Farm Bill is Not a Priority to Republican House Leaders
By Jean-Paul McDonald, Farms.com
After months of stalling on the proposed 2012 Farm Bill, it appears that the U.S government’s five week summer vacation wasn’t enough to get them back to work on a high-priority bill that millions of Americans will live under for the next five years. The Republican leaders in the house has decided not to pursue legislation, leaving hundreds of thousands of farmers uncertain about the future.
“Americans want us to work together to get it done for rural America,” said Senator Debbie Stabenow, Democrat of Michigan and chairwoman of the Senate Agriculture Committee. Senator Jerry Moran, Republican of Kansas has also spoken out against his own party for refusing to bring their own committee’s farm bill to the floor, saying “Don’t sit on the sidelines waiting for something to happen”. “Agriculture has always been bipartisan,” Ms. Stabenow said. “But the extreme element of the House doesn’t believe” in a farm bill at all, she said, while others “don’t want reforms.” She added, “The anti-reformers are hiding behind the extreme elements.”
The farm bill also addresses the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as food stamps, which over 45 million Americans currently depend on for survival. “This is far from a perfect bill,” said Representative Peter Welch, Democrat of Vermont. “But we should vote up or down on this bill, and then we can be held accountable. We could be in a worse position next year, including on food stamps.”
The current farm bill is set to expire on September 30 2012 and if that should happen, the country would revert back to a farm bill from 1949, which is most likely completely out of touch with the needs of farmers today and would shed approximately 40 programs that are currently financed. Some Republicans are now-pondering a one year extension of the current law, but this has not been well received by Democrats.
It seems fairly obvious that these stalls are political in nature as we head into one of the most controversial presidential election in decades. It’s hard to imagine that so many farmers support the Republican Party only to be kicked in the pants by them.