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FARMING WITH MY TAX DOLLARS
Maybe I’m not that smart, or more likely I just have not had
the time to dedicate to really studying this topic, but I wish someone would
explain to me how the rhetoric of free trade can co-exist with the practice of
farm subsidies?
I mean if we are going to promote free markets, efficiency,
and survival of the fittest, how can we justify $164.7 billion in farm payments
between 1995 to 2005? My grad
school teachers proposed the argument of national security, which I get to an
extent. Yes, if the US for
whatever reason could not access global food markets due to things like war,
famine, or what have you, yes, we would need to be able to grow our own food. But to this level and in the manner in
which subsidies are doled out to huge farming conglomerates?
Check out the SF Chronicle Article here. It's a good read about the issue and has some interesting insights on the future of California farming. For you market proponents, it depicts the innovations made by Cali-farmers in the small, organic farming space (these guys get a pittance of subsidy that Texans and midwesterners get) versus how the large farming conglomerates operate since they have the government safety net.
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Sometimes I get amazed by the intensity of emotion that the ‘G’ word provokes. Whether it’s an activist underground rock concert, workers’ rights group rallies, or the fallout of the World Social Forum, the ‘G’ word gets people riled up.
But it also makes sense. It’s the word that people have camped around; or is the stake in the ground where people decide which side they are going to take. On one end, you’ve got those who benefit from it and say that the rest will eventually, someday, in the future sometime also benefit. Then you’ve got those who are getting the shaft and are tired of it.
For me, globalization is just a word and is as old as apple pie. Louis L’amour wrote a historical novel set in the 12th century called the Walking Drum. I read it in my freshman high school world history class, and what I took from it is that from the beginning of time, people have crossed regions and borders to share (and sometimes steal) ideas and technology.
Admittedly, there are ‘new-ish’ aspects to the current brand that should be noted, i.e. the intensity and pace globalization today versus, for instance, the 12th century, as well as the way that it is managed. The game is currently rigged to benefit some and not others.
And that is what I think we should focus on, the management of globalization and the special interests that have taken control of it, versus attacking a word that has taken on a human and almost sinister personality. In so doing, you attack a problem at its root, you become more accurate, and you make it alot harder for special interest to dismiss you.
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2008 is going to be a big year of change. First of all, it’s a leap year, that’s a big one. But in addition to that, 2008 will also bring things like the year of the rat, the Olympics in Beijing, elections in Wales, the Dominican Republic, Taiwan, and Russia (assuming Putin lets that happen)... the orbit of the Cassini Spacecraft around the 6th largest moon of Saturn… and the year the next United States president will be chosen.
Polls for the 2008 presidential election portend the completion of a cycle of change that swept through congress in 2006 that will likely put a democratic candidate in the White House. For many, this will bring a much-ballyhooed change in leadership and direction that has turned the last dregs of the Bush administration vehemently sour. For others, not so much.
In recent polls, Hillary Clinton is showing strong numbers, and the experience and fine-tuned campaign machinery seem to be paying off. In any other election, her likely victory and the change that she will bring to issues like healthcare, the war in Iraq, fighting poverty, etc. would be a no-brainer. But in this election, and with a candidate like Barack Obama, I have to ask what distance is this country willing to go to achieve true, sustainable change?
Yes, Hillary will change plenty of things. By the mere virtue of her progressive stance, we can expect significant changes in relation to the current conservative agenda. Added on top of this, her impeccable credentials, keen intelligence, the combined political wisdom of the Bill-Hillary conjugal presidency, and the support of a democratic congress will collectively add up to much, much change.
In any other year, this degree of change would probably be enough. But 2008 is different, it’s different because there is a potential for change that can only happen once in a very long time. It’s the sort of change that not only changes the players in the game and the policies that they create.... but also how the game is played and the structural barriers which divide the country between right and left, liberal and conservative, and neighbor against neighbor.
Hillary can do almost everything that the president can and should do, she is that good. But the one thing she can't do is to unite this country.
Once you gotten past all the peripheral arguments of history, tenure, experience, intelligence, etc. and arrive at the core ability to unify, Hillary will not deliver. Try and desire as she might, her tenure and record, which in most cases are assets, prevent her from changing the system... because she is the system.
In Barack, we have the freshness and the ability to unite the country in a way that has long been absent.
Whether this can be realized in time, or whether his political team can challenge the Clinton machinery is another question onto itself. But if the nation can get past the political maneuvering and campaign illusionary, 2008 can be the year we go the distance... all the way.