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POPSObama and Iowa In this week's National Journal, the magazine's regular "Insider's Poll" asks Democratic and Republican luminaries (pollsters, strategists, and so on) which state is Obama's top pickup opportunity. Iowa ranks at the top for both groups. In the clip, James Barnes fleshes out a bit why. Note the importance of ethanol.
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POPSEPA Refuses to Cut Ethanol Requirements "Response to the decision fell along predictable lines: The Environmental Working Group's director of government affairs, Sandra Schubert, called the mandate "misguided" and said it was "forcing farmers to plow up marginal land and wildlife habitat while increasing global warming and dumping toxic fertilizers and pesticides into our precious water sources." "America should be focusing on viable clean energy solutions like conservation, solar and wind," she said. The president of the Biotechnology Industry Organization, Jim Greenwood, said the decision sent "a strong message that we must continue moving forward toward sustainable production of advanced biofuels" to cut dependence on important oil and to increase biofuel production from non-food sources. His organization represents biotech companies, among others involved in expanding the use of biofuels.""
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POPSEPA Rejects Ethanol Waiver For Texas Cattle Ranchers Scott Faber with the Grocery Manufacturers Association says more than a third of the corn crop now goes to fuel and that increases the cost of food. Faber says food prices have already risen around 6 percent and critics say ethanol hasn't lived up to its promise. It was supposed to cut pollution and reduce demand for oil. Frank O'Donnell is with Clean Air Watch. It's not often he agrees with Texas, but he does today. He says the EPA got it wrong. Frank O'Donnell: We are actually seeing more air pollution this summer than last. Now, maybe it's a coincidence, maybe not, but we've got more ethanol and we've got more smog. Groups against today's decision plan to lobby Congress to ease the ethanol mandate.
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POPSEnvironmentalists Hold On Congress
What's the political response to our energy problems? It's more congressional and White House kowtowing to environmentalists, farmers and multi-billion dollar corporations such as Archer Daniels Midland. Their “solution," rather than to solve our oil supply problem by permitting drilling for the billions upon billions of barrels of oil beneath the surface of our country, is to enact the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 that mandates that oil companies increase the amount of ethanol mixed with gasoline. Anyone with an ounce of brains would have realized that diverting crops from food to fuel use would raise the prices of corn-fed livestock, such as pork, beef, chicken and dairy products, and products made from corn, such as cereals. Ethanol production has led to increases in other grain prices, such as soybean and wheat. Since the U.S. is the world's largest grain producer and exporter, higher grain prices have had a huge impact on food prices worldwide.
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POPSMagical Thinking vs. Reality amount to $1.05 to $1.38 per gallon, or 42 to 55 percent of ethanol's wholesale market price. Ethanol does not reduce gasoline prices. If you lived in urban areas that used reformulated gasoline last summer -- that's the environmentally "clean" gasoline required for areas with air pollution problems -- you might have paid up to 60 cents a gallon more for gasoline. That's because the federal government required oil refineries to use 4 billion gallons of ethanol in 2006, regardless of price, and gas pump prices last summer reflected the fact that ethanol was twice as expensive as conventional gas in wholesale markets, and far more costly to deliver. The truth is that if ethanol has commercial merit, it doesn't need the subsidy. And if it doesn't, no amount of subsidy will bestow it.
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POPSAgricultural Contributions to The Death of Our Oceans Combine this with the attempt for more oil exploration in the Gulf and you can imagine the damages coming our way. THE DEAD ZONE in the Ocean and the DEAD ZONE on Land due to unfettered mono culture growth. Creating waste lands and waste water wherever they go whatever they touch.
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POPSThe Great Biofuels Con It is a crime against humanity and a crime against nature. Cutting down forests for monocrops of any kind is ecocide.
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POPSFlooding Spurs Ethanol Backlash But others remain strongly in support of biofuels. "Abandoning our commitment to ethanol and biofuels, as some would suggest we do, would do nothing to provide meaningful relief from high grain prices today or in the future," said Bob Dineen, president of the Renewable Fuels Association. "It would absolutely force the price of gas through the roof and require the import of more record-high foreign oil."
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POPSEthanol: The Fuel To Nowhere Farm belt support for reducing or eliminating the corn ethanol mandate was higher once respondents were informed that two studies, one from Princeton University and another from the University of Minnesota, found that ethanol contributes more greenhouse gas to the atmosphere than does conventional gasoline. It does so, in part, because it encourages the clearing of so-called carbon sinks, such as rain forests, which absorb carbon dioxide, to produce crops for ethanol production. "We shouldn't sacrifice food for fuel, nor should we sacrifice carbon sinks for fuel," said Ridenour. "Ethanol is costing us as taxpayers, it is costing us as consumers, and it is costing us important environmental resources while providing little-to-no benefit for most of us in return. Ethanol is the fuel to nowhere. Like the infamous 'bridge to nowhere' earmark, ethanol mandates mean we all pay enormous costs so a few can benefit."
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POPS Tremendous Range Of Unintended Consequences On the losing side of the equation have been cattle, hog and chicken producers, as well as consumers. The government’s latest projection, released Friday, is that food prices this year will rise as much as 5.5 percent. Some products, including cereals and eggs, are expected to rise about 10 percent. The idea of easing ethanol mandates, while it would also lower the price of corn, is contentious. Keith Collins, the former Agriculture Department chief economist, will release a study on Monday saying that as much as half of the sharp increase in corn prices over the last few years is due to the demands of ethanol production. “We’ve seen a tremendous range of unintended consequences” from the requirement that increasing amounts of ethanol be blended into gasoline. The White House will be forced to confront the ethanol issue next month. States are allowed to asked for waivers of the mandate for corn ethanol on the ground that it is harming the economy or the environment.
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POPSMcCain Calls For End To Corn Subsidies For Ethanol In comments published by the Estado de S. Paulo newspaper, McCain also said he would support Brazil's addition to the Group of Eight industrialized nations and lauded the nation's drive to find clean energy sources. White House economic advisers say corn-based ethanol is responsible for just 2 to 3 percent of the overall increase in food prices, which are up more than 40 percent this year over 2007.
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POPSThe Enemy Within and the developing world’s discovery of corn-fattened beef. Greenies – Oil The greenies supported by the Democrats have blocked all efforts to increase the domestic supply of oil and gas and the Democrats and their greenies have blocked all efforts to build atomic plants for decades. We can’t expect relief from such high prices as Democrats are holding our oil reserves hostage to some delusional belief it is saving our planet. Anti-Capitalist Socialist Democrats Not all Democrats are both anti-capitalist or socialists but enough of them were to nominate Obama, a card-carrying community activist whose political proposals on his website are pure Marxian – taking from the rich and redistributing to the poor. It seems clear that our enemy is right here in America – The far left of the Democrat Party, They bribe the poor, indoctrinate our youth into socialism and traitorously work to undermine our military at every college and every recruiting station in the nation.
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POPSBrazil's Lula Rebuffs Biofuels Critics at World Food Summit "Subsidies create dependency, break down entire production systems and provoke hunger and poverty. It is high time to do away with them,'' Lula stated. "It offends me to see fingers pointed against clean biofuels—fingers tainted with oil and coal." US corn-based ethanol is an example of a harmful type of biofuel "shot up with subsidies and shielded behind tariff barriers," Lula added. ::
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POPSGMO - what we don't know An interesting article. I, for one, would like to have a choice about what I consume. Without accurate labeling, it's next to impossible to make an informed purchasing decision.
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POPS Farming For Riches for direct payments each year to farmers, regardless of whether they grow anything. Can we honestly demand fair and free trade from other countries when this bill increases trade distorting payment rates and restores an illegal cotton program? Sen. Barack Obama has raised the rhetoric on fair trade and restoring fiscal discipline, but his support for the farm bill betrays the inconsistency of his position: Cry foul with our trade partners, but break the rules at home. It is time to wean ourselves from the huge crop subsidies being paid by taxpayers and the flawed policies that distort the markets, artificially raise prices for consumers and pit producers against consumers.
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POPSWho Will Pay For The Politicians Promises? Because of onerous regulations, it has been 30-plus years since a new refinery has been built. Similar regulations also explain why the U.S. nuclear energy production is a fraction of what it might be. Congress' solution to our energy supply problems is not to relax supply restrictions, but to enact the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 that mandates that oil companies increase the amount of ethanol mixed with gasoline. Anyone with an ounce of brains would have realized that diverting crops from food to fuel use would raise the prices of a host of corn-related foods, such as corn-fed meat and dairy products. Wheat and soybeans prices have also risen as a result of fewer acres being planted in favor of corn. Congress' proposed "solutions" to the energy and food mess it has created include a windfall profits tax on oil companies, food stamps, etc. These measures will not solve the problem, but will create new problems.
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POPSOppose Climate Alarmist Gore: Sign Free Petition Worried about high food prices, Congress tries to push the biofuel industry to use nonfood crops. Chicago - America's love affair with corn-based ethanol is cooling – at least in Washington. Some legislators blame the rising use of corn as a biofuel as a key factor behind high food prices. Others want to freeze the federal mandate on biofuels production at current levels, reversing legislation passed just a few months ago that increases it through 2022. Still others are pushing to shift tax incentives away from corn-based to cellulose-based ethanol in the nearly completed farm bill. These moves represent a dramatic backlash against corn ethanol, which until a few months ago was widely viewed as a boon for both farmers and consumers. Many experts worry that Washington's new skepticism will undo important progress the US has made in replacing foreign oil with domestic energy alternatives. http://www.csmonitor.com/2008/0501/p03s03-usec.html
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POPSFACTORY FARMS OR FAMILY FARMS from 5-1999 With the same corporations controlling so much of the food chain, the question is--are some of these corporations in violation of anti-trust laws?
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