Farm Bill: Porky The Pig

Both sides in the battle over the farm bill have tried to dupe Americans.  Democrats claimed the legislation would gut the food stamp program.  Republicans argued rural farmers would go bankrupt. The truth has been missing in action during the debate that concluded last week with the House rejecting the bill.

The bill's defeat came after defections by both parties. Support from Democrats and Republicans evaporated because there was not enough pork in it to satisfy either side.   That's saying something considering the 629-page legislation was stuffed with a myriad of projects to reap political benefit.

The maneuvering over farm legislation began when Democrats insisted on calling the law the Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act of 2013.  In past years, it was simply referred to as the Farm Bill. The spiffy new moniker was supposed to fool uneducated and uniformed Americans.

Implementation of the legislation would have cost taxpayers nearly $1 trillion over 10 years.  The final price tag was $940 billion. Although both sides griped about cuts in food stamps and crop subsidies, actual expenditures would have topped the previous farm bill.

There were sweetheart subsidies and crop insurance for the sugar, dairy, peanut and cotton industries.  One subsidy would guarantee farmers of Japonica rice protection against falling market prices. This particular sticky rice is used in making sushi rolls.

Subsidizing farmers seemed like a good idea when it began in the 1930's.  But today taxpayer dollars are often wasted on large companies and urbanites turned farmers, such as millionaire performers Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi, both beneficiaries of huge subsidies.

There were scores of research programs included in the bill, investigating everything from biomass feedstock development to speciality crops.  Millions of dollars were earmarked for pilot programs to deal with a variety of issues, including feral swine and famine in the Horn of Africa.

Major expenditures for things that had nothing to do with farming or nutrition were crammed into the bill.  For instance, millions of dollars were designated for distance learning, rural energy savings programs, broadband access and business loan support.

It is laughable to call this a "farm" bill when very little in the legislation involved actual production of crops.

The 800-pound gorilla in the legislation was food stamps, which accounts for 80 percent of the bill's expenditures.  Democrats whined about taking food out of the mouths of babes.  Yet the legislation would have maintained the historically high levels of spending on the program.

In President Bush's last budget, the federal government spent $39 billion on food stamps.  Costs have more than doubled under Obama. Last year, the food stamp program gobbled up $85 billion in taxpayer dollars with no end in sight.

Today nearly 48 million people in the nation receive food stamps, known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). That is almost one out of every six Americans.  The Obama Administration has orchestrated historic growth by relaxing standards and recruiting beneficiaries.

The result has been record waste and fraud.  Hard working Americans are picking up the annual $2.2 billion tab.

The farm bill deserved to be rejected.  However, in all likelihood Democrats and Republicans will craft a back room deal to resurrect the legislation.  That is the kind of bipartisanship that will bankrupt the nation unless it is stopped.