June, 2018
Lincoln -- The best thing that could happen right now to help Nebraska's faltering agricultural economy would be for our three congressmen – Bacon, Smith, and Fortenberry – to tell their Republican House leadership to support the just-passed Senate farm bill and consign the terrible House farm bill to history.
The House version is a partisan, divisive bill that wastes money needlessly and counterproductively; it cuts conservation programs to do so; it futher squeezes farmers at a time of low commodity prices and high property taxes. The bill's farm policy provisions are adamately opposed by left, center, and right. Its transparent purpose is to create an election-year wedge issue over food stamps; in other words, farmers' need for a decent farm bill will be held hostage to demagogic attacks on the poor.
The Senate version is a bi-partisan effort that maintains programs such as the Conservation Stewardship Program, much used by Nebraska farmers. The House version zeros it out in favor of giving taxpayer help to more CAFO developments (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations), which citizens in many Nebraska counties are vehemently opposing.*
The Senate version limits the number of non-farm managers who can benefit from farm subsidies, in the form of the Grassley Amendment. Excessive subsidies to non-farmers drive land prices upward and keep them there, not only burdening real farmers with high property taxes but limiting the entry of young farmers into agriculture. (Unfortunately, the similar Durbin-Grassley amendment was not included in the Senate bill, which would have means-tested crop-insurance subsidies to further take pressure off property taxes.**)
The Senate bill also gives support to local and regional agricultural programs, where there is huge potential for job development according to the St. Louis Fed in its encouraging report, Harvesting Opportunity. Nebraska could be in the forefront if the Senate bill passes.
All Nebraska eyes should be on Senator Deb Fischer, a member of the Senate Agriculture Committee which produced the Senate-passed bill, to see if she will try to unite the Nebraska congressional delegation in favor of the bi-partisan and clearly superior Senate bill. So far, her record both as a state and U.S. senator leaves much to be desired in terms of Nebraska agriculture. She now has a chance to remedy at least part of that unfortunate legacy by telling her Nebraska colleagues in Washington not to sacrifice the future of the state to a shameless scheme that is now unfolding in all its ugliness.
This could also be a test of Governor Rickett's leadership. Will he advise the Nebraska House delegation to drop their support of the House bill, and also weigh in for our state with the Speaker and the President?
_______________________
* Colfax, Washington, and Lancaster counties are the latest to witness citizen uprisings against CAFOs. If you want to see what goes on in a pountry CAFO, watch the new documentary movie "Eating Animals." Despite its unfortunate name, it is worth a watch. (My own family – Oberg Hatcheries – goes way back in the poultry industry, when chickens were raised on small farms as a part of diversified farming.)
** Senator Durbin had too little company from his fellow Democrats on the farm bill, as their strategy is to be bi-partisan at all costs and not put forth a Democratic vision of what rural America needs. I think this is a big mistake. Rural America is hurting in so many ways; the farm bill would have been a chance for Democrats to get back into winning in states like Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania (and holding Minnesota), where rural voters hold the balance of power. Many of these voters would be attracted to Democratic initiatives on conservation, nutrition, opioid control, diversified farming, and jobs from the growing local and regional food markets. Yet the Democrats' "Better Deal" is silent on all these issues, giving the impression that Democrats are content in doubling down on their failed 2016 bi-coastal, popular-vote strategy and conceding the heartland and the electoral college to the other party, perhaps in perpetuity.
AVA Colleagues in the News
June, 2018
Washington -- How good to open the New York Times today electronically and see an op-ed from the German entertainer-activist Wolf Bierman, writing on the difficult decisions of Angela Merkel. I especially liked that the newspaper gave us the original German version as well as English, so we can compare the two.
How daunting it must be for the translator to know that millions of bilingual people may be second-guessing him or her while reading the paper over their morning coffee. Bierman himself is a lyricist, so turning a phrase of a phrase-maker is a challenge.
Then I saw who did the translation: Isabel Cole, none other than our fellow member of American Voices Abroad (AVA) in Berlin. Well done, Isabel.
Isabel Fargo Cole has recently written a novel, Die grüne Grenze, which won notice from German reviewers not least for the idea that an American could write it so well.
Another AVA member also has published a new, important book in German, Worauf wir stolz sein dürfen. That would be our friend, the indomitable Gretchen Dutschke, who is now on tour around Germany discussing it.
Isabel and Gretchen are both midwesterners, from Illinois.
Washington -- How good to open the New York Times today electronically and see an op-ed from the German entertainer-activist Wolf Bierman, writing on the difficult decisions of Angela Merkel. I especially liked that the newspaper gave us the original German version as well as English, so we can compare the two.
How daunting it must be for the translator to know that millions of bilingual people may be second-guessing him or her while reading the paper over their morning coffee. Bierman himself is a lyricist, so turning a phrase of a phrase-maker is a challenge.
Then I saw who did the translation: Isabel Cole, none other than our fellow member of American Voices Abroad (AVA) in Berlin. Well done, Isabel.
