Farm Bill ‘Reform’ Stuffed With Pork

Every once in a while, Democrats and Republicans can work together. Witness Thursday’s 90-8 vote to bring a “bipartisan reform” farm bill before the Senate. In the expectation that the bill will garner the necessary 60 votes, the House Agriculture Committee has changed its schedule to allow a floor debate on the measure in July. The White House applauded. This is Washington’s version of the dawning of the Age of Aquarius.

There’s just one little problem. Somehow, whenever the two parties work together, they end up spending a lot of other people’s money. The Agriculture Reform, Food and Jobs Act of 2012, co-authored by Sens. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich., and Pat Roberts, R-Kan., would be a 10-year, $969 billion package.

Stabenow boasts that her bill would produce $23.6 billion in savings from what Washington would spend under current law. “We examined every agriculture program to see what was working and what wasn’t,” said she. That’s all she could squeeze out of a $969 billion package? President Barack Obama proposed shaving $32 billion from that pot. The GOP House budget calls for a reduction of almost $180 billion over 10 years.

Stabenow does have one accomplishment over which she is free to crow, and she has: “The era of direct payments is over. We’re not going to be paying farmers for crops they don’t grow.” The end of the direct payments program should save taxpayers about $5 billion annually.

Alas, noted Citizens Against Government Waste spokeswoman Leslie Paige, “it’s like a Whac-A-Mole game with these programs.” Goodbye, direct payments. Hello, new crop-insurance subsidy.

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