Free Republic

A bipartisan group of Capitol Hill lawmakers is pressing EPA Director Lisa Jackson to answer questions about privacy issues and other concerns after the agency used aerial surveillance to monitor livestock operations over their home state of Nebraska. “Farmers and ranchers in Nebraska pride themselves in the stewardship of our state’s natural resources. As you might imagine, this practice has resulted in privacy concerns among our constituents and raises several questions,” says the letter signed by Republican Reps. Adrian Smith, Jeff Fortenberry and Lee Terry, as well as Democratic Sen. Ben Nelson and GOP Sen. Mike Johanns. Smith, co-chairman of...

The Obama administration’s move to scrap a plan that would prevent some children from working in dangerous farm jobs drew sharp rebukes Friday from child-welfare advocates who claim the president caved in to election-year pressure from farmers and Republicans. The Labor Department spent more than a year working on the proposal to ban children younger than 16 from using power-driven farm equipment — including tractors — and prevent those under 18 from working in grain silos, feed lots and stockyards. The goal was to protect children, who are four times more likely to be killed while performing farm work than...

Although negotiations over a package of tax increases and a proposed casino collapsed Monday night, the Maryland General Assembly passed a lot of bills this session — 791, to be exact. Of those, 96 percent were passed in the last week, including hundreds in the hours and minutes before midnight on Monday. Here are some highlights from the 90-day session’s last day: STORMWATER FEE The Senate spent much of the session’s waning hours fiercely debating a stormwater fee bill that was on few people’s radar earlier in the session. The bill requires localities to fund projects to reduce polluted runoff...

Politics: To leftist food scolds, eating more vegetables is important. So why are California's two Democratic senators having a cow about a water bill that would let their Central Valley's farmers grow more veggies? House Republican Devin Nunes' Sacramento-San Joaquin Valley Water Relief Act (H.R. 1837), which passed easily in the House last week, was the first standalone bill to address the persistent problem of arbitrary state decisions to deny water to the farmers of the Central Valley. It's a good bill. But not to the more obtuse Democrats. Sen. Dianne Feinstein has denounced the Nunes bill as "a recipe...

MAGNOLIA, WI — John Adams can’t see the nearly 3,000 cows on the dairy farm two miles from his Wisconsin home, but when the wind blows he can smell them. The stench gives him and his wife headaches. They blame the big farm for contaminating their air and polluting the groundwater well they use for drinking, bathing and watering their garden. They no longer feel safe eating the vegetables they grow. Adams also blames the state, which requires local governments to grant permits to large farms that meet certain limited criteria, even if there are additional environmental concerns. The rural...

A new rule being proposed by the federal Department of Transportation would require farmers to get commercial drivers licenses. The Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which is a part of DOT, wants to adopt standards that would reclassify all farm vehicles and implements as Commercial Motor Vehicles, officials said. Likewise, the proposal, if adopted, would require all farmers and everyone on the farm who operates any of the equipment to obtain a CDL, they added. The proposed rule change would mean that anyone who drives a tractor or operates any piece of motorized farming equipment would be required to pass...

When Gov. Rick Perry was just Farmer Perry, the federal government paid him more than $9,000 in farm subsidies to leave his ground fallow, The Austin American Statesman reported Sunday. Twenty years later, the Texan now denounces the program that benefited him as a waste of government money. “In the 1995 farm bill, we must carefully but thoughtfully move our farmers and ranchers away from a subsidized system to a market-driven system,” Perry said in a speech delivered in Iowa . “We must move away from government assistance to opportunity enhancement.” Perry’s $9,624 in benefits pale in comparison to $15...

National Farmers Union (NFU) submitted comments to Thomas Yager of the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration (FMCSA) about a possible reinterpretation of the Motor Carrier Act of 1935, the Motor Carrier Safety Act of 1984, and the Commercial Motor Vehicle Safety Act of 1986. The FMCSA is exploring the possibility of categorizing "implements of husbandry and other farm equipment" as commercial motor vehicles, thus requiring a commercial driver's license (CDL) to operate. "Most farmers have little, if any, control or knowledge of the final destination of the commodities they produce," said NFU President Roger Johnson. "As such, it is inappropriate...

