Dakota Beacon

It's done. Just what the Obama administration wanted -- a "bipartisan farm bill" passed by congress and quickly signed by the president on February 7.

Senators John Hoeven and Heidi Heitkamp and Congressman Kevin Cramer all proclaimed victory after voting for the $1 TRILLION piece of legislation. Of course, this is money we don't have. It means more expenses for taxpayers and higher costs for consumers. No matter. America will borrow it from China -- if China is still willing to buy our debt -- or print more money. To turn a phrase, let's peel this onion.

One trillion dollars is a lot of money. What does it look like?

Put $1 TRILLION in a context that will help us to conceive of such a large number. National Basketball Association player Kobe Bryant takes in $30,500,000 per year. He would need to work 32,837 years to make one trillion dollars.

Try again. An average person's life in the US is about 2.4 billion seconds long. One billion seconds ago would equate to 1981 AD. One trillion seconds ago would equate to 29,700 BC.

The nation's fiscal situation is much worse today than when President Obama took office. Public debt has doubled since the Great Recession of 2008. The deficit has exceeded $1 TRILLION every year during Obama's first term. Keep in mind the annual deficit is the money the US Government spends each year that it does not have while the national debt reflects the annual deficits accumulated over time.

In the summer of 2013 the US House defeated the "farm" bill because it contained the food stamp program. This opened the way for meaningful reform if only congress would continue to separate the agriculture and food stamp programs. However, after much debate the two programs were rejoined behind closed doors and the US House passed the "farm" bill on January 29.

In this context congress chose to pass a $1 TRILLION piece of legislation. This $1 TRILLION is going to help the family farmer. Right? Not entirely. Far from it. Eighty percent of the "farm" bill price tag pays for the food stamp program. Forty-eight million people are now on food stamps compared to 31 million in 2008 and 17 million in 2000.

One would think the food stamp program would benefit the neediest among us. Right? Wrong again. Participation of able-bodied adults without dependents (known as ABAWDs) has caused food stamp participation to skyrocket. From Fiscal Year 2007 to Fiscal Year 2010 food stamp participation among ABAWDs more than doubled from 1.7 million to 3.9 million, a 127 percent increase. Furthermore, with work waivers in place, ABAWDs can remain on food stamps indefinitely. (Source: Congressional Research Service – http://www.loc.gov/crsinfo.)

That's not all. Because of the way the "farm" bill was assembled, there are many other recipients who have no direct involvement in agriculture per se. President Jimmy Carter gets $272,288. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack will pocket $82,874. Several Manhattan, NY residents will skim a total of $9,000,000. Families of various congressmen will scoop up $995,805. (Source: The Environmental Working Group – http://www.esg.org).

Which brings us back to the fact that we are saddled with a "farm" bill that has a whole lot to do with social entitlement and little to do with farm aid. Our senators and congressman knew this before they voted for the "farm" bill. They knew how the bill was structured, how much it would cost and where the money would go. Did they tell us? Not really. If they did it was with a gentle whisper. After the so-called bipartisan victory, it was left to the alternative media to ferret out the details. Even then our delegation avoided the specifics instead focusing on how wonderful the "farm" bill would benefit family farmers.

I feel like a voice crying in the wilderness.

We've heard it before. The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. If we keep voting for our tax-and-spend delegation over and over again expecting different results, maybe we should have our collective heads examined.



Dennis M. Patrick can be contacted at P. O. Box 337, Stanley, ND 58784 or (JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address).