Yesterday, I did a little work on cartoons for June (the operative word is “little” – but fortunately I don’t need that many.) I also discovered that i am apparently going to have to uninstall and reinstall my printer. First I have to find the CD. I’m pretty sure i know where it should be, but whether or not that’s where it actually is is another question. Also, I’ll have to disconnect it from the computer until I’m finished and then reconnect it, and neither end of the USB cord is exactly easy to reach. I’m wondering too whether I should use a new cord (or at least an unused one) and that would mean reaching both ends. Fortunately, having gotten my Auto ID card printed, I don’t need to print anything right away. Anyway, as i reported ysterday, there is a tentative debt ceiling deal, and I happened to come across two amusing money stories, so at least we can have a laugh or two.
Cartoon – 29 Sojourner Truth (and Memorial Day)
Short Takes –
AP News – Jan. 6 rioters are raking in thousands in donations. Now the US is coming after their haul
Quote – Dozens of defendants have set up online fundraising appeals for help with legal fees, and prosecutors acknowledge there’s nothing wrong with asking for help for attorney expenses. But the Justice Department has, in some cases, questioned where the money is really going because many of those charged have had government-funded legal representation. Most of the fundraising efforts appear on GiveSendGo, which bills itself as “The #1 Free Christian Fundraising Site” and has become a haven for Jan. 6 defendants barred from using mainstream crowdfunding sites, including GoFundMe, to raise money. Click through for details, I believe it’s called “profiting from a crime,” and it’s a legal no-no. If, of course, they catch you and can prove it. If you brag about it, they probably can.
PolitiZoom – MAGA Moron Buys $2,200 in “Trump Bucks” is Surprised When Bank Won’t Exchange Them
Quote – Purchaser John Amman said “he bought $2,200 worth of Trump Bucks and other items over the past year only to learn that they were worthless when he tried to cash them in at a local bank.”… This writer has to commend you, John Amann, if I were to fall $2,200 dollars deep into such an obvious scam I could not confide my idiocy to family and friends, much less advertise it On Twitter for all to see: Click through for story. I have no trouble believing it. They used actual imagery from actual money. Sure, they tarted it up to protect themselves against being charged with counterfeiting – but what MAGA would realize that?
Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage. These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that. As a reminder, though no one really knows how many there were supposed to be, the three names we have are Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone. These roughly translate as “unceasing,” “grudging,” and “vengeful destruction.”
We all need to eat – and unless you grow everything you eat (which I certainly don’t – I haven’t even been able, over the longhaul, to grow all my own chives) you depend on farmers (using the term to include ranchers.) In addition to eating, I also have food allergies, including to the two top cash crops we grow here – corn and soy – so I have a more than passing interest n the farm bill – at least in theory. But since we started in the 1930’s passing multi-year farm bills, those bills have become so unwieldy that I strongly suspect that no one actually kows what is in them – not down to the last detail. But Director Merrigan, who wrote this article does know more than most people – including a good chunk of Congress.
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These four challenges will shape the next farm bill – and how the US eats
For the 20th time since 1933, Congress is writing a multiyear farm bill that will shape what kind of food U.S. farmers grow, how they raise it and how it gets to consumers. These measures are large, complex and expensive: The next farm bill is projected to cost taxpayers US$1.5 trillion over 10 years.
Modern farm bills address many things besides food, from rural broadband access to biofuels and even help for small towns to buy police cars. These measures bring out a dizzying range of interest groups with diverse agendas.
As a former Senate aide and senior official at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, I’ve seen this intricate process from all sides. In my view, with the challenges in this round so complex and with critical 2024 elections looming, it could take Congress until 2025 to craft and enact a bill. Here are four key issues shaping the next farm bill, and through it, the future of the U.S. food system.
These measures follow unprecedented spending for farm support during the Trump administration. Now legislators are jockeying over raising the debt ceiling, which limits how much the federal government can borrow to pay its bills.
Agriculture Committee leaders and farm groups argue that more money is necessary to strengthen the food and farm sector. If they have their way, the price tag for the next farm bill would increase significantly from current projections.