Is the US government starting to implement the policies of the United Nation’s plan for global management of people and resources known as Agenda 21? The latest efforts out of the Department of Transportation (DOT) seem to indicate this is happening. And they are starting by targeting America’s farming communities with costly and oppressive regulations. In Late May, the DOT proposed a rule change for farm equipment, and if it this allowed to take effect, it will place significant regulatory pressure on small farms and family farms all across America – costing them thousands of dollars and possibly forcing many...

While thievery has long been a fact of life in the country, such crimes are on the rise and fighting them has become harder in many parts of California as many grants for rural law enforcement have withered on the vine. While other states have their own agricultural intrigue — cattle rustlers in Texas, tomato takers in Florida — few areas can claim a wider variety of farm felons than California, where ambushes on everything from almonds to beehives have been reported in recent years. Then there is the hardware: diesel fuel, tools and truck batteries regularly disappear in the...

Double Red Alert Posted by Ann Barnhardt - June 24, AD 2011 9:01 AM MST Two HUGE intel leads in my email box this morning from way-back contacts that I've had for years, that are actually somewhat connected concepts. 1. File this one under "Now It All Makes Sense". A Missouri farming and ranching contact just got off a conference call wherein he was informed that the federal government is sending out letters to all of the flooded out farmers in the Missouri River flood plain and bottoms notifying them that the Army Corps of Engineers will offer to BUY...

By Tom McClintock House Chamber, Washington, D.C. January 19, 2011 M. Speaker: The Department of Interior issued an announcement yesterday that perfectly illustrates the irrationality of our current approach to water issues. California’s precipitation this season has gone off the charts. Statewide snow water content is 198 percent of normal; in the all-important Northern Sierra snowpack is 174 percent of normal. This is not only a wet year – it is one of the wettest years on record. Yet yesterday, we have this announcement from the Department of the Interior: that despite a nearly unprecedented abundance of water, the Bureau...

China Running Out Of Farmland: What This Means For U.S. Stocks by: Greyson S. Colvin October 27, 2010 As the Chinese growth engine continues to propel forward, the government is faced with the dilemma: How do we feed our growing and developing population? China’s middle class is expected to double over the next 10 years and will demand a higher protein diet. China has roughly 20% of the world’s population although only 7% of the world’s arable land. The big problem is that China’s farmland has disappeared at an alarming rate and the country may no longer be able to...

Fears of food inflation and tighter global supply make China and India, holders of nearly half the world's wheat reserves, reluctant to send large volumes to market despite surging prices that offer a huge opportunity. The world's most populous nations, China and India are estimated to finish the 2010/11 crop year with a combined stockpile of around 78 million tonnes, 44 percent of the world total of 175 million, the U.S. Department of Agriculture says. But they will probably defend that stockpile in the face of rising consumption. "I don't think China will be an exporter because of increasing domestic...

HARRISBURG, Pa. — The search by the booming North American population of Amish for affordable, fertile farmland has produced settlements in 28 states and Ontario — and has even led parties to scout recently for suitable properties in Alaska and Mexico. A new study estimates the number of Amish has increased nearly 10 percent in the past two years alone, to a total population of 249,000, compared with about 227,000 in 2008. That figure was just 124,000 in 1992. Nearly all Amish descended from a group of about 5,000 in the early 20th century.

When the 20 agents arrived bearing a search warrant at her Ventura County farmhouse door at 7 a.m. on a Wednesday a couple weeks back, Sharon Palmer didn't know what to say. This was the third time she was being raided in 18 months, and she had thought she was on her way to resolving the problem over labeling of her goat cheese that prompted the other two raids. (In addition to producing goat's milk, she raises cattle, pigs, and chickens, and makes the meat available via a CSA.) But her 12-year-old daughter, Jasmine, wasn't the least bit tongue-tied. "She...

