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As you are aware, Congress just passed a new farm bill which will most certainly bode well for our sugar growers, especially those in the state of Minnesota, which happens to be our largest sugar producing area.
This bill pretty much sucks ass so far as the sugar consumer is concerned.
There is a provision in this bill which would have the government buy the sugar surpluses and then sell that extra to the ethanol producers just in case we happen to have an over-abundance of sugar from imports. Can you see our sugar prices rising? As if we do not pay more than enough for our cane already.
The legislation calls for a gradual 5.2 percent increase in the loan rate for sugar beet growers, or guaranteed minimum price, through 2011, and a 4.2 percent increase for cane. That would be the first increase since 1985.
President Bush has threatened to veto the bill, and the Bush administration has cited the sugar-to-ethanol provision as one of several elements to which it objected. But the Senate passed the farm bill last week by a veto-proof margin a day after the House did the same.
Of course, all of the Senators from Minnesota ( R-Norm Coleman and D-Amy Klobuchar ) and North Dakota (D- Kent Conrad and D-Byron Dorgan ) voted in favor of the bill.
The sugar-to-ethanol proposal has its critics. New Hampshire Sens. Judd Gregg and John Sununu, both Republicans, were among 15 senators to vote against the $290 billion farm bill.
The legislation would make small cuts to direct payments that are distributed to some farmers no matter how much they grow, and would eliminate some federal payments to individuals with more than $750,000 in annual farm income.
But Sununu said overall it would leave massive subsides in place even as food prices soar.
"At a time when farms are experiencing record profit, there is absolutely no reason to provide price supports for sugar and extend the ethanol tariff," he said. "The bill is a continuation of bad economic policy that taxpayers in New Hampshire and across the country do not deserve."
This is just more of the " screw the consumer " crowd at it once again.
ATLANTA - In planning Jimmy Carter's climb to the White House, Hamilton Jordan pushed a strategy still popular with lesser-known candidates today: start campaigning years in advance and target early voting states to build support from early upsets.
Jordan, 63, died at his home in Atlanta about 7:30 p.m., said Gerald Rafshoon, who was Carter's chief of communications.
Say what you will about the Carter administration, Jordan was a brilliant man and we could sure use more of him in the Democratic Party today.
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