On the other side, reformers argue for capping payments to farmers, which The Washington Post recently described as an “expensive agricultural safety net,” and restricting payment eligibility. In their view, too much money goes to very large farms that produce commodity crops like wheat, corn, soybeans and rice, while small and medium-size producers receive far less support.
Food aid is the key fight
Many people are surprised to learn that nutrition assistance – mainly through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, formerly known as food stamps – is where most farm bill money is spent. Back in the 1970s, Congress began including nutrition assistance in the farm bill to secure votes from an increasingly urban nation.
Today, over 42 million Americans depend on SNAP, including nearly 1 in every 4 children. Along with a few smaller programs, SNAP will likely consume 80% of the money in the new farm bill, up from 76% in 2018.
Why have SNAP costs grown? During the pandemic, SNAP benefits were increased on an emergency basis, but that temporary arrangement expired in March 2023. Also, in response to a directive included in the 2018 farm bill, the Department of Agriculture recalculated what it takes to afford a healthy diet, known as the Thrifty Food Plan, and determined that it required an additional $12-$16 per month per recipient, or 40 cents per meal.
Because it’s such a large target, SNAP is where much of the budget battle will play out. Most Republicans typically seek to rein in SNAP; most Democrats usually support expanding it.
Anti-hunger advocates are lobbying to make the increased pandemic benefits permanent and defend the revised Thrifty Food Plan. In contrast, Republicans are calling for SNAP reductions, and are particularly focused on expanding work requirements for recipients.
Debating climate solutions
The 2022 Inflation Reduction Act provided $19.5 billion to the Department of Agriculture for programs that address climate change. Environmentalists and farmers alike applauded this investment, which is intended to help the agriculture sector embrace climate-smart farming practices and move toward markets that reward carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services.
This big pot of money has become a prime target for members of Congress who are looking for more farm bill funding. On the other side, conservation advocates, sustainable farmers and progressive businesses oppose diverting climate funds for other purposes.
But without more research and standards, observers worry that investments in climate-smart agriculture will support greenwashing – misleading claims about environmental benefits – rather than a fundamentally different system of production. Mixed research results have raised questions as to whether establishing carbon markets based on such practices is premature.
A complex bill and inexperienced legislators
Understanding farm bills requires highly specialized knowledge about issues ranging from crop insurance to nutrition to forestry. Nearly one-third of current members of Congress were first elected after the 2018 farm bill was enacted, so this is their first farm bill cycle.
I expect that, as often occurs in Congress, new members will follow more senior legislators’ cues and go along with traditional decision making. This will make it easier for entrenched interests, like the American Farm Bureau Federation and major commodity groups, to maintain support for Title I programs, which provide revenue support for major commodity crops like corn, wheat and soybeans. These programs are complex, cost billions of dollars and go mainly to large-scale operations.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack’s current stump speech spotlights the fact that 89% of U.S. farmers failed to make a livable profit in 2022, even though total farm income set a record at $162 billion. Vilsack asserts that less-profitable operations should be the focus of this farm bill – but when pressed, he appears unwilling to concede that support for large-scale operations should be changed in any way.
When I served as deputy secretary of agriculture from 2009 to 2011, I oversaw the department’s budget process and learned that investing in one thing often requires defunding another. My dream farm bill would invest in three priorities: organic agriculture as a climate solution; infrastructure to support vibrant local and regional markets and shift away from an agricultural economy dependent on exporting low-value crops; and agricultural science and technology research aimed at reducing labor and chemical inputs and providing new solutions for sustainable livestock production.
In my view, it is time for tough policy choices, and it won’t be possible to fund everything. Congress’ response will show whether it supports business as usual in agriculture, or a more diverse and sustainable U.S. farm system.
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AMT, if Merrigan is correct and we are not able to pass a farm bill before 2025 (and she makes a solid case), and if we do not gain the House, increase our lead in the Senate, and hold the White House, that bill is likely to be a disaster. And, in one way or another, every American will be affected. And I don’t have any answers. My best suggestion is for you to help us get people elected to Congress who are both caring and intelligent. And help get them elected in sufficient quantity that the anarchist Republicans (I use the term loosely – I know it does have a meaning that doesn’t fit them) will not be able to ruin it. A daunting task indeed.