Shirley Sherrod's Disappearing Act: Not So Fast By: Tom Blumer Special to The Examiner 07/20/10 1:52 PM EDT My oh my, that happened quickly. Perhaps too quickly. Until yesterday, Shirley Sherrod was Georgia Director of Rural Development for the USDA. Earlier in the day at Big Government, Andrew Breitbart put up a video that exposed Ms. Sherrod as someone all too willing to discriminate based on race. Within hours of the video's release, USDA Director Tom Vilsack announced Sherrod's resignation, and in the process issued an exceptionally strong condemnation ("We are appalled by her actions ... Her actions were shameful...

President Obama’s team has discovered another errant profit-seeking, job-producing villain -- the blueberry farmers of America. Who knew sprinkling blueberries on your cereal could be controversial? According to a release from Labor Secretary Hilda Solis, the Obama administration has hired an additional 250 investigators – a 33% increase – to more energetically oversee those who employ migrant workers, such as blueberry farmers in North Carolina. They are especially on the lookout for growers who have hired children under the (legal) age of 12, or who have paid less than minimum wage to pickers. To rein in abuses, the Labor Department...

The federal government is taking a Franklin County farm family to court. The Department of Homeland Security is threatening to take part of their land through eminent domain to increase border security. The Rainville's say the move will put them out of business. The Department of Homeland Security wants to expand its outdated and crumbling border station at Morses Line. Originally the government was in need of 10 acres. But after further review, which revealed only 40 cars use the port each day on average, scaled the project back to 5 acres. "They are pitching this as a stimulus project,...

Returning from Mexico, Michelle Obama made a brief stop Thursday in San Diego to visit a community garden farmed by international refugees that she called a model for building healthy communities across the nation and around the world....

The number of California dairies has plummeted by more than 500 in the past decade as farmers move to states promising lower costs and simpler regulations. Some are willing to leave California because high land costs often mean they can't grow their own grain. Others complain California has more agricultural regulations than many states. States courting California dairies include Colorado, Idaho, Iowa, Kansas, Montana, Nevada, Texas and Wyoming. Mike Meissen recruits businesses to Iowa. He says each dairy cow he lures brings about $15,000 per year to the local economy. Jay Van Rein of the California Department of Food and...

What is the environmental movement thinking? Now extending the list of their mistakes is a Robert Kennedy Jr. campaign to dump millions of tons of hog waste into American rivers … while his trial lawyer acquaintances take billions suing the modern confinement farms that produce most of America’s meat and eggs. How does that square with Bobby’s long-term claim to be the nation’s top “riverkeeper”? Read more:

The Shenandoah Valley of Virginia is above all a land of farms and farmers. Since the firm Pennsylvania Germans crossed the Potomac with horses, oxen, pigs and tools, the fertile lands along the Shenandoah River have beckoned to those who love the country life. Although areas of the Valley have developed and there are cities here and there, a drive along the old roads will provide a multitude of pastoral views. [Vintage pictures]

Politics: The water spigots are back on, at least temporarily, in California's Central Valley. Turned off to protect a tiny fish, they happen to be in the districts of two congressmen "undecided" on health care reform. One could chalk it up to good fortune or just good constituent service. But in the middle of a contentious health care debate marked by Cornhusker Kickbacks and Louisiana Purchases, we may be forgiven if we find an announcement by the Department of the Interior regarding California's water supply a tad too coincidental. On Tuesday, the Department of the Interior announced it was increasing...

Farmers' lobby groups on Tuesday demanded clarity on a proposal that agricultural land become a "national asset", which they fear is a move towards nationalisation. Although Land Affairs director-general Thozi Gwanya said the government was not considering nationalisation, and that making land a national asset was just a land reform "option... Land invasion fears...talk of nationalisation of farms could be followed by land invasions, as happened in Zimbabwe... the Chinese communist model in which farmers pay rent to the state which owns the land. More than 90% of the 5.9 million hectares of land the state bought for emerging farmers...

