Senate Panel OKs $3B Cut in Farm Payments

[acmavm]

By LIBBY QUAID, Associated Press Writer
12 minutes ago

SNIP

WASHINGTON - The Senate Agriculture Committee on Wednesday voted to pare $3 billion from farm and conservation payments but kept alive a contentious $1 billion dairy subsidy program.

Lawmakers from Western states with huge dairy operations tried to kill the subsidy program, arguing it hurts big producers by flooding the market with milk. Senators from the Northeast, where dairy herds are smaller, argued the program keeps small family farms afloat.

"This is a simple program to help the little guy," said Sen. Rick Santorum (news, bio, voting record), R-Pa.

Congress ordered the $3 billion in cuts in a budget outline passed this year. Most of the spending reductions would come from cutting payments to farmers by 2.5 percent across the board, which would save nearly $1.3 billion, and cutting conservation spending by more than $1 billion.

The Republican-controlled panel approved the budget bill on an 11-9 vote. One Democrat, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy (news, bio, voting record), sided with Republicans, saying he backs the dairy program, which benefits farmers in his state.

<snip>

Well boy howdy, wonder how all these farmers here in the red (neck) state of Nebraska will feel about being picked on by their hero, pResident AWOL???????

Serves 'em right.

[unhappycamper]

1. acmavm:

Please be aware that DU copyright rules require that excerpts of copyrighted material be limited to four paragraphs and must include a link to the original source.

Thanks,

unhappycamper
DU Moderator

[acmavm]

8. OOPS, I forgot the link. I am fully aware to the requirements but I am at

work and posted this on the fly (on my lunch hour).
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051019/ap_on_go_co/food_fa...

[INdemo]

2. its funny how

at least in my state the dairy farms are now (at least the majority)owned by corporation's .Family owned Dairy farms is a thing of the past..so its strange that they didnt get the ax

[Horse with no Name]

3. Flooding the market with milk?

I grew up on a dairy and I used to find it horrible that farmers would be subsidized to dump their milk on the ground to keep prices up.
With milk at almost $5 a gallon I can't see that this is a bad thing--but could certainly see how these corporations would not like it.
However, I would be curious about the $3 billion in cuts that will most likely screw other family farmers.

[barbaraann]

4. Oregon farmers get paid for not burning their fields but no one checks

to see if they aren't burning. When you drive down I-5 in Oregon, for several months a year, you see huge plumes of smoke rising from fields. It really upsets me.

http://www.katu.com/consumernews/story.asp?ID=79183

[texpatriot2004]

5. Well as long as they don't repeal those tax cuts for the wealthy

I mean, those are really beneficial.

[gulfcoastliberal]

9. Yeah, ya know it was the estate tax that was killing family farms!

[TheFarseer]

6. What happened to a cap on total payments?

Only so much per farmer? I see, float that in the spring and get points for standing up for family farms, and then slash everything in the fall when no one is paying attention. Well, I'm paying attention and I'm going to make sure all the farmers I know are paying attention. Not too many more nails can go in this coffin before family farms are 6 feet under ground. Republicans HATE family farmers and want them all out of business. How many times do they have to prove this before people will see?

[fed-up]

7. Farm Subsidy Database link-Environmental Working Group

Click link to find out how much your local farmers have received

http://www.ewg.org/issues/siteindex/issues.php?issueid=...

November 2004 - The data from 2003 suggests that wealthy agribusinesses continue to collect the bulk of taxpayer subsidies, hurting small farms. -- Taxpayers doled out $16.4 billion in farm subsidies last year, a 27 percent increase over 2002, for a total since 1995 of $131 billion, according to the latest update of EWG's Farm Subsidy Database.

[madmark]

10. There should be no subsidies period.

[leesa]

11. Good. Time for farmers to come to their senses