Glenn Kirschner – Trump’s Mar-a-Lago “dress rehearsal” to hide docs from DOJ shows premeditation to obstruct justice (Glrnn dordn’t mention the copies today, but I expect to be hearing about that from him very soon.)
The Lincoln Project – In Loving Memory
Ring of Fire – DeSantis Vows To Pack Supreme Court With Morons For Next ‘Quarter Century’
Rocky Mountain Mike – Coordinated Universal Out Of Touch Time (no music – just a bit of silliness. The CC is perfect.)
When your cat brings home a friend… (over 10 minutes, but the variety of odd coupling….)
A few months ago I witnessed something that disturbed me. While riding MARTA (Atlanta rapid transit) I watched as two transit police officers ordered several people off the train I had just boarded. I surmised that those people were homeless, and they had been riding the train to stay out of the cold. Believe me when I say it can get crazy cold in Atlanta!
On the one hand, those unfortunate people have the right to find a warm place for shelter. On the other hand, the MARTA cops need to do their job. If they didn’t chase the unsolicited off the trains, soon the cars would be full of the homeless. I would not be surprised if the officers acted with at least a little reluctance. Just about anybody could hit rock bottom.
The real problem is not homeless people using public transit as a warming center, or cops ordering them off trains. The real problem is lack of resources for the homeless. Not everybody has a reliable backup plan, family or friends who can take them in. Affordable housing is scarce, as is compassion for those in need of shelter.
Not long after the MARTA incident, members of the Reynoldstown Civic Improvement League (Reynoldstown is a neighborhood of Atlanta) voted 79-16 against a proposal to turn a dilapidated vacant house into 42 studio apartments to house undomiciled people. The reason? They were concerned about people with mental health or substance abuse issues living in their neighborhood. I can understand the concerns, but those civic league people apparently don’t know, or conveniently forgot, that not all homeless people are winos or junkies, or mentally ill. Many are reasonably stable people who had some rotten luck – they lost their jobs and couldn’t find work, they made bad investments, they lost their savings to medical bills, or something else beyond their control. Any of the people who voted against building housing for the homeless could join their ranks. There are homeless people who were once multi-millionaires.
I have written about the unhoused before, and I had to write again because of how hard it is to bounce back from rock bottom. Also, recently I read an article on how US residents have been programmed to regard the homeless as less than human. Dehumanizing a segment of society is just the first step towards the gulag. Considering how insatiable is the maw of the prison-industrial complex, and that homeless lack resources or recourse, shoveling them into prisons to provide greedy corporations with slave labor looks like a probable motivation.
Culver City, CA recently passed an ordnance against living in tents. The aim is clear – drive out all homeless people. Similar bans have been passed in other communities, with little success. Opponents of the ordnance say it criminalizes vulnerable people. California has a serious homeless problem, with over 170,000 people having no permanent roofs over their heads. Gentrification, which leads to a lack of affordable housing, is often to blame.
The homeless need our assistance and our compassion. Our country’s treatment of the unhoused is execrable, inhuman, inhumane, inexcusable and unforgivable. Those who regard and treat them as vermin, those who pass laws that make life even more unbearable for those without permanent homes, should consider that they could easily join the ranks of the unhoused.
Yesterday, the radio opera was (finally!) “Champion” by Terence BLanchard. It’s based on the life of Emile Griffith, a closeted black welterweight boxer whose career began in the late 1950s and went off the rails (though it dontinued, and for a while with a stream of victories before becoming a string of losses) after an opponent who had outed him and whom he defeated with series of 17 blows went into a coma and died. The story has all the elements of tragedy except that he didn’t die young but lived into old age and dementia, which may be an even greater tragedy. Dying is easy – living is hard. (Living is also harder to write about, which may explain why so few creators have chosen to deal with it.) Blanchard chose to address it head on by splitting Emile’s role into three parts – in order of appearance, the old man, played by Eric Owens; the young man, played by Ryan Speedo Green; and even Emile as a child (Ethan Joseph.) Anyone who has ever had any regrets for anything (and what decent person hasn’t?) will appreciate the mechanism of the two adult Emiles having duets. It does feel like that. Not really on topic, but having kind of followed Green’s career and backstory, I’m aware he has mommy issues – and so did Emile, having been abandoned (along with six siblings) by her and raised by a fundamentalist cousin. Also interesting that when cast, he went out and studied boxing and did bodybuilding to be “worthy of the role.” And that Blanchard himself revised and added to the opera because he wanted it to be “worthy of the Met.” I wish I could tell them both that it’s sweet that they did that, but that they ARE WORTHY. Period. Except that that is something one really can’t tell anyone else. Everyone has to find it for themself. And that – is kindof the essential meaning of the opera. Also yesterday, the Texas House of Repuresentatives voted to impeach texas Attorney General Ken Paxton. Under Texas law, he must now step down while he is tried in the Texas Senate. And one more thing – the White House and the GOP have reached a “tentative” deal on the debt ceiling.