The next time you're at a grocery store, let the cashier ring up the sale. Then try to bargain for a better deal. Sounds ridiculous, doesn't it? After all, just a handful of retailers sell more than half of all the groceries in the United States, and an individual shopper has very little power to negotiate. That same imbalance of power is a real problem for farmers and ranchers in the United States. Farmers are proud of their independence, but having millions of growers bartering separately puts them at a real disadvantage in the marketplace. That is why they banded...

http://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/2010/February/10-at-182.html NOTE: The following text SNIPPET is a quote: FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Tuesday, February 23, 2010 Department of Justice and USDA Workshops to Explore Competition and Regulatory Issues in the Agriculture Industry to Begin March 12 in Iowa Initial Workshop to Be Held in Ankeny, Iowa, at Des Moines Area Community College, FFA Enrichment Center WASHINGTON — The Department of Justice and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) announced today the agenda and panelists for the first joint public workshop, which will be held on March 12, 2010, in Ankeny, Iowa, to explore competition and regulatory issues in the agriculture...

Agriculture: Already buffeted by rising food prices due to biofuels, consumers face a bigger hike if climate-change legislation is passed. Farming costs will rise, and it may be more profitable to plant trees than crops. If the cap-and-trade provisions of the Waxman-Markey bill become law, you can wave goodbye to those amber waves of grain as America's heartland falls victim to a perverse set of incentives and a process called "afforestation." Soybeans and wheat will give way to elms and oaks. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack wants a review of what amounts to an agricultural impact study of HR 2454, which...

Our president has asked for greener energy. In Indiana, Gov. Mitch Daniels has asked for greener energy. And in this state, things are happening. All over the state of Indiana, if you drive through the farmlands, you will see windmills rising above the horizon. Not the oil rig looking mills of yesteryear, but high tech turbines.

Environmentalism: Sen. Dianne Feinstein votes to deny water to California's drought-stricken San Joaquin Valley. Farmers, families and food are being held hostage to an endangered fish called the delta smelt. (snip) The Senate rejected the amendment by a largely party-line 61-36 margin, with Feinstein opposing the restoration of water deliveries to farmers. The California senator claimed she was blindsided by the amendment to the bill she was managing in the Senate, bizarrely comparing the move to a "Pearl Harbor." "No one from California has called, written or indicated they wanted this on the calendar," Feinstein protested.

Delta smelts: Preferred over humans. Environmentalism: Sen. Dianne Feinstein votes to deny water to California's drought-stricken San Joaquin Valley. Farmers, families and food are being held hostage to an endangered fish called the delta smelt.There was a time when the San Joaquin Valley was the most productive agricultural region in the world. It was a large part of what made the Golden State golden.Now it's a place where farmers no longer farm, but instead line up at food banks to feed the families of those who once fed the rest of the country and a good chunk of the...

LABOR DEPARTMENT SEEKS TO REVERSE CHANGES MADE DURING BUSH ADMINISTRATION The Labor Department is trying again to roll back Bush administration regulations that made it easier for farmers to hire temporary foreign farm workers. The agency Thursday said it is proposing new rules that would boost wages and increase safeguards for thousands of seasonal workers brought in each year to help farmers pick their crops. It also would require that growers make greater efforts to fill those jobs with American workers. If the rules are adopted, they largely will reverse regulations finalized shortly before President George W. Bush left office...

NORTH ROSE – Border patrol officers can’t break the law to enforce it, the Wayne County Farm Bureau is asserting. Farm Bureau is in the process of gathering information for a formal complaint to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Buffalo, asking for an investigation into the circumstances of the stop of four migrant farm workers on Route 414 in front of Barbara Jean’s Furniture Store Aug. 17. Also, U.S. Sen. Kristen Gillibrand was made aware of the incident last week and indicated she will write a letter to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napalitano regarding border patrol activity in...

Despite some really eloquent speeches to the contrary, our “for sale” House of Representatives passed the Food Fascism Act….euphemistically called a food safety act, by a margin of about 140 over the naysayer’s. True to form, Rosa DeLauro spoke about things she knows nothing about and couldn’t care less; Rosa just loves her some Monsanto! And that exclusion for farms??? Gone! And that includes you organic idiots who thought you had kissed enough behinds to have your industry excluded. The newly revised bill that appeared overnight after the original was defeated 29th of July, now includes all those farms we...

