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The farm lobby vs. the global warming bill: The agriculture lobby’s fingerprints are all over a crucial bill aimed at fighting global warming, says editorial

Posted by: Aqua Blog Maven on June 26, 2009 at 7:20 am

From the Los Angeles Times, this editorial:

Conspiracy theorists point to an assortment of groups they think secretly run the country — the gun lobby, Big Oil, the New World Order and even Yale’s Skull and Bones society have all been fingered as the shadowy Illuminati who rule Washington. Yet the nation’s real power brokers are in plain sight, amid amber waves of grain: the farmers.

The farm lobby demonstrates its awesome might every few years with the passage of a new farm bill, which invariably shovels billions in corporate welfare to agribusiness while damaging U.S. trade relationships and in many cases raising consumer prices for agricultural goods. But its power goes beyond the farm bill; it’s hard to pass any legislation even tangentially related to farming without the support of a bipartisan bloc of lawmakers from Midwestern states. Which is why, when congressional Democrats bring their sweeping 1,200-page bill to fight climate change to the House floor today, the farm lobby’s loamy thumbprints will be all over it.

The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 from Reps. Henry A. Waxman (D-Beverly Hills) and Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.) is an ambitious effort to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions 17% below 2005 levels by 2020. It would do this by capping emissions and allowing polluters to trade carbon credits; regulating cleaner fuels; investing in clean energy development; and boosting energy efficiency and renewable power.

What does that have to do with farming? Not a lot. Although agriculture plays a key role in global warming — clearing forest land for farms eliminates trees that absorb carbon, and livestock generate hefty emissions of climate-altering methane — the bill largely ignores such issues. That didn’t stop Rep. Collin C. Peterson (D-Minn.), chairman of the House Agriculture Committee, from holding up the bill to wrestseed money for his constituents under the theory that heading off global catastrophe is only worthwhile if agribusiness can profit from it.

Read more from the Los Angeles Times by clicking here.

June 26, 2009 · Filed Under Climate change & water supply

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