. This has been as a result of working with the USDA on plant and label approval with new stricter requirements with respect to eggs. We've endured numerous delays and setbacks throughout the process. About a week ago we had received approval to begin Production. We did so and even had product on UPS trailers ready to be picked up. We got a call from the USDA...

Race hustlers are shaking down taxpayers for payoffs, and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is falling for the scam. The controversy involves a discrimination claim against the USDA for allegedly denying loans because of race. A federal judge approved payments of $50,000 or more based on low levels of proof. This encouraged a mad scramble for cash based on false claims. The “Pigford Settlement,” an agreement that came out of the original 1997 lawsuit by Timothy Pigford and 400 southern black farmers, resulted from some apparently legitimate instances of discrimination. However, plaintiffs’ lawyers got involved, and the number of...

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is teaching farmers how to participate in “carbon markets” despite the fact that such markets do not exist and Congress – in rejecting cap and trade legislation last year – has refused to create them. Deputy Secretary of Agriculture Kathleen Merrigan made the admission at the WorldWatch Institute’s 2011 State of World Symposium Wednesday, saying that one of the ways USDA was dealing with climate change was to teach American farmers how to participate in “carbon markets,” the technical term for a cap and trade program. “[USDA] will show farmers clearly and directly how...

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The government is officially announcing on Friday an expanded program that should provide 140,000 to 150,000 children from low income families with supper meals, a senior Agriculture Department official said. A federal program aiding such children, many with parents away from home until late in the evening, has been in operation in 13 states and the District of Columbia, but USDA Under Secretary Kevin Concannon told Reuters in an interview that "this afternoon the official announcement goes out that the program will be available in all 50 states." The expansion, authorized in the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act...

JANUARY 13, 2011 Prices Soar on Crop Woes U.S. Cuts Global Grain Supply Outlook; Higher Prices Expected at Grocery Stores. By SCOTT KILMAN And LIAM PLEVEN Evidence of tightening global food supplies grew as the U.S. Agriculture Department cut its estimates for global harvests of key crops and raised some demand forecasts, adding to worries about rising food prices. Prices of corn and soybeans leapt 4% Wednesday and wheat gained 1%, continuing the broad rally in commodity prices that began in June. With yesterday's gains, prices of corn futures contracts are now up 94% from their June lows; soybeans are...

Complete title: Rep. Steve King Says Witnesses Are Ready to Testify in Congress About Alleged Fraud in Federal Compensation Payments to Black Farmers(CNSNews.com) - Rep. Steve King (R.-Iowa), who serves on both the House Agriculture Committee and the House Judiciary Committee, says he has personally talked to two potential witnesses in recent months who are ready to come forward and speak to a congressional committee—if one decides to actually investigate the matter--about alleged fraud in discrimination-compensation payments that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has made to black farmers. One of these would-be witnesses is a black farmer who was a...

The rule will apply to raw and single-ingredient major cuts of meat and poultry, including boneless chicken breast, tenderloin steak and ground meat such as hamburger or turkey. It will go into effect in 2012. Coming soon to a grocery store near you: nutrition labels, like the ones seen on soda pop and potato chips, slapped on packages of raw ground meat and chicken breasts. The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Wednesday that a new federal rule will require 40 of the most commonly purchased cuts of poultry, pork, beef and lamb to carry labels that disclose a variety of...