Late blight, which caused the Irish Potato Famine of the 1840s and 1850s, is killing potato and tomato plants in home gardens from Maine to Ohio and threatening commercial and organic farms... "Late blight has never occurred this early and this widespread in the United States," said Meg McGrath, a plant pathologist at Cornell University's extension center in Riverhead, New York. She said the fungal disease, spread by spores carried in the air, has made its way into the garden centers of large retail chains in the Northeastern United States. "Wal-mart, Home Depot, Sears, Kmart and Lowe's are some of...

The goal seems to be nothing short of eradicating American farms and self-sustainability. Even DEMOCRATS are opposing the Obama Energy Bill. Climate change legislation will be utterly devastating for American farmers. Rep. Leonard Boswell (D-IA) of the House Agriculture Committee says that not only will he not vote for it, but no one else on his committee will support it either. The bill would increase the cost of everything that farmers depend on, such as diesel fuel, gasoline, fertilizers, pesticides, and a host of other things. It would raise taxes on energy by $846 billion over the next ten years....

From The Evil Empire: Government control of our food supply is the ultimate step in our enslavement. Barack Obama has moved swiftly...to seize authority over the very food we eat. The mechanism...is legislation that most Congressmen will vote for without reading, as usual, based on the synoptic introduction listing intended improvements.... H.R.875, the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009 S.425, the Food Safety and Tracking Improvement Act These bills have the legal potential to eliminate organic farming, destroy small family farms, outlaw natural seed banks, and criminalize even backyard vegetable gardens. Their overt intention, although nobody is noticing, is to...

The Farm and Ranch Freedom Alliance (FARFA) is leading the fight to save family farms and individuals from expensive and unnecessary government regulation. Help us protect our food supply and our liberties! The National Animal Identification System ("NAIS") poses a serious threat to all farmers, ranchers, livestock owners, and companion-animal owners, whether they are organic or conventional, small or large, involved with animals for business or for pleasure. If it is made mandatory, every person with even one horse, cow, chicken, pig, goat, sheep, or virtually any other livestock animal on their premises will be required to register their homes...

Something like the purges of the Kulaks during the Russian Bolshevik Revolution is about to happen to many of California's Central Valley farmers. Only in a Capitalist society like ours the government just adjudicates the de facto taking of your property only without additionally hanging you like Lenin did the Kulaks. But why are California's coastal cities not joining with agricultural water districts to appeal the court order which has blocked 85% of water deliveries through the California Aqueduct to both farmers and Southern California? Don't they both have something to lose? For those who haven't been following what is...

One of 14 ArmaTrac 602 tractors presented to local sheiks in the Lutifiyah Nahia during a ceremony on Combat Outpost Meade, March 5. Photo by Pfc. Evan Loyd, 1st Armored Division Public Affairs. COMBAT OUTPOST MEADE — Multi-National Division—Baghdad Soldiers presented 14 new tractors to local Shaykhs from the Lutifiyah Nahia during a ceremony here, March 5. Each ArmaTrac 602 tractor should help to cultivate an area over 25,000,000 square feet.  Troops from Task Force 4th Battalion, 27th Field Artillery, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Armored Division used funds from the Commander’s Emergency Response Program to purchase the 14 new...

'We're looking at a scenario where there's no more agriculture in California,' Steven Chu says. He sees education as a means to combat threat. Reporting from Washington -- California's farms and vineyards could vanish by the end of the century, and its major cities could be in jeopardy, if Americans do not act to slow the advance of global warming, Secretary of Energy Steven Chu said Tuesday.

PEACH BOTTOM, Pa. — Jacci Cook is a big fan of the Hangin’ Tree Cowdog breed. Her husband, Herman Cook, has six of the dogs on their 164-acre dairy farm in southern Lancaster County. “With a dog on the job, I don’t have to help drive the cows into the milking parlor, I don’t have to help bring them in from pasture, and if they get out, I don’t have to help round them up. “I love our dogs.” And so does her husband, and their 25-year-old son, Jordan. Father and son manage their 190-head herd of milking cows, young...