Cartoon –
Short Takes –
Crooks & Liars – PIGS FLY: SCOTUS Rules In Favor Of The Little Guys In Tax Sale
Quote – The Supreme Court [Thursday] gave a 94-year-old Minneapolis woman a chance to recoup some money after the county kept the entire $40,000 when it sold her condominium over a much smaller unpaid tax bill…. A handful of states in addition to the District of Columbia allow local governments to keep the excess money, according to the Pacific Legal Foundation, a not-for-profit public interest law firm that represented Tyler at the Supreme Court. Click through for details – Not that $25,000 will go that far, assuming she sees any of it – but the decision id a good one, and those are becoming increasingly rare.
The Nib (Levi Hastings and Dorian Alexander) – Drag Balls of the Civil War
Quote – The Civil War has always been romanticized as a tragic narrative of conflicting American idealism. It doesn’t matter if you’re a yankee or a rebel though, queerness has never been considered an American ideal. Naturally, that doesn’t mean that it didn’t exist… Click through for graphic article (perfectly SFW). I have a couple more graphic articles which I want to get in – I now need to try a bit harder since The Nib is folding in August, and I don’t know how long they’ll be available.
Yesterday, the subject line on the HuffPost newsletter was “Republicans keep forgetting you’re NOT supposed to say the quiet part out loud.” I think they’re wrong about that. I think they have discivered, and that it’s Deoctats who keep forgetting, that today’s Republican voters will not recoli from an elected official or a candidate for same who openly takes hostages (or whatever the “quiet part” is in any given incident.) Instead they will embrace him (or, surprisngly, her) for what they wtongly believe is “alpha male” behavior but is actually just being a jerk.
Cartoon –
Short Takes –
Crooks & Liars – Just 11 People Filed Most Book Bans Across The Country
Quote – A small number of people were responsible for most of the book challenges, The Post found. Individuals who filed 10 or more complaints were responsible for two-thirds of all challenges. In some cases, these serial filers relied on a network of volunteers gathered together under the aegis of conservative parents’ groups such as Moms for Liberty…. The majority of the 1,000-plus book challenges analyzed by The Post were filed by just 11 people. Click through for details – but not the eleven names, unless the Post has them and C&L just didn’t pick them up. I don’t subscribe and I don’t have a gift link so I can’t say.
Democratic Underground (bigtree) – Tina’s husband’s selfless act before her death (hanky alert)
Quote – Two things are missing from the obituaries about #TinaTurner: her commitment to Buddhism, which she credited with saving her life, and this story of true abiding love which, imho, should bump all stories of her first husband…. She Married Husband Edwin Bach, The Love Of Her Life For Over 38 Years, At Her Home Adorned With 70,000 Flowers In Switzerland In 2013. Click through for a potpourri of anecdotes not in the obits, including of course the incident in the title.
Talking Feds (while Glenn is on vacation) – Former Federal Prosecutor BREAKS DOWN an Underreported MASSIVE Takeaway from Trump’s Town Hall. (His comments on venue start at approximately 2:40)
The Lincoln Project – Last Week in the Republican Party – May 23, 2023
MSNBC – BREAKING: Trump lawyers demand meeting with Attorney General Merrick Garland
Moskowitz: The good news for you today is that if you have to shut down your business because the country defaults, your gas stove will still be there. And so, you know, I look forward to the legislation of our time, the appliance bill of rights pic.twitter.com/HuWSjSYaz9