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
This is bad news for the developing world and good news for Monsanto. Rajiv Shah, who used to work on agriculture at the Gates Foundation, is going to head up USAID - the U.S. Agency for International Development. That's the part of the government that is currently working on helping the 1 billion hungry people in the world by giving them better agricultural knowledge and technology.
The choice of Shah is a crystal clear sign of the direction the Obama Administration plans to go on fighting hunger. The majority of the world has signed onto a UN/World Bank study (the IAASTD report) calling for agroecological farming methods as the way to solve world hunger. The IAASTD report says that GMOs are not the way forward to help hunger among smallholders in Africa and South Asia and that our free trade agenda actually harms these farmers. The Gates Foundation (and presumably, Shah) takes the opposite view - against the conclusions of the 400 scientists from around the world who worked on the IAASTD report - that GMOs are the way to go. And, obviously, Obama is following Clinton and Bush as a die-hard free-trader.
This is not unexpected, but it's bad news. Bad, bad, bad news.
The EPA said no to California's aerial spraying of 2 pesticides to combat the light brown apple moth. It's good news but not good enough... CA will probably find something else nasty to spray.
You know, being out of work as I am, I'm not one to suggest that the recession is good for us. But check out this headline that the recession means more money spent on gardens and less on cigarettes and alcohol. So I guess the next time I look at my bank balance and cry, I should tell myself that it's not all bad.
Dave Murphy gives us his $.02 on the new movie Food Inc. We're still in countdown mode until this film is in theatres. The date to mark on your calendar is June 12.
Here's another good one from Laskawy - his comments on Obama USDA nominee Rajiv Shah. Laskawy's a lot nicer about this than I am. He doesn't use any four-letter words.
Fooducate tells us about recession shopping trends. Like reducing impulse buys, cooking at home instead of eating out, and switching from sit-down restaurants to fast food ones or from grocery stores to superstores.
However bad your food is, just be glad you're not Russian. I'm not dissing vodka and borscht - according to this article, Russians too poor to buy regular food are instead opting for spoiled food.
I was just finishing up a post about the USDA's new organic garden when I got an email (subject: Second Green Revolution, anyone?). Yikes! So I went to have a look. We've got a new nominee to the USDA. I guess after they nominated Kathleen Merrigan to the Deputy post and Doug O'Brien as her Chief of Staff, they felt that their "sustainable ag" quota among USDA leadership was filled? Perhaps the decided to balance it out by looking for the biggest douchebag they could find?
The nominee is Rajiv Shah as Under Secretary of Research, Education and Economics and Chief Scientist at USDA. And who's Rajiv Shah? He's the Director of the Agricultural Development Program at the Gates Foundation. In other words, he's the guy heading up all of the bad shit going on around the world.
And... here's what Vilsack thinks about him:
Dr. Rajiv Shah is a globally recognized leader in science, health and economics ... disciplines that are critical to the missions of this department," said Vilsack. As Director of the Agricultural Development Program at The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Rajiv has a profound influence on helping the world's poor lead healthy and productive lives. With his extensive background, Rajiv will help guide advances in food safety, nutrition, energy and climate, agricultural productivity, and global food security-to name a few of USDA's challenges.
I don't know much about Shah as a person, but I am incredibly frustrated by the destructive and paternalistic approach the Gates Foundation has taken to "help" the developing world feed itself. They are pushing to continue and expand all of the worst of Western agriculture into the developing world, to essentially privatize the means of food production. And they are doing this despite the harmful results the same approach has already had in other parts of the world. So now they'll have their man on the inside. Terrific.
UPDATE: Here is what the NY Times had to say about Shah.
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:
