Answer is blowin' in the wind

Grain bins, and former grain bins, Buffalo County, NE

We had just spent a week on the road, starting from Des Moines, Iowa, zig-zagging across western Iowa, northwest Missouri, half of Nebraska, northern Kansas and back home again--a route like a lariat trying to catch the wind. The Crop Tech Tour is a free-wheeling, season-long look at how newer production technologies are performing in-season, and in real time, so to speak.

We saw farmers using an array of practices--plant genetics, precision ag, energy and labor savings inventions, and so on. The inventiveness of the American farmer is a boundless topic, one that deserves a year-round tour bus, with a tag-team of journalists. On this trip, it was just my brother and me, wielding video and photo equipment, hoping to capture some bits of what it's like to be farming in this challenging year.

The weather trumped the technology last week. At just about every farm where we stopped, somebody had a story about the tough conditions this spring--hail, high winds, heavy rains, flooding, you name it. Despite all the planning, equipment, and skill used by farmers, it is the weather that has the last word. We all know that. But, every spring is a reminder.

By Kearney, Nebraska, we had endured several big storms and seen pivot irrigation units and grain bins twisted up and pitched across fields like discarded farm toys. Our rental car was pock-marked by hail.

But the worst was yet to come.

On Thursday, we stopped at a Kansas farm that had just been destroyed by a tornado. There, Maureen Pfizenmaier described to us in a video interview how she felt seeing her farm in shambles. All of a sudden, through her amazing composure, it was as if we were seeing through to some larger truth. Some days, we can simply only witness the larger forces at work on the land.

A few hours later, in Manhattan, Kansas, the tour about finished, I walked into a public facility and heard the old Bob Dylan song playing over the PA system--"The answer, my friend, is blowin' in the wind...."

Indeed that's the theme for the Crop Tech Tour so far this year, at least from my worm's eye view of it. Blowin' in the wind.

Ethanol disinformation and dirty tricks

An article in the The New Yorker magazine, The Dirty Trickster, portrays the life of Roger Stone, a political operative who takes credit for roles in Watergate, the Florida recount, and the fall of former New York governor Eliot Spitzer. And that's not even the half of it. If Stone's story can be believed, there's certainly a lesson about how you get ahead in Washington: play dirty.

A few folks from the farmer side of the ethanol debate are finding political life to be rough and tumble these days. A recent story in Agriculture Online reported Iowa Senator Charles Grassley's claim that a lobbying group funded by the Grocery Manufacturers Association engineered a "smear campaign" against the ethanol industry.

The anti-ethanol forces have blamed the alternative fuel for everything from high gas prices and global food shortages to global warming and deforestation. A beltway public relations firm hired by the Grocery Manufacturers Association was responsible for the campaign, Grassley (R-IA) said on the Senate floor last week.

Industry defenders, like Charlie Martin, an ethanol plant grain buyer, point out that a "dollar rise in the cost of a gallon of gasoline has up to three times the impact on food prices as a dollar rise in the price of a bushel of corn." Higher commodity prices are to blame for only about 20% of the cost of a rise in food prices, corn growers say.

Looking in from press row here, it appears that the "disinformation campaign" has made a big impact on the public perception of ethanol. What a switch from the time not so long ago when corn was viewed as green for its contribution to renewable energy.

One of Roger Stone's rules is "Admit nothing, deny everything, launch counterattack." Don't be surprised if the war of words continues....

Weather folklore 'simply dangerous'

A new discussion thread in Agriculture Online centers on the question of whether farmers pay any attention to the phase of the moon anymore. Some farmers do apparently, or at least they remember that their fathers and grandfathers had their eye on the zodiac when they performed chores like planting crops or handling livestock.

The discussion made me think too about the weather proverbs that you hear from time to time. Things like, "Red sky at morning: Sailor take warning. Red sky at night, sailor's delight."

Digging around on Agriculture Online, I found a story from a few years back, Weather folklore 'simply dangerous. ' The story debunks a number of myths about tornados, one being that you can outrun a twister with your vehicle. Oh, and you better not believe the old saw that lightning never strikes the same place twice, Kansas State University experts tell us.

I'm getting ready to head through the tornado alleys of Nebraska and Kansas in the next couple weeks, so guess I'll take this warning to heart.

Why many farmers would veto farm bill

Would farmers really veto the farm bill? You wouldn't think so, given how all the critics believe the thing is a big fat handout for everybody. John McCain is the latest to condemn the plan. A wire story outlining his dissent, which appeared in the Washington Post today, included mention of the Agriculture Online poll that shows farmers in favor of a presidental veto.
Dan Looker, Successful Farming business editor who covers the farm bill for Agriculture Online, gives these reasons for farmer disfavor for the legislation:
* They agree with President Bush and Senator Grassley that more reform is needed by lowering the adjusted gross income to $200,000.
* They might believe it spends too much on food stamps (a sure bet before the current food price inflation but I’m not so sure now).
* The safety net of marketing loans and countercyclical payments in the farm bill is irrelevant in today’s market.
* Continued direct payments are irrelevant in today’s market.
* Continuing the conservation reserve program makes no sense in today’s market.
What's your theory? Take the poll and add your own comments.

Farmers would veto farm bill?

The farm bill has been called a lot of things by a lot of people--mostly by people whose business it is to make policy and talk policy, and mostly by people inside the Beltway. Out in the country there is not near as much talk about the thing, it seems. One wonders what the working farmer thinks of the much-debated, much-maligned legislation, now that it seems destined for passage.

Is it a little bit of a shock to look at the early returns from the new Agriculture Online poll: Would you veto the farm bill?

In one comment on the poll, a North Carolina farmer worries about the public perception that farmers are ripping off the public: "All we can hope for is a national consciousness that realizes that feeding ourselves is a genuine national security issue. Maybe then they'll be willing to keep us around on the payroll for a while longer."

Take the poll, add your own comments....