I had one of those 'doh' moments today.  I receive the ONE campaign weekly emails.  This weeks email was highlighting the Farm Bill and the possibility of changing it to help our nation and the world in a number of ways.  The Farm Bill actually impacts our communities and the developing world more than the name lets on.  The bill determines how much the government can subsidize farming in the US and which crops it will subsidize.  While this was helpful in its inauguration, it has since become very cumbersome and morally questionable.  The bill now encourages over-production of corn and soy and in turn penalizes farmers who specialize in what we normally think of as healthy crops (carrots, fruit, broccoli, asparagus, etc.).  This is why you can by a box of twinkies for less than a bag of carrots.  Michael Pollan has a great article about this in the NY Times.  This has a profound impact on the health of our nation.  Since most sugary substances on the market today use sugar made from corn they get the lions share of the benefits from the government subsidies.  Thus leaving poor people little alternative but to eat less healthy with fewer fresh vegetables which could be cheaper if they were subsidized.  The governments intentional price control also damages the world economy and keeps farmers in developing countries from ever getting ahead. OK so enough of Farm Bill politics...

This email from ONE encouraged people to call their senator, which I was willing to do.  But I wanted to go one step farther and write my senators!  I didn't get around to writing them until the next day and I had two nice formal letters addressed to my two senators in the envelopes ready to stamp and go.  However, while I was addressing the envelopes I began to wander if one of my senators already supported the amendments I was encouraging them to.  So I googled Lamar Alexandar and Bob Corker and found that not only did they not agree with the amendment to the bill they had already voted - 'doh!'

 Unfortunatelly the amendment was denied by both my senators ultimately it failed.

Posted In: social-issues agriculture

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