An alarming new study to be published in November in the Annual Review of Environment and Resources finds that one-third of the world's marine fish catches are ground up and fed to farm-raised fish, pigs, and poultry, squandering a precious food resource for humans and disregarding the serious overfishing crisis in our oceans. Lead author Dr. Jacqueline Alder, senior author Dr. Daniel Pauly, and colleagues urge that other foods be used to feed farmed animals so that these "forage fish" can be brought to market for larger-scale human consumption. "Forage fish" include anchovies, sardines, menhaden, and other small- to medium-sized...

Phil Stine is not crazy, or possessed, or even that special, he says. He has no idea how he does what he does. From most accounts, he does it very well. “Phil finds the water,” said Frank Assali, an almond farmer and convert. “No doubt about it.” Mr. Stine, you see, is a “water witch,” one of a small band of believers for whom the ancient art of dowsing is alive and well. Emphasis, of course, on well. Using nothing more than a Y-shaped willow stick, Mr. Stine has as his primary function determining where farmers should drill to slake...

FOB DELTA — Team Borlaug conducted their last scheduled farm assessment is Wasit province, just outside al Kut, Sept. 25. The team from Texas A&M also accompanied Gov. Abd al-Latif Hamad Tarfah, governor of Wasit province, on a tour of a family cooperative farm, managed by two brothers. The 400-dunam (248 acre) farm was planted with 100 dunam of barley and wheat, 100 of alfalfa, 25 of cotton, 10 of corn, 25 of watermelon, 100 fallow and five devoted to greenhouses, said John Hargreaves, member of Team Borlaug. There were also 6,000 fish being raised in drainage canals, as well...

Zimbabwe militants seize farm of Commercial Farmers' Union president By Sebastien Berger in Johannesburg Last Updated: 1:43am BST 10/04/2008 Zanu PF militants have invaded the farm of Commercial Farmers' Union president Trevor Gifford, saying he is never to return home. Mr Gifford, who has spent a frantic week in Harare trying to assist at least 60 fellow farmers cope with their own invasions around the country was not at home near Chipinge, about 220 miles south east of Harare, when the mob of about 30 wearing Zanu-PF T-shirts arrived at his security gate. "They have left messages with staff for...

FORWARD OPERATING BASE KALSU — Chicken farming in Iraq is moving toward pre-war levels, as Coalition forces work with farmers to overcome challenges. There are about seven functioning chicken houses in the region where 3rd Battalion, 7th infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 3rd Infantry Division operates, and dialogue has begun with the owners on how to increase production. One of the first areas where the unit discovered chicken houses was the community of Abu Lukah. It has four chicken houses, three of which are functioning. The first visit by the unit was at the end of January during which...

South Africa may force more white farmers to sell in order to speed up the transfer of land into nonwhite hands, the agriculture minister said Thursday. Lulu Xingwana also said the government was considering new regulations for foreign land ownership. She said that black South Africans, who make up nearly 80 percent of the population, currently own just 4.7 percent of the land — even though land reform has been a key part of government policy since 1994 to right the wrongs of apartheid. Xingwana and other officials have repeatedly ruled out Zimbabwe-style land grabs, but the public's patience is...

Hugo Chavez leveled a threat against Venezuelan farmers over the weekend, another step in creating his socialist paradise. He called farmers who sell abroad to gain a better price for their goods "traitors", and told his ministers to identify them so that he could send the Army to confiscate their property: President Hugo Chavez threatened on Sunday to take over farms or milk plants if owners refuse to sell their milk for domestic consumption and instead seek higher profits abroad or from cheese-makers. With the country recently facing milk shortages, Chavez said "it's treason" if farmers deny milk to Venezuelans...

EL CAMPO, Tex. -- Even though Donald R. Matthews put his sprawling new residence in the heart of rice country, he is no farmer. He is a 67-year-old asphalt contractor who wanted to build a dream house for his wife of 40 years. Yet under a federal agriculture program approved by Congress, his 18-acre suburban lot receives about $1,300 in annual "direct payments," because years ago the land was used to grow rice. Matthews is not alone. Nationwide, the federal government has paid at least $1.3 billion in subsidies for rice and other crops since 2000 to individuals who do...