Isabel Fargo Cole has recently written a novel, Die grüne Grenze, which won notice from German reviewers not least for the idea that an American could write it so well.
Another AVA member also has published a new, important book in German, Worauf wir stolz sein dürfen. That would be our friend, the indomitable Gretchen Dutschke, who is now on tour around Germany discussing it.
Isabel and Gretchen are both midwesterners, from Illinois.
Remorse and Ranked Choice Voting
June, 2018
Washington -- Maine has now approved ranked choice voting (RCV). The RCV victory may have been helped by a strong New York Times editorial in its favor.
Australia and Ireland use this voting method, as do several local governments in the United States. Bills have been introduced in nineteen states to replace winner-take-all elections with ranked choice voting.
The reason I favor RCV is that it deals with often legitimate voter complaints. Many voters feel they are forced to choose between the lesser of two evils. Even if their favorite candidate is on a multi-candidate ballot, in a winner-take-all election voting their actual preference can be a "wasted" vote. Voters often feel manipulated by spoiler candidates who split popular candidates' support, resulting in victories by candidates that most voters actually reject. Many voters stay home because they don't like the choices presented to them, or they think their votes make no difference if their spouses vote differently, cancelling each other out.
Many voters want to "send a message" with their vote, but can't for some or all of these reasons. And if they do vote, their desired message is often misinterpreted or deliberately twisted.
With RCV, each voter is invited to send several clear, unmistakable messages through thoughtful voting. Dislike a candidate intensely? Place that candidate last. Really like a minor candidate and want to send a message of encouragement? Place that candidate first and mark a major candidate you can tolerate second. Dislike candidates who sling mud? Reward those who don't by ranking them higher.
Once more people understand that RCV is message-voting in spades, more states will adopt it. It could also be called no-more-excuses voting.
Now is the time to give RCV* a try. There many voters who are experiencing remorse or even shame at the turn of events resulting from the 2016 national elections. Conservative voters especially sent their messages but did not want or expect outcomes to include trade wars, the breakup of the Western Alliance, cozying up to dictators, and forceably taking children from parents who legally seek asylum. Their excuse for enabling all this? That they had no choice, as it was unthinkable to vote for the other side. Leaving aside the thought that they were duped by Russian manipulation of social media, they have a point. They voted (or chose not to vote) in a system that can produce such outcomes, and it did.
Perhaps these voters will lead the charge for RCV voting. They should.
______________________________
* RCV has its detractors, and not just those who benefit from the current system of electing by mere pluralities. Some voting experts and mathematicians demonstrate that different ways of counting can result in different RCV outcomes. These almost never happen, however, and hardly outweigh all the RCV advantages. Where RCV has been used, the usual result is higher voter turnout, election of more candidates who can compromise on issues, and encouragement for outsiders who can test their ideas with voters and prevail over time.
Washington -- Maine has now approved ranked choice voting (RCV). The RCV victory may have been helped by a strong New York Times editorial in its favor.
Australia and Ireland use this voting method, as do several local governments in the United States. Bills have been introduced in nineteen states to replace winner-take-all elections with ranked choice voting.
The reason I favor RCV is that it deals with often legitimate voter complaints. Many voters feel they are forced to choose between the lesser of two evils. Even if their favorite candidate is on a multi-candidate ballot, in a winner-take-all election voting their actual preference can be a "wasted" vote. Voters often feel manipulated by spoiler candidates who split popular candidates' support, resulting in victories by candidates that most voters actually reject. Many voters stay home because they don't like the choices presented to them, or they think their votes make no difference if their spouses vote differently, cancelling each other out.
Many voters want to "send a message" with their vote, but can't for some or all of these reasons. And if they do vote, their desired message is often misinterpreted or deliberately twisted.
With RCV, each voter is invited to send several clear, unmistakable messages through thoughtful voting. Dislike a candidate intensely? Place that candidate last. Really like a minor candidate and want to send a message of encouragement? Place that candidate first and mark a major candidate you can tolerate second. Dislike candidates who sling mud? Reward those who don't by ranking them higher.
Once more people understand that RCV is message-voting in spades, more states will adopt it. It could also be called no-more-excuses voting.
Now is the time to give RCV* a try. There many voters who are experiencing remorse or even shame at the turn of events resulting from the 2016 national elections. Conservative voters especially sent their messages but did not want or expect outcomes to include trade wars, the breakup of the Western Alliance, cozying up to dictators, and forceably taking children from parents who legally seek asylum. Their excuse for enabling all this? That they had no choice, as it was unthinkable to vote for the other side. Leaving aside the thought that they were duped by Russian manipulation of social media, they have a point. They voted (or chose not to vote) in a system that can produce such outcomes, and it did.
Perhaps these voters will lead the charge for RCV voting. They should.
______________________________
* RCV has its detractors, and not just those who benefit from the current system of electing by mere pluralities. Some voting experts and mathematicians demonstrate that different ways of counting can result in different RCV outcomes. These almost never happen, however, and hardly outweigh all the RCV advantages. Where RCV has been used, the usual result is higher voter turnout, election of more candidates who can compromise on issues, and encouragement for outsiders who can test their ideas with voters and prevail over time.
Loss of a Friend
June, 2018
Washington -- Last month I lost a friend, Harold, in Maryland. No, he didn't pass away. Rather, he acted in such a manner that friendship between us henceforth is unlikely if not impossible.
Harold (not his real name) and I had shared several good times over the years around Chesapeake Bay, including at least two Thanksgiving dinners at the home of mutual friends. I thought he was a decent fellow, always doing the right thing despite challenges from within a troubled family.
But at a gathering last month he gravely insulted his former Thanksgiving hostess with vulgarities and obscenities. Knowing she held a dim view of our country's current president, he let her know he was a strong supporter. Among his reasons: he likes how the president speaks – crudely – which gives license to people like himself to do so as well.
When his former hostess tried to change the conversation to a happier subject, the British royal wedding, Harold let loose with a stream of invective about how terrible it was that British royalty was allowing n-----s into it. (Apparently he was unaware that Queen Charlotte, wife of George III, was partly of African descent.)
What is our country coming to when an American president is encouraging behaviors such as Harold's? I was surprised and disgusted when I learned of Harold's actions. He is college educated, a retired former federal employee. I inquired of a witness to these outbursts if Harold had ever served our country in the military. He had not. Often such service, in my experience, knocks nonsense like Harold's out of people. It also makes those who serve reflect on what kind of a country they are risking their very lives for: one founded on the proposition that all men are created equal, with unalienable rights, or a country of blood and soil, ruled by despots committed to the very opposite.
Are we a country full of Harolds, who put their own prejudices, grievances, and unexamined fears above the heritage passed down from the Declaration of Independence? Is the president's bestowed license more important to them than (1) two centuries of ongoing work toward a more perfect union and (2) a decent respect to the opinions of mankind? Increasingly, it seems so.
Washington -- Last month I lost a friend, Harold, in Maryland. No, he didn't pass away. Rather, he acted in such a manner that friendship between us henceforth is unlikely if not impossible.
Harold (not his real name) and I had shared several good times over the years around Chesapeake Bay, including at least two Thanksgiving dinners at the home of mutual friends. I thought he was a decent fellow, always doing the right thing despite challenges from within a troubled family.
But at a gathering last month he gravely insulted his former Thanksgiving hostess with vulgarities and obscenities. Knowing she held a dim view of our country's current president, he let her know he was a strong supporter. Among his reasons: he likes how the president speaks – crudely – which gives license to people like himself to do so as well.
When his former hostess tried to change the conversation to a happier subject, the British royal wedding, Harold let loose with a stream of invective about how terrible it was that British royalty was allowing n-----s into it. (Apparently he was unaware that Queen Charlotte, wife of George III, was partly of African descent.)
What is our country coming to when an American president is encouraging behaviors such as Harold's? I was surprised and disgusted when I learned of Harold's actions. He is college educated, a retired former federal employee. I inquired of a witness to these outbursts if Harold had ever served our country in the military. He had not. Often such service, in my experience, knocks nonsense like Harold's out of people. It also makes those who serve reflect on what kind of a country they are risking their very lives for: one founded on the proposition that all men are created equal, with unalienable rights, or a country of blood and soil, ruled by despots committed to the very opposite.
Are we a country full of Harolds, who put their own prejudices, grievances, and unexamined fears above the heritage passed down from the Declaration of Independence? Is the president's bestowed license more important to them than (1) two centuries of ongoing work toward a more perfect union and (2) a decent respect to the opinions of mankind? Increasingly, it seems so.
Germany's Options to Save the Western Alliance
June, 2018
Berlin -- Western Europe is looking to save itself from a rogue U.S. president who seems bent on disrupting if not destroying the defense and economic alliances that have served our common interests so well since World War II.
European leadership in this crisis must come from the German government in Berlin.
Germany could do as Gaullist France did in 1966: assert itself by removing U.S. troops from the country. Or Germany could embark on a trade war. But these options only weaken all parties and make the alliances even more vulnerable.
A move that would make Western Europe's point and actually strenghten all the parties in our alliances would be for Germany quickly to fulfill its pledge to increase its defense spending to 2% of GDP. Currently it is at about 1.3%.
But the increased spending would not be for conventional NATO purposes; it would be for increased cybersecurity, to fend off hacking and social media threats from both the east (Putin) and the west (Trump).
In addition to increasing spending for security measures along an east-west axis, Germany should also be prepared to spend more to defend itself and Western Europe along a north-south axis. This will require investments and new defense and economic alliances with the countries of North Africa, to stem the flow of dispossessed peoples into Europe.
Such bold moves by Germany would make an indelible impression around the world. They would be welcomed by its Western European partners and by many if not most Americans, who likewise are troubled by the crisis needlessly fomented by our own president.
Berlin -- Western Europe is looking to save itself from a rogue U.S. president who seems bent on disrupting if not destroying the defense and economic alliances that have served our common interests so well since World War II.
European leadership in this crisis must come from the German government in Berlin.
