White House to harvest your cash? Chastain warns Bush to sign bill costing each family thousands

WorldNetDaily.com ^ | Thursday, May 9, 2002 | Jane Chastain

[JohnHuang2]

As hard as this may be to believe, George W. Bush, the president who championed tax relief, is poised to sign a bill that would cost every household in the United States a whopping $4,377. Why haven't you heard about it? Chances are you have but it just didn't catch your interest.

It doesn't have a slick title. It isn't a sexy issue. It doesn't offer the rush of bombing the Taliban or the excitement of tracking down the mailbox bomber. It doesn't have the box office appeal of a juicy Hollywood murder.

It's the farm bill!

"What does this have to do with me?" you say. "I'm not a farmer." Yes, but you are a taxpayer and you will be picking up the tab for this monstrosity which represents the largest non-military expansion of the federal government since the Great Society.

Heritage Foundation's agriculture analyst Brian Riedl points out that the true cost of this bill, which will eat up $190 billion of our hard-earned money over the next 10 years, or $1,805 per household, is just the beginning. The bill strengthens the Soviet-style cartels, which fix the prices of commodities like milk and sugar up to three times the world price. That means that the average household will shell out an extra $2,572 to cover the cost of these inflated prices at the checkout counter.

Make no mistake, if President Bush signs this bill you will pay your share. An 80 percent increase in spending is an outrage and flies in the face of the belt-tightening that is going on outside Washington. Furthermore, the $190 billion will become the baseline for subsequent farm bills for an out-of-control Congress and a future president who can't say no. If tax revenues don't make up the difference, they must be raised or the country will go deeper and deeper into debt.

However, the inflated prices of these farm products at the checkout stand, is the worst tax of all because it is hidden. The average family, with both dad and mom now forced into the workforce fulltime, will pedal harder and harder and will not understand why it is getting farther and farther behind.

It is because our representatives in Washington couldn't – or wouldn't – say no to the big agri-businesses and a plethora of special interest groups who have lined up with their hands poised to dip into your wallet.

If you think the idea behind this increase is to keep the poor family farmer off welfare, forget it. Riedl ran the numbers and discovered that it would take just $4 billion per year to bring the income of every full-time farmer in America up to 185 percent of the federal poverty level of $32,652 for a family of four.

This is not about helping the poor. In 1999, farm households had an average income of $64,347, which was 17 percent above the national average, and an average net worth of $563,600, double the national average. Furthermore, these figures do not take into account that the cost of living in rural areas is much lower than other areas. On top of that, farms fail – and some should – at only one-sixth the rate of non-farm businesses.

However, the way this scheme is constructed, the largest and most profitable farms receive the lion's share of the dough. The top 10 percent of recipients receive 73 percent of the subsidies. To add insult to injury, the bill sets a limit on gross income for those eligible to receive farm payments and the limit is $2.5 million or more. What restraint! Fat-cat farmers need not worry – there is a loophole. If the majority of the recipient's income comes from farming, ranching or forestry, the sky is the limit.

Those on the receiving end of farm subsidies include David Rockefeller, the grandson of the oil tycoon; NBA star Scottie Pippen; former Enron president Kenneth Lay and the 25th-wealthiest man in America, Ted Turner. We also give farm subsidies to Fortune 500 companies like Chevron, Caterpillar, International Paper and Archer Daniels Midland.

The Washington Post called on Bush to veto this bill and called it the "defining challenge" for his administration. In the past, Bush spoke out against this bill, but now indicates he will sign it. Why? There is no public outcry! It's the path of least resistance.

This is a defining challenge – not simply for Bush, but for each and every taxpayer. If you don't take a moment to call the White House to express your outrage to President Bush before it is too late, you deserve what you will get … a $4,377 bill.

[JohnHuang2]

Thursday, May 9, 2002

Quote of the Day by Common Tator 5/8/03

[Mitchell]

Bump.

[billybudd]

Uh-oh, here come the Bush-worshippers!

This guy is an idiot...
He's just helping the Democrats...
Don't question; don't think; don't ask...
We must accept anything Bush does as holy and sacred...
Because Bush is a god...
Amen!

[brat]

I don't understand how anyone could propose and support such a bill. George....are you SURE you're a Conservative? Oh..that's right..you're a Republican who believes that people don't count but corporate WELFARE is ok! Enough! This abomination must not pass! Lets Roll Freepers and let him know we don't want him to sign this megabuck bill.

[Texasforever]

I must have missed the part that calculated the cost to my family of the food I actually buy if the farming industry is limited to the corporate farmers. I don't like subsidies of any kind but I also like both points of view to be researched and presented.

[Texasforever]

What was your stance on the Klaymath farmers?

[Satadru]

This guy is an idiot...

you mean this gal right. Oh, but you missed a big one. Al Gore would have given us a bigger farm bill. Liberal baiting by the Bushibans go on.

[Satadru]

I must have missed the part that calculated the cost to my family of the food I actually buy if the farming industry is limited to the corporate farmers.

Much...much less.

