U.S. Representative for Texas District 11, Mike Conaway, cruised to victory on Tuesday. And Wednesday morning he was on a Midland, Texas, radio station boasting about getting over 90% of the vote.
His opponent was Libertarian Ryan Lange, and although Lange was virtually invisible during the campaign, perhaps because he raised zero dollars , he must be some kinda of super political powerhouse. Why else would donors dump almost $2 million into Conaway's campaign chest for this election?
Conaway's donors really must be dumb. Or maybe they're smart and just know how to play the game for more corporate welfare. Let's revisit one of Mr. Conaway's pet causes, the Farm Bill. Here's Bloomberg.com:
A record U.S. harvest has pushed crop prices so low that taxpayers may pay billions of dollars more to subsidize farmers than anticipated just months ago, thanks in part to changes Congress approved this year.
Lawmakers passed a five-year farm law in February and hailed its projected savings in subsidies of $14 billion over a decade. The forecast was based on farmers getting paid more for their crops. Instead, prices have fallen and may trigger subsidies the law aimed to reduce.
“This was a bill based on false premises of fake savings,” said Josh Sewell, a policy analyst with Taxpayers for Common Sense in Washington. “The prices Congress used to calculate the bill’s cost were divorced from reality.”
The bill, one of the few bipartisan measures Congress passed this year, could end up costing taxpayers billions of dollars more than expected after legislators bet commodity prices would stay high and states would end programs that qualified them for higher food stamp spending.
Gee. A government program that costs way more than promised. Either they didn't anticipated that or they did and foisted it on us with a lie. Either way, it's a good argument that government should just quit meddling with business with their relentless rewards and punishments.
Meanwhile, Mr. Conaway is angling for chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee. He was steadfastly against George W. Bush's efforts to reform corporate farm subsidies, so if he gets the chairmanship it will likely be business a usual.
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