Germany could do as Gaullist France did in 1966: assert itself by removing U.S. troops from the country. Or Germany could embark on a trade war. But these options only weaken all parties and make the alliances even more vulnerable.
A move that would make Western Europe's point and actually strenghten all the parties in our alliances would be for Germany quickly to fulfill its pledge to increase its defense spending to 2% of GDP. Currently it is at about 1.3%.
But the increased spending would not be for conventional NATO purposes; it would be for increased cybersecurity, to fend off hacking and social media threats from both the east (Putin) and the west (Trump).
In addition to increasing spending for security measures along an east-west axis, Germany should also be prepared to spend more to defend itself and Western Europe along a north-south axis. This will require investments and new defense and economic alliances with the countries of North Africa, to stem the flow of dispossessed peoples into Europe.
Such bold moves by Germany would make an indelible impression around the world. They would be welcomed by its Western European partners and by many if not most Americans, who likewise are troubled by the crisis needlessly fomented by our own president.
One Reform to Save America
June, 2018
Washington -- The conservative pundit David Brooks and I would not agree on everything, but I can't say enough good about his recent column on how voting reforms are the most promising cure for our increasingly destructive two-party polarization.
Ranked-choice voting and multimember congressional districts have much to offer. Maine voters are leading the way on ranked choice voting this month. Let this adage once more come true: As Maine goes, so goes the nation.
Eight years ago I wrote in favor of voting reforms that would bring the advantages of proportional representation into our national politics. There is nothing in our Constitution that mandates political parties and winner-take-all voting. These matters are under the jurisdiction of states. In fact, many local governments already utilize ranked choice (instant run-off) voting and multimember districts, so these concepts are hardly new.
Brooks' column is titled "One Reform to Save America." This is not hyperbole. We should get on with it.
Washington -- The conservative pundit David Brooks and I would not agree on everything, but I can't say enough good about his recent column on how voting reforms are the most promising cure for our increasingly destructive two-party polarization.
Ranked-choice voting and multimember congressional districts have much to offer. Maine voters are leading the way on ranked choice voting this month. Let this adage once more come true: As Maine goes, so goes the nation.
Eight years ago I wrote in favor of voting reforms that would bring the advantages of proportional representation into our national politics. There is nothing in our Constitution that mandates political parties and winner-take-all voting. These matters are under the jurisdiction of states. In fact, many local governments already utilize ranked choice (instant run-off) voting and multimember districts, so these concepts are hardly new.
Brooks' column is titled "One Reform to Save America." This is not hyperbole. We should get on with it.
Exploiting Veterans and the Military
May, 2018
Washington and Lincoln -- It's Memorial Day and a time to think of veterans past, present, and future.
The New York Times led off the day with a harsh but truthful look at how veterans are being exploited by predatory colleges. It is shameful; it is corrupt, there are no other words for it. As a veteran myself, I assist as much as I can those who are in the fight to protect veterans, but it is a difficult struggle when so much of the country willfully turns a blind eye to it.
Then there is the news that my U.S. senator, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, supports taking money out of the federal Impact Aid program to support private elementary and secondary schools for the children of those in the military. Impact Aid now supports public schools to make up for the loss of taxable property in locations where there are large military bases. Bellevue and Papillion in Nebraska are examples of school districts where there are many military schoolchildren but a small tax base due to the presence of Offut Air Force Base.
When I worked in the U.S. Senate many years ago, Impact Aid was targeted for cuts by Ronald Reagan. The cuts had no real rationale behind them other than that Nebraska should be happy to have the presence of Offut and that state, not federal, taxpayers should be responsible for equalizing property tax bases among districts.
Bellevue and Papillion school boards approached Nebraska Senator Jim Exon about fighting the cuts to Impact Aid. He was a member of the Armed Services Committee and well-positioned to lead the fight. And lead he did, organizing a hearing at which he was joined by his committee colleagues Sam Nunn of Georgia, John Warner of Virginia, John Tower of Texas, and others to keep Impact Aid intact.
If memory serves (I assisted with the testimony), John Chafee of Rhode Island, a former Secretary of the Navy, and James Abnor of South Dakota also fought the cuts vigorously. Abnor was particularly concerned about the effect of the cuts on South Dakota counties with Indian Reservations.
The effort succeeded. Impact Aid survived intact.
How times change. Now my Nebraska senator would take funds from Impact Aid with the rationale that military families will choose to take their children out of public schools, so districts like Bellevue and Papillion will have fewer pupils and therefore need less support.
If I were still writing testimony on Impact Aid, I would raise another question. Is it good to promote, with federal funds, an educational system in which military families are incentivized to leave the the public schools? The public schools are institutions that bring communities together, where civilians and military families mix and learn from each other. The public schools are places where our common heritage and common values are taught. Increasingly, non-public schools and home-based schools are teaching their own versions of our country, promoting nativist and sectarian ideologies. Many military children go into military service themselves. Is it for support of such ideological causes our future military is being prepared?
Looking at these matters from a veteran's viewpoint, I think we are on dangerous ground here at all levels of education, from elementary school through college. What are we becoming as a nation, when veterans and those in military service are not so much to be honored as exploited?
Washington and Lincoln -- It's Memorial Day and a time to think of veterans past, present, and future.
The New York Times led off the day with a harsh but truthful look at how veterans are being exploited by predatory colleges. It is shameful; it is corrupt, there are no other words for it. As a veteran myself, I assist as much as I can those who are in the fight to protect veterans, but it is a difficult struggle when so much of the country willfully turns a blind eye to it.
Then there is the news that my U.S. senator, Ben Sasse of Nebraska, supports taking money out of the federal Impact Aid program to support private elementary and secondary schools for the children of those in the military. Impact Aid now supports public schools to make up for the loss of taxable property in locations where there are large military bases. Bellevue and Papillion in Nebraska are examples of school districts where there are many military schoolchildren but a small tax base due to the presence of Offut Air Force Base.
When I worked in the U.S. Senate many years ago, Impact Aid was targeted for cuts by Ronald Reagan. The cuts had no real rationale behind them other than that Nebraska should be happy to have the presence of Offut and that state, not federal, taxpayers should be responsible for equalizing property tax bases among districts.
Bellevue and Papillion school boards approached Nebraska Senator Jim Exon about fighting the cuts to Impact Aid. He was a member of the Armed Services Committee and well-positioned to lead the fight. And lead he did, organizing a hearing at which he was joined by his committee colleagues Sam Nunn of Georgia, John Warner of Virginia, John Tower of Texas, and others to keep Impact Aid intact.
If memory serves (I assisted with the testimony), John Chafee of Rhode Island, a former Secretary of the Navy, and James Abnor of South Dakota also fought the cuts vigorously. Abnor was particularly concerned about the effect of the cuts on South Dakota counties with Indian Reservations.
The effort succeeded. Impact Aid survived intact.
How times change. Now my Nebraska senator would take funds from Impact Aid with the rationale that military families will choose to take their children out of public schools, so districts like Bellevue and Papillion will have fewer pupils and therefore need less support.
If I were still writing testimony on Impact Aid, I would raise another question. Is it good to promote, with federal funds, an educational system in which military families are incentivized to leave the the public schools? The public schools are institutions that bring communities together, where civilians and military families mix and learn from each other. The public schools are places where our common heritage and common values are taught. Increasingly, non-public schools and home-based schools are teaching their own versions of our country, promoting nativist and sectarian ideologies. Many military children go into military service themselves. Is it for support of such ideological causes our future military is being prepared?
Looking at these matters from a veteran's viewpoint, I think we are on dangerous ground here at all levels of education, from elementary school through college. What are we becoming as a nation, when veterans and those in military service are not so much to be honored as exploited?
Don Bacon's Farm Bill
May, 2018
Lincoln -- On April 30, 2018, a dust storm swept across central Nebraska. Visibility was so bad that traffic on Interstate 80 was halted after a twenty-nine vehicle pile-up that caused one fatality. The source of the dust? Blowing farm fields, inadequately protected by conservation measures.
On May 18, Nebraska Republican Congressman Don Bacon, a member of the House Agriculture Committee, voted for a farm bill that kills the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), the nation's largest conservation program for working farms. Nebraska, moreover, has been the nation's largest beneficiary of CSP in terms of acres covered, almost eight hundred thousand in 2017. But clearly not enough.
This could not have been an easy vote for Don Bacon, hurting Nebraska so hard, assuming he understood what he was voting on.
Historically, farm bills have been developed on a bipartisan basis with the needs of different parts of the country taken into account. This one, however, was a partisan product of the Republican leadership, for which conservation is a low priority. Congress being what it is these days, Don Bacon saw no option but to put partisanship above soil health. Let the fields blow.
Fortunately, the bill did not pass. It is widely seen as the worst farm bill in memory. Conservative organizations such as the Cato Institute, the Club for Growth, and Heritage Action oppose it. So do many farmer-led organizations. Conservation and natural resource groups are dead set against it to the point of outrage.
Unfortunately, Speaker Paul Ryan will try to bring the bill up again, to force it through the House on a party-line vote. The Republican leadership wants political talking points about putting more work requirements on food stamp (SNAP) recipients, sensing (perhaps correctly) that it can take rural America voters for granted and need not address rural America's needs. The major media seem happy to play along, as there has been scant coverage of anything that is actually in the farm bill beyond the SNAP issue.
Apologists for the bill say some of the savings from killing CSP will be redirected to other conservation programs, such as EQIP, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program. This is good if you want taxpayer dollars moved from land stewardship to helping feedlots and huge chicken farms expand across the countryside, as is now happening around Fremont. Maybe that's the future Don Bacon sees for the remaining rural areas of Douglas County.
Adding insult to injury, the bill does not modernize and reform crop insurance as it should, to encourage farmers to plant cover crops to protect the soil. Instead, it wastes $3.4 billion (over ten years) in unnecessary subsidies (according to CBO scoring) and even retreats from the crop insurance reforms that were enacted in the 2014 Farm Bill. Think what $3.4 billion could have done for soil conservation.
Cogent reviews of the House farm bill and its conservation issues have been written by the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and the Rural Advancement Foundation International.
For a broader look, check out Farm and Food File; if you can stand to be really appalled about what is happening to the Great Plains, read "Kansas Is Dying."
Because this is not a partisan blog, I should note that Democrats are hardly being helpful in bringing the farm bill's shortcomings to public attention. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi visited an Iowa farm on May 7 and said nothing about how the troubling provisions in the bill are hurting rural America. Although Democrats have pointed out the bill's lamentable attempt to end bipartisan farm bill cooperation over food stamp issues, at the national level they have been silent as to what they stand for in the rest of the bill, if anything.
It remains a mystery as to how Democrats think they can win elections in rural America by ignoring it. Rural voters may develop suspicions about whether the Don Bacons of the world are watching out for their interests (clearly not), but they will ask Democrats what they are for, and Democrats need to be ready with answers, rather than silence.
Lincoln -- On April 30, 2018, a dust storm swept across central Nebraska. Visibility was so bad that traffic on Interstate 80 was halted after a twenty-nine vehicle pile-up that caused one fatality. The source of the dust? Blowing farm fields, inadequately protected by conservation measures.
On May 18, Nebraska Republican Congressman Don Bacon, a member of the House Agriculture Committee, voted for a farm bill that kills the Conservation Stewardship Program (CSP), the nation's largest conservation program for working farms. Nebraska, moreover, has been the nation's largest beneficiary of CSP in terms of acres covered, almost eight hundred thousand in 2017. But clearly not enough.
This could not have been an easy vote for Don Bacon, hurting Nebraska so hard, assuming he understood what he was voting on.
Historically, farm bills have been developed on a bipartisan basis with the needs of different parts of the country taken into account. This one, however, was a partisan product of the Republican leadership, for which conservation is a low priority. Congress being what it is these days, Don Bacon saw no option but to put partisanship above soil health. Let the fields blow.
Fortunately, the bill did not pass. It is widely seen as the worst farm bill in memory. Conservative organizations such as the Cato Institute, the Club for Growth, and Heritage Action oppose it. So do many farmer-led organizations. Conservation and natural resource groups are dead set against it to the point of outrage.
Unfortunately, Speaker Paul Ryan will try to bring the bill up again, to force it through the House on a party-line vote. The Republican leadership wants political talking points about putting more work requirements on food stamp (SNAP) recipients, sensing (perhaps correctly) that it can take rural America voters for granted and need not address rural America's needs. The major media seem happy to play along, as there has been scant coverage of anything that is actually in the farm bill beyond the SNAP issue.
Apologists for the bill say some of the savings from killing CSP will be redirected to other conservation programs, such as EQIP, the Environmental Quality Incentives Program. This is good if you want taxpayer dollars moved from land stewardship to helping feedlots and huge chicken farms expand across the countryside, as is now happening around Fremont. Maybe that's the future Don Bacon sees for the remaining rural areas of Douglas County.
Adding insult to injury, the bill does not modernize and reform crop insurance as it should, to encourage farmers to plant cover crops to protect the soil. Instead, it wastes $3.4 billion (over ten years) in unnecessary subsidies (according to CBO scoring) and even retreats from the crop insurance reforms that were enacted in the 2014 Farm Bill. Think what $3.4 billion could have done for soil conservation.
Cogent reviews of the House farm bill and its conservation issues have been written by the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition and the Rural Advancement Foundation International.
For a broader look, check out Farm and Food File; if you can stand to be really appalled about what is happening to the Great Plains, read "Kansas Is Dying."
Because this is not a partisan blog, I should note that Democrats are hardly being helpful in bringing the farm bill's shortcomings to public attention. House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi visited an Iowa farm on May 7 and said nothing about how the troubling provisions in the bill are hurting rural America. Although Democrats have pointed out the bill's lamentable attempt to end bipartisan farm bill cooperation over food stamp issues, at the national level they have been silent as to what they stand for in the rest of the bill, if anything.
It remains a mystery as to how Democrats think they can win elections in rural America by ignoring it. Rural voters may develop suspicions about whether the Don Bacons of the world are watching out for their interests (clearly not), but they will ask Democrats what they are for, and Democrats need to be ready with answers, rather than silence.
Iron Triangles: Part VII
May, 2018
Washington -- Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has twice this year admonished Education Department employees that they must not communicate with others outside the department. The first was a crackdown of communications between budget and appropriations officials. The second is more general warning that employment at the department is a "public trust" and all outside communications must be cleared, even by departmental attorneys if necessary.
All I can say is that if there is any breach of the public trust going on, it is being committed by the Secretary and her appointees, who are rife with conflicts of interest and whose policies are inimical to the very concept of public trust. The latest violation of such a trust is the disestablishment of the office to police fraud by for-profit colleges. As one victim of the DeVos reign put it, “Those people who are in those high positions — they need to look at themselves....I don’t know how you can sleep at night.”
