Hog Politics: Blanche Lincoln's Latest Earmark

Bill Smith, Editor: The below referenced article was titled: "Lincoln's Last Earmark" based on a Wall Street Journal article. But in fact, Sen. Lincoln is still in office and may well do more damage in a both the pre-election and post election Lame Duck Session. Thus, this post reflects the title: "Blanche Lincoln's Latest Earmark." Lincoln has become a master at Plantation Politics (helping to enrich those in power) especially when it has come to enriching her own coffers via farm subsidies. I will offer more comments after the following posted article about Lincoln.

by Ted Abram, Freedom Works: Senator Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas has been attempting to change an agriculture insurance law to allow corporate agribusinesses to retroactively extract hundreds of thousands of dollars from the US Treasury.  The total cost is $1.5 billion.

Senator Lincoln is the most endangered Democratic Senator in the upcoming November elections.  Ardently, she has attempted to attach her “earmark” to a series of bills.  The Wall Street Journal reports:

Mrs. Lincoln's claim is preposterous enough that she can't persuade even her fellow Democrats to pony up the cash. First she suggested tapping TARP for the money. When that didn't fly, she tried unsuccessfully to add an earmark to a war funding bill, and then to the small business bill that Congress will take up after Labor Day. Her colleagues keep saying "no."

Ah, but the President must help a collaborator in need.  The WSJ continues:

Enter the White House. In an August 6 letter, deputy budget director Robert L. Nabors II pledged that "the Administration is committed to providing [the disaster] assistance consistent with your legislative proposal by the end of the month." The White House says it can do so under a Depression-era law allowing tariff funds to be used for farm emergency payments.

 Will the amounts received by the agribusinesses be published?  Apparently, not.

Coincidentally—or not—the USDA has chosen this moment to stop publishing the names of farm subsidy recipients and how much they receive. As EWG (Environmental Working Group) puts it: "This policy effectively shields from disclosure subsidy benefits going to multiple, and often absentee, owners of large, agribusiness farming operations." The USDA says shutting down the data base will save money. Welcome to the new era of transparency in government.

According to the WSJ the insurance program has merit, and this raid will destroy the program.

If Mrs. Lincoln gets her $1.5 billion, the White House will have eviscerated the one laudable farm subsidy reform in years. Congress will revert to raiding the Treasury every year to enrich its wealthiest constituents. All of this in a last ditch, and probably futile, effort to help Mrs. Lincoln retain her Senate seat.

Tragically, this is politics as usual in DC.
Democracy and Power 103: The politician transfers money from productive people, to mostly favored special interest groups.

Or as Walter Williams states: Conservatives and liberals are kindred spirits as far as government spending is concerned. First, let's make sure we understand what government spending is. Since government has no resources of its own, and since there's no Tooth Fairy handing Congress the funds for the