Opponents of the farm bill are digging in for a fight. A coalition of nearly 30 taxpayer watchdog groups yesterday wrote lawmakers pleading to reopen debate on a section of the bill dealing with trade. And two Republican senators have vowed to prolong debate despite the long odds they face. Because of a clerical error, House and Senate votes overriding President Bush’s veto didn’t include a 34-page section of the bill on trade. Farm bill supporters would like to move quickly and approve the measure, but Sens. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) …
As every school child knows, to become law, Art. I, § 7 of the U.S. Constitution requires a bill to go through the formal process of bicameral passage in Congress and presentment to the President. Should the President veto the legislation, then it may become law if it is “repassed by two thirds of the Senate and the House of Representatives.” The word repassed is important to the current controversy, because the farm bill as currently considered by the House and Senate never passed. Rather, a different bill—a version which …
Most of the reports on President Bush’s veto of the “subsidies for millionaires” farm bill mention that since the bill passed both the House and Senate by such large margins, the veto will likely be overridden soon. Hopefully Congress will take a look at world wide record high food prices and rethink the idea of farm subsidies all together like the European Union is doing, and not lock in this years high prices which will cost the American taxpayers billions in price support for years to come. This bill represents …
What do the Bridge to Nowhere, the highway bill, the “subsidies for millionaires” farm bill and our crippling entitlement crisis have in common? They are all examples of the corrupt governance that is guaranteed to happen when the federal government takes over responsibilities best left to the states. In each of these cases (transportation funding, agriculture policy and health care), massive federal government spending and aid to states in the form of matching grants have all but drowned out the ability of state and local governments to set their own …
The farm bill is onerous enough just from a federal spending/government dependency perspective, but even worse it hurts United states efforts to promote free trade abroad. Reuters explains: The $285 billion farm bill unveiled by Congressional leaders last week after months of negotiations may set the United States up for a hornet’s nest of problems at the World Trade Organization. If the plan for a massive new U.S. agriculture law is passed this week as expected, lawmakers face a promised veto from President George W. Bush. The White House says …
The reason Congress has an approval rating at an all-time low (only 16% approve in the latest survey) is that the American people simply don’t trust their leaders to look beyond their own narrow interests and do what is good for the country. The farm bill that passed the House yesterday, and is set to be passed by the Senate by the end of the week, justifies the American people’s deep mistrust in the federal government. Both parties deserve blame on this fiasco. At a cost of $290 billion over …
The House and Senate are set to pass a farm bill either Wednesday or Thursday that will cost Americans billions in higher taxes and food costs every year. Farm subsidies supposedly exist to keep farmers afloat yet 90% of all payments go to just five crops (wheat, cotton, corn, soybeans and rice). Everything else you eat (fruits, vegetables, beef, poultry, etc.) is produced by farms that somehow manage to survive without government help. As if that weren’t bad enough, Heritage scholar Brian Riedl has identified seven other reasons why President …
