Local foods hero Anna Lappé has written a beautifully simple sum-up on HuffPo of what the new Farm Bill could do right: support small and mid-level farmers, not just the big ones; spend more than the current one percent of the federal agricultural research budget on studying organic farming; reform the current near-useless $3-a-day food stamp system; develop community-based solutions to local food problems; and improve school meals.  Wouldn’t that be nice?

Two young Iowan idealists write an op-ed in the Des Moines Register about the need for new farm policy to “regard farmers as stewards of the environment, rather than simply producers of a few commodities,” and for “national policy [to] explicitly recognize the interaction between agriculture [and] our environment.” 

We love men who love nuance: Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin favors a counter-cyclical system “that places a strong focus on paying farmers when they need the help,” instead of making yearly payments that disregard market or crop conditions.  Wisconsin Democrat Ron Kind, despite being from a district that profits heavily from subsidies, is the man who introduced the divisive bill to kill subsidies in favor of land conservation, renewable energy and rural development that got thrown out by the subcommittee.

The Organic Farming Research Foundation has charted the divergent priorities of the organic faction and the current House Agriculture Committee.

Here’s a pithy, punchy LA Times article calling out the legislators who ix-nayed the reform efforts and heralding the non-denominational, cross-party motley crew that’s banding together to ban subsidies. “Conservatives don't like [farm subsidies] because they're a waste of taxpayer money and interfere with free trade. Consumers don't like them because they inflate food prices. Anti-poverty activists don't like them because they encourage American farmers to overproduce certain crops and dump them on the world market, putting farmers in poor countries out of business. Even most U.S. farmers don't like the current system because its benefits are distributed so unevenly: The top 20% of recipients collect 84% of crop payments, and roughly two-thirds of American farmers don't get any subsidies at all.”  That sums the argument up pretty well. 

And finally, some good sense from Tom Philpott, about how there’s more to reforming the Farm Bill than just eliminating subsidies.