Viewed historically, however, this behavior is typical of what happens when outside interests capture the government and turn it to their own ends through establishment of an iron triangle. Currently the for-profit college industry has its people in control at both the Education Department and at the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. They are dismantling consumer protections everywhere they find them.
It is not the first time. From 2002-2006 the House committee was led by Congressmen John Boehner and Buck McKeon. McKeon owned stock in a for-profit college (Corinthian) when he presided over higher education policy. The Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education at the time, Sally Stroup, had been a lobbyist for the for-profit college industry as well as a former member of the committee's staff. Together, they pushed through repeal of a previous consumer protection statute known as the fifty-percent rule.
The rule had been put in place after Senator Sam Nunn's hearings on corruption in the for-profit sector in 1990. The idea was that a college could not offer more than fifty percent of its programs online, in order to discourage fly-by-night online operators. When McKeon and Stroup got the consumer protection repealed, the for-profit industry boomed.
In 2012, Senator Tom Harkin opened more hearings on fraud in the for-profit college industry. Two years later, McKeon left the House, but not before had taken advantage of the iron triangle to recover from his California western-wear store's bankruptcy, in part by using political campaign contributions from the for-profit college industry to pay his wife to be his campaign manager. In the meantime, after Stroup's departure from the Education Department, she went back to work for McKeon in the House and eventually returned to her position as a very well paid lobbyist for the industry through 2015.
The DeVos threats against Education Department employees who speak up against iron triangle behavior of any kind will likely succeed, I'm afraid. One reason is that federal employees are kept in the dark about the Lloyd-Lafollette Act, under which they may legally and properly share their concerns about waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement with Congress and its agencies. It would be good to see Education Department employees take the "public trust" argument and turn it right back against iron triangle behavior wherever and whenever it occurs. The DeVos administration is nothing if not a gross abuser of programs intended to help students and families, not to ruin countless lives with worthless degrees and unmanageable student debt.
Washington -- Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos has twice this year admonished Education Department employees that they must not communicate with others outside the department. The first was a crackdown of communications between budget and appropriations officials. The second is more general warning that employment at the department is a "public trust" and all outside communications must be cleared, even by departmental attorneys if necessary.
All I can say is that if there is any breach of the public trust going on, it is being committed by the Secretary and her appointees, who are rife with conflicts of interest and whose policies are inimical to the very concept of public trust. The latest violation of such a trust is the disestablishment of the office to police fraud by for-profit colleges. As one victim of the DeVos reign put it, “Those people who are in those high positions — they need to look at themselves....I don’t know how you can sleep at night.”
Viewed historically, however, this behavior is typical of what happens when outside interests capture the government and turn it to their own ends through establishment of an iron triangle. Currently the for-profit college industry has its people in control at both the Education Department and at the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. They are dismantling consumer protections everywhere they find them.
It is not the first time. From 2002-2006 the House committee was led by Congressmen John Boehner and Buck McKeon. McKeon owned stock in a for-profit college (Corinthian) when he presided over higher education policy. The Assistant Secretary for Postsecondary Education at the time, Sally Stroup, had been a lobbyist for the for-profit college industry as well as a former member of the committee's staff. Together, they pushed through repeal of a previous consumer protection statute known as the fifty-percent rule.
The rule had been put in place after Senator Sam Nunn's hearings on corruption in the for-profit sector in 1990. The idea was that a college could not offer more than fifty percent of its programs online, in order to discourage fly-by-night online operators. When McKeon and Stroup got the consumer protection repealed, the for-profit industry boomed.
In 2012, Senator Tom Harkin opened more hearings on fraud in the for-profit college industry. Two years later, McKeon left the House, but not before had taken advantage of the iron triangle to recover from his California western-wear store's bankruptcy, in part by using political campaign contributions from the for-profit college industry to pay his wife to be his campaign manager. In the meantime, after Stroup's departure from the Education Department, she went back to work for McKeon in the House and eventually returned to her position as a very well paid lobbyist for the industry through 2015.
The DeVos threats against Education Department employees who speak up against iron triangle behavior of any kind will likely succeed, I'm afraid. One reason is that federal employees are kept in the dark about the Lloyd-Lafollette Act, under which they may legally and properly share their concerns about waste, fraud, abuse, and mismanagement with Congress and its agencies. It would be good to see Education Department employees take the "public trust" argument and turn it right back against iron triangle behavior wherever and whenever it occurs. The DeVos administration is nothing if not a gross abuser of programs intended to help students and families, not to ruin countless lives with worthless degrees and unmanageable student debt.
Farm Bill in Trouble, As It Should Be
May, 2018
Lincoln -- Today the U.S. House of Representatives voted down the 2018 Farm Bill, but for the wrong reason: the House Freedom Caucus wanted a vote on immigration first.
Republicans have now gone on record that they would rather play politics on immigration than pass the Farm Bill for rural America. Apparently it is a calculation that Democrats are so weak in rural America that Republicans can neglect heartland voters with impunity, and get by with it. They may be right, as Democrats have shown no savvy in crafting their own version of the legislation that would signal a return to political competitiveness in the heartland.
