Posted 11:13 AM by Eve
CAN'T GET ENOUGH of the Tom-Harkin-campaign-taping-weird-bizarrofest? Click here and wallow in it like Scrooge McDuck in a pile of taxpayers' money. Unfortunately, Harkin's Republican opponent is (no surprise) equally beholden to the farm-welfare lobby. Sigh.

Posted 12:37 PM by Eve
STRANGE BEDFELLOWS. This is a random round-up of anti-farm subsidy articles and papers. I do this not because I think you people are too stupid to do this, but in order to demonstrate how wide-ranging opposition to the farm dole is.

AllAfrica.com
A Canadian finance minister
The Guardian
A(nother) lefty news site
A righty think tank
A libertarian think tank
A lefty NYT op-ed writer
A random Kenyan vegetable saleswoman, via TIME Europe
Business Week

All for now. More farm stuff presently...

Posted 12:22 PM by Eve
FARMERS AGAINST SUBSIDIES: Not American farmers, of course. After all, American farmers are emblems of independence and local, communal aid--we've gotta make sure they stay on welfare! Now, if only them furriners had a real appreciation for good old fashioned free enterprise...

Posted 12:22 PM by Eve
ETHANOL: NOW MORE THAN EVER. Ethanol subsidy update from intrepid foe of farm-welfare Michelle Malkin. Lots of good stuff. Here's a small sample: "According to the Washington Post, Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) supervised the writing of a section in the Senate-passed energy bill requiring gasoline refiners to nearly triple the use of ethanol by 2012.

"After 2012, this anti-free market maneuver would guarantee ethanol a growing fixed share of the country's fuel consumption every year, no matter what consumers actually demand or what better methods of reformulating gasoline come along."

Note: That link goes to Malkin's current column. After she posts a new one, you can find the ethanol update here--look around August 28.

Posted 12:19 PM by Eve
MCCAIN ROCKS!!!: OK, well, he did rock on one issue, back in 1999, but hey, I'll take what I can get. A good Michelle Malkin column on why ethanol subsidies are lamer than lame. Only one GOP candidate was willing to say so at an Iowa primary debate. Guess who it was? (Hint: Not Dubya.)

Posted 12:16 PM by Eve
LINKS LINKS LINKS: J. Bradford Delong on cotton subsidies and African workers.

Dave Barry on mohair and other farm subsidies. Great stuff.

And I battle Wendell Berry. Start here, then scroll down.

Posted 7:56 AM by Eve
I know I've been neglecting this site. Will try to post farm-dole-y goodness fairly soon.

Posted 10:41 AM by Eve
THE PIGS AND THE ASS: Dumb talk from a Kennedylet.

Posted 3:52 PM by Eve
...SO?: A friend sent me this Michelle Malkin smackdown of the Environmental Working Group, which I've praised for its farm-dole expose project. The nifty thing, though, is that it doesn't matter if Malkin's points are correct--the EWG has been getting props for its reporting, not its accounting, lobbying, or silly scare campaigns. As far as I know, no one's questioned the farm subsidy numbers. Anyway, just figured I had to note that, in case you hear that EWG has been "debunked" and therefore its farm-dole research is irrelevant. I really can't stand it when people just casually say, "Well, Jones has been debunked," or, "Smith debunked Brown over a year ago," with no attention to what that means and whether the relevant portions of Jones' or Smith's work has actually been addressed.