Tag: farm bill

House to split off food stamps from farm bill.

“Elections have consequences.” That phrase isn’t always a knell of doom, by the way:

House Republican leaders have decided to drop food stamps from the farm bill and are whipping the farm-only portion of the bill for a vote that will likely come this week, according to a GOP leadership aide.

The nutrition portion of the bill would be dealt with later.

The Rules Committee is expected to post the text Tuesday night and meet Wednesday, the aide said.

Continue reading House to split off food stamps from farm bill.

I went through some trouble to tell you that I was wrong about the farm bill.

It took me forever to get this emergency netbook to function long enough to let me post that, hey, turns out that the House CAN set a big heap of pig sh*t on fire when it wants to. But it’s IMPORTANT, dagnabbit.

Now cut more.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/house-votes-to-cut-food-stamps-by-2-billion-a-year-as-part-of-wide-ranging-farm-bill/2013/06/19/e1ed997c-d93e-11e2-b418-9dfa095e125d_story.html

For the record, with regard to the current farm bill. (Only technically SFW)

Just to make it clear:

  • I am assuming that the current farm bill is a huge pile of pigsh*t.  Only less useful as fertilizer.
  • I have not researched it to determine how the current farm bill is a huge pile of pigsh*t, largely because every other farm bill in my lifetime has been a huge pile of pigsh*t and after a while in this business you learn to spot trends.
  • I am also assuming that none of you need to be told that the current farm bill is a huge pile of pigsh*t.
  • Do any of you have the bribe money necessary to make a viable counter-offer that would set this huge pile of pigsh*t on fire?  No?  Don’t feel bad; neither do I.
  • I’ll be less mildly cynical about the situation as soon as I hear a viable plan for setting this huge pile of pigsh*t on fire that does not include the implicit step And then a miracle happens.  Which I privately anticipate will be a factor in every solution that gets proposed.

Sorry, folks. The agricultural industry has, as it has been put, “awesome iconography.” And don’t they just know it, too.

Compromise reached on… farm bill.

Moo, I say. Moo.

If you were asking yourself Just how much of a kabuki theater is what’s going on in Congress right now? – well, wonder no more. From USA Today:

Top leaders on both the Senate and House Agriculture committees announced a deal on Sunday to extend the 2008 farm bill by a year, a deal that could avoid a surge in market prices for milk and other commodities.

The measure, which still has to be approved by votes in both chambers of Congress, would give lawmakers another year to iron out a deal. The 2008 farm bill expired on Sept. 30, but a failure to have a law in place would have its biggest impact on the agricultural sector next year beginning with milk.

Continue reading Compromise reached on… farm bill.

#rsrh Barack Obama: typically ignorant of GOP farm bill’s passage.

(H/T Gateway Pundit) Well, this is embarrassing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=70Vnvd4e3fA&feature=player_embedded

Short version: in his haste to make it look like he actually cares about the state of Iowa, Barack Obama snidely wondered what was up with passage of the farm bill.  Well, what’s up with the farm bill is that House Republicans did pass an emergency one two weeks ago; only, Democrat Debbie Stabenow got her nose so out of joint because she couldn’t have her Five Year Plan* passed that she refused to let the Senate version advance.  Which you would think that Barack Obama would know perfectly well, since the New York Times reported that Senate aides indicated “the White House would have considered the House measure”.

I guess nobody ever tells Barack Obama anything.  Frankly, I wouldn’t: there’s always the chance that he’d take an interest in the subject, and thus muck it up thoroughly. Continue reading #rsrh Barack Obama: typically ignorant of GOP farm bill’s passage.