This particular Farm Bill, let it be noted, deserves to be voted down on its own accord, politics aside. It is a remarkably bad bill. The non-partisan National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition offered this:
“This bill is an insult to the American family farmers and rural communities who are responsible for putting food on our families’ tables each night,” said Greg Fogel, NSAC Policy Director. “For over 30 years, our coalition has been fighting for a stronger, more sustainable and equitable food and farm system – and we’ve seen real progress being made. Congress has advanced many important issues in recent years, including efforts to strengthen working lands conservation and increase support for beginning farmers and ranchers. The farm bill before the House today, however, will go down in history as being one of the most anti-farmer bills ever seen.It is a shame that the bill drafters have thrown away the bipartisan legacy of the farm bill, and instead chosen to provide unlimited subsidies to mega-farms, undermine rural entrepreneurship and make it more difficult for farmers to access new markets, and decimate our natural resources by cutting support for working lands conservation programs and eliminating the Conservation Stewardship Program completely. We sincerely hope that Members will do the right thing this week, and vote on this bill."
NSAC is right, which raises the question of how Nebraska House members Don Bacon, Adrian Smith, and Jeff Fortenberry could have voted for it. It should be an albatross around each of their necks in November.
I expect Kara Eastman, the new Democratic nominee in Nebraska's second congressional district, will be all over Bacon for his vote for this insult to farmers. Bacon beat Brad Ashford in 2016 with strong support in rural areas around Omaha, but is this the Farm Bill those rural voters will support? Not if they know what's in it.* Bacon has no excuse for it, as he is even a member of the committee that brought the bill to the floor.
________________________
*H.R. 2 has also been panned by a multitude of conservation and rural-advocacy organizations, including the National Farmers Union and the Nebraska-based Center for Rural Affairs. Organizations on the right of the political spectrum don't like it either: Heritage Action for America, The Club for Growth, and FreedomWorks said in a letter, “The House Agriculture Committee farm bill, which is expected to be debated on the House floor in May, is unacceptable." Religious groups have also weighed in: “Providing food for those suffering from hunger is central to our Christian faith. The United Methodist Church understands this call not simply as a matter of charity, but of responsibility, righteousness, and justice,” said the Rev. Dr. Susan Henry Crowe, general secretary of the United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society.
Lincoln -- Today the U.S. House of Representatives voted down the 2018 Farm Bill, but for the wrong reason: the House Freedom Caucus wanted a vote on immigration first.
Republicans have now gone on record that they would rather play politics on immigration than pass the Farm Bill for rural America. Apparently it is a calculation that Democrats are so weak in rural America that Republicans can neglect heartland voters with impunity, and get by with it. They may be right, as Democrats have shown no savvy in crafting their own version of the legislation that would signal a return to political competitiveness in the heartland.
This particular Farm Bill, let it be noted, deserves to be voted down on its own accord, politics aside. It is a remarkably bad bill. The non-partisan National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition offered this:
“This bill is an insult to the American family farmers and rural communities who are responsible for putting food on our families’ tables each night,” said Greg Fogel, NSAC Policy Director. “For over 30 years, our coalition has been fighting for a stronger, more sustainable and equitable food and farm system – and we’ve seen real progress being made. Congress has advanced many important issues in recent years, including efforts to strengthen working lands conservation and increase support for beginning farmers and ranchers. The farm bill before the House today, however, will go down in history as being one of the most anti-farmer bills ever seen.It is a shame that the bill drafters have thrown away the bipartisan legacy of the farm bill, and instead chosen to provide unlimited subsidies to mega-farms, undermine rural entrepreneurship and make it more difficult for farmers to access new markets, and decimate our natural resources by cutting support for working lands conservation programs and eliminating the Conservation Stewardship Program completely. We sincerely hope that Members will do the right thing this week, and vote on this bill."
NSAC is right, which raises the question of how Nebraska House members Don Bacon, Adrian Smith, and Jeff Fortenberry could have voted for it. It should be an albatross around each of their necks in November.
I expect Kara Eastman, the new Democratic nominee in Nebraska's second congressional district, will be all over Bacon for his vote for this insult to farmers. Bacon beat Brad Ashford in 2016 with strong support in rural areas around Omaha, but is this the Farm Bill those rural voters will support? Not if they know what's in it.* Bacon has no excuse for it, as he is even a member of the committee that brought the bill to the floor.
________________________
*H.R. 2 has also been panned by a multitude of conservation and rural-advocacy organizations, including the National Farmers Union and the Nebraska-based Center for Rural Affairs. Organizations on the right of the political spectrum don't like it either: Heritage Action for America, The Club for Growth, and FreedomWorks said in a letter, “The House Agriculture Committee farm bill, which is expected to be debated on the House floor in May, is unacceptable." Religious groups have also weighed in: “Providing food for those suffering from hunger is central to our Christian faith. The United Methodist Church understands this call not simply as a matter of charity, but of responsibility, righteousness, and justice,” said the Rev. Dr. Susan Henry Crowe, general secretary of the United Methodist Church General Board of Church and Society.
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