[Uncle Bill]

"Help is on the way"

"My concern about the role of the federal government is that an intrusive government, a government that says, ‘Don’t worry, we will solve your problems’ is a government that tends to crowd compassion out of the marketplace, that too often in the past people said: ‘Somebody else will take care of the problem in my area. Don’t worry. The government is here.’ "
George W. Bush - Source: Remarks at Cityteam Ministries, San Jose, CA Oct 31, 2000

Bush Wants Food Stamps For Some Noncitizens

Bush Spending Bill Largest Ever

2001 Laws Cost Taxpayers 733 Billion

Billions More For Education - Cooking 101

George W. Bush's Big Government Adventure

BUSH - Blowing The Budget

House Republicans Can't Help Self - Planning Prescription Drug Plan 60% Larger Than Bush's Proposal

House Republicans Ready Legislation For Full Drug Subsidies For Low-Income Elderly

House Panel Authorizes $73.4 Billion Military Procurement
Note: The War on Waste - Rumsfeld Says 2.3 Trillion Dollars Missing

Welfare Reform Bills Get House Panels' Ok - Come Back, We miss you afterall

Bush Administration Prepares Big-Time Response To Help African Famine, Especially With All The Compassion Displayed Towards White Farmers

THAT GIANT SUCKING SOUND

House Passes the Farm Bill, Which Bush Says He'll Sign

House passes election-year expansion in farm subsidies

House passes bill to boost farm spending (by 70%)

Farm Subsidy Limit Loophole Cost Taxpayers Billions In Payments To Biggest Farms

Bush Says He'd Sign Farm Bill

Farming the Taxpayers-The farm-subsidy faucet is being turned up, full blast

The Farm State Pig-Out

Immigrant food-stamp aid restored for farm bill

Immigrant food-stamp aid restored for farm bill

Accord Reached on a Bill Raising Farm Subsidies

THE PIG BOOK - 2002

America, Ted Turner thanks you:

Poor Ted Turner sets up another homestead, more than 35,000 acres hard up against the Oklahoma border. He plans to run bison on it. He'll do, in short, the same thing he's done on the other 1.6 million acres he owns across Montana, Nebraska, New Mexico and South Dakota. He'll have the confiscators steal our hard earned money, give it to him and many more, then ranch, farm, give zillions to the United Nations, and come for your guns. Pretty cool, huh?

The Millionaire's Club

Farm Subsidy Database

Give us this day our daily commodity certificate

The Grapes of Graft

Farm bill a pork feast

If voting made a difference the politicans would make it illegal

[philman_36]

If voting made a difference the politicans would make it illegal
LOL...yes they would. Worth repeating!

[Uncle Bill]

Bush promises to cut farm bill

[Hank Rearden]

And some people still ask why I'm a Libertarian. Duh.

[Texasforever]

Much...much less

I take it you have a source for that?

[Uncle Bill]

LOL! I figured if Bush wants to promote socialist programs like a communist in heat, I'd throw out something close to the old wobbly communist quote. What the heck. Tomorrow I'm working on my diversity quilt like George Tenet.

[WhiteGuy]

This waste brought to you by:

The gop!

Lets face it, the republicans are not our friends....

Nor do they represent our values

[billybudd]

The huge corporate farms provide the vast majority of output today. To say that small farms keep prices down is just silly. (Click here for stats) The only thing subsidies accomplish is to prop up food prices by supporting inefficient farms. Moreover, some subsidies actually restrict supply. The truth is, a totally free market in agriculture would lower prices and stop the most massive welfare scheme in the country. This article was well written and presented the arguments that the author thought were valid.

[philman_36]

I figured if Bush wants to promote socialist programs...
Why UB, what ever gave you that idea?. Damn it, this is Amerika, after all, and he's just doing his job.
Tomorrow I'm working on my diversity quilt like George Tenet.
And I hope you're then donating it to a chronic bedwetter. LOL

[philman_36]

Hey billy, to Texasforever..."It doesn't matter" (thanks Rock/Duane for a great line) if This article was well written and presented the arguments that the author thought were valid.
If it doesn't contain every single facet then it is a lousy article, no matter how true or factual the information is.

[Balding_Eagle]

There's not a tinkers d*mns worth of difference between GWB and Clinton/Gore/Democrats, and the following articles prove it beyond a shadow of a doubt::

1. Tokyo irked by US stance on Kyoto............(President George Bush saying the US will not ratify the protocol)

 

2. AIDs fear as Bush blocks sex lessons...............(President George W. Bush is blocking an international drive to provide teenage sex education because of his belief in chastity before marriage)

3. Powell confirms United States to pull out of treaty creating international criminal court...........(The United States will tell the United Nations this week it is renouncing formal involvement in a treaty creating the first permanent war crimes tribunal)

 

4. White House reverses [decades old] stand on right to bear arms

 ......... (told the Supreme Court for the first time late Monday that the Constitution "broadly protects the rights of individuals" to own firearms.)

 

We wasted our time with the Election fight in Florida. Gore could be President today, the country wouldn't have the specter of that election hanging over our heads, and ALL THE ABOVE WOULD STILL HAVE HAPPENED.

 Or so the legions of Bush Bashers would have you believe.

[philman_36]

Or so the legions of Bush Bashers would have you believe.
I'm a legion of one (kinda like the Army's new commercial isn't it) groupee, and I'll bash or praise whomever I choose, and I don't really care what anyone else believes or thinks about it. I'll back any stance I take too, liked or not liked. I don't think that GWB, nor his advisors, are infallible gods. Others may, but I don't.
I note that you fail to mention some of the other deeds by this administration that are not looked upon too favorably. You just talk about "the good stuff" that's been done. Typical.