La Vida Locavore is the blog for anyone whose crazy life includes planting, growing, weeding, fertilizing, raising, picking, harvesting, processing, cooking, baking, making, serving, buying, selling, distributing, transporting, composting, organizing around, lobbying about, writing about, thinking about, talking about, playing with, and eating food!
Agriculture
Chair: Blanche Lincoln (D-AR)
- Max Baucus (D-MT)
- Michael Bennet (D-CO)
- Sherrod Brown (D-OH)
- Bob Casey (D-PA)
- Kent Conrad (D-ND)
- Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY)
- Tom Harkin (D-IA)
- Amy Klobuchar (D-MN)
- Pat Leahy (D-VT)
- Ben Nelson (D-NE)
- Debbie Stabenow (D-MI)
- Saxby Chambliss (R-GA)
- Thad Cochran (R-MS)
- John Cornyn (R-TX)
- Chuck Grassley (R-IA)
- Mike Johanns (R-NE)
- Dick Lugar (R-IN)
- Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
- Pat Roberts (R-KS)
- John R. Thune (R-SD)
Appropriations
Chair: Daniel Inouye (D-HI) Ag Sub-Committee
Chair: Herb Kohl (D-WI)
- Byron Dorgan (D-ND)
- Dick Durbin (D-IL)
- Dianne Feinstein (D-CA)
- Tom Harkin (D-IA)
- Tim Johnson (D-SD)
- Ben Nelson (D-NE)
- Jack Reed (D-RI)
- Robert Bennett (R-UT)
- Christopher Bond (R-MO)
- Sam Brownback (R-KS)
- Thad Cochran (R-MS)
- Mitch McConnell (R-KY)
- Arlen Specter (R-PA)
Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions
- Chris Dodd (D-CT)
Agriculture
Chair: B Collin Peterson (D-MN)
V. Chair: B Tim Holden (D-PA)
B Joe Baca (D-CA)
- John Boccieri (D-OH)
B* Leonard Boswell (D-IA)
- Bobby Bright (D-AL)
B* Dennis Cardoza (D-CA)
- Travis Childers (D-MS)
B Jim Costa (D-CA)
- Henry Cuellar (D-TX)
- Kathy Dahlkemper (D-PA)
B Brad Ellsworth (D-IN)
- Debbie Halvorson (D-IL)
B Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (D-SD)
- Steve Kagen (D-WI)
- Larry Kissell (D-NC)
B Frank Kratovil (D-MD)
- Betsy Markey (D-CO)
B Jim Marshall (D-GA)
P Eric Massa (D-NY)
B Mike McIntyre (D-NC)
- Walt Minnick (D-ID)
B Earl Pomeroy (D-ND)
- Mark Schauer (D-MI)
- Kurt Schrader (D-OR)
B David Scott (D-GA)
B Zachary Space (D-OH)
- Timothy Walz (D-MN)
- Frank Lucas (R-OK)
- Bill Cassidy (R-LA)
- K. Michael Conaway (R-TX)
- Jeff Fortenberry (R-NE)
- Virginia Foxx (R-NC)
- Bob Goodlatte (R-VA)
- Sam Graves (R-MO)
- Timothy Johnson (R-IL)
- Steve King (R-IA)
- Robert Latta (R-OH)
- Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO)
- Cynthia Lummis (R-WY)
- Jerry Moran (R-KS)
- Randy Neugebauer (R-TX)
- Phil Roe (R-TN)
- Mike Rogers (R-AL)
- Jean Schmidt (R-OH)
- Adrian Smith (R-NE)
- Glenn Thompson (R-PA) *=House Organic Caucus member B=Blue Dog Democrat
Appropriations
Chair: Dave Obey (D-WI) Ag Sub-Committee
Chair: P Rosa DeLauro (D-CT)
- Sanford Bishop (D-GA)
* Allen Boyd (D-FL)
- Lincoln Davis (D-TN)
*P Sam Farr (D-CA)
*P Maurice D. Hinchey (D-NY)
P Jesse L. Jackson, Jr. (D-IL)
P Marcy Kaptur (D-OH)
- Jack Kingston (R-GA)
- Rodney Alexander (R-LA)
- Jo Ann Emerson (R-MO)
* Tom Latham (R-IA) *=House Organic Caucus member
P=Congressional Progressive Caucus
Education and Labor
P Chair: George Miller (D-CA)
- Jason Altmire (D-PA)
- Robert Andrews (D-NJ)
- Timothy Bishop (D-NY)
P Yvette Clarke (D-NY)
- Joe Courtney (D-CT)
- Susan Davis (D-CA)
P Marcia Fudge (D-OH)
P Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)
P Phil Hare (D-IL)
- Ruben Hinojosa (D-TX)
P Mazie Hirono (D-HI)
- Rush Holt (D-NJ)
- Dale Kildee (D-MI)
P Dennis Kucinich (D-OH)
P Dave Loebsack (D-IA)
- Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY)
P Donald Payne (D-NJ)
- Jared Polis (D-CO)
- Robert Scott (D-VA)
- Joe Sestak (D-PA)
- Carol Shea-Porter (D-NH)
P John Tierney (D-MA)
- Dina Titus (D-NV)
- Paul Tonko (D-NY)
P Lynn Woolsey (D-CA)
- David Wu (D-OR)
- Buck McKeon (R-CA)
- Judy Biggert (R-IL)
- Rob Bishop (R-UT)
- Bill Cassidy (R-LA)
- Michael Castle (R-DE)
- Vernon Ehlers (R-MI)
- Luis F Fortuno (R-PR)
- Brett Guthrie (R-KY)
- Peter Hoekstra (R-MI)
- Duncan D. Hunter (R-CA)
- John Kline (R-MN)
- Kenny Marchant (R-TX)
- Tom McClintock (R-CA)
- Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA)
- Thomas Petri (R-WI)
- Phil Roe (R-TN)
- Todd Russell Platts (R-PA)
- Tom Price (R-GA)
- Mark Souder (R-IN)
- GT Thompson (R-PA)
- Joe Wilson (R-SC) P=Congressional Progressive Caucus
Iowa Citizens for Community Improvement, Iowa's leading farm organization, and urban organization, has been recognized as Most Valuable Grassroots Advocacy Group. Iowa CCI is a member of the National Family Farm Coalition. It has done a great job of bringing inner city urban folks together with farmers. I've heard farmers say things like, the next time you're fighting a drug pusher in your neighborhood, (an issue they discussed,) I'll come and help!
Iowa CCI has also taken this into Chicago's National People's Action (NPA), where large actions urban/rural actions in DC, (and recently in Chicago) have brought these two groups together to go after USDA (ie. Sec. Veneman) as well as urban and combo problem leaders (ie. Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich)
Also, historical family farm icon, Mark Ritchie, founder of IATP, won (for his newer role as Minnesota Secretary of State,) Most Valuable State Official.
Often when non-farmers speak out about agriculture, we get painted as "anti-farmer." I've been outspoken about my dislike of concentration in the seed industry (and, for that matter, a number of industries in the agricultural sector) and I want to share a press release (below) with you from a number of farmer groups who are also upset about seed industry concentration and the resulting higher prices for the seeds they have to buy. The Farmer to Farmer Campaign on a Genetic Engineering has just put out a report on the subject called Out of Hand: Farmers face the consequences of a consolidated seed industry.
This past week, Obama held a forum on jobs and economic growth, and he included Ben Burkett, President of the National Family Farm Coalition, Mississippi farmer and director of the Mississippi Assn of Cooperatives, and Rhonda Perry of the Missouri Rural Crisis Center and Rural Coalition among the invitees. You can find a full transcript of the event at the link, or a statement made by the National Family Farm Coalition below.
I am very glad that family farmers were represented in the jobs summit because I believe that increasing the number of farmers is not only vital to helping with our nation's high unemployment, but it's also vital to fixing the problems in our food system. It's not possible to feed our country without increasing the number of farmers - unless you either import food or use destructive production methods and produce unhealthy foods (all of which we are doing). Increasing the number of farmers (and decreasing the size of farms) would also do quite a bit to revitalize the economy in rural areas.
From The Colbert Report, Colbert gives a tip of the hat to Missouri State Representative Cynthia Davis who said that needy kids shouldn't be fed because hunger can be a motivating factor
Raj Patel, author of Stuffed and Starved, recently gave a talk about the global food crisis at the 2009 Ecological Farming Conference. Raj is not someone I've met, nor have I read his book. Reading his (paraphrased) words from his recent talk (entitled "Food, Financial Stability and Democracy in Crisis") makes me think that he's someone I should pay more attention to. (I received notes on the talk from Ethan G and I'd like to say a big thanks to him for the time he took typing everything out.)
For those who need a handy case study on the insanity of our agricultural subsidy system, I give you the dairy industry's solution to falling prices caused by a "milk glut": kill the cows.
No joke. A dairy cow "retirement" program almost went through in the House stimulus bill - but the beef industry freaked out at the thought of what that might do to beef prices. Laskawy further explains the dairy oversupply problem as follows:
Cows aren't assembly line robots who can be switched off when their output isn't selling. They need to be milked every day. So when you have a subsidy regime that tends to encourage over-expansion when times are good (to cash in on high prices) and over-production when times are bad (through payments that offset losses and provide an incentive for farmers to attempt to recoup as much as possible), you apparently discover that the only exit runs through the slaughterhouse.
I'd add that it's not ONLY an issue of too much milk - it's also an issue of the use of cheap milk substitutes, namely MPC (milk protein concentrate), which lower demand for the real thing.
Buy an autographed copy of Recipe for America LVL Gear
"Too Big to Fail" T-Shirt
(details)
Support La Vida Locavore
Subscribe for $10/month:
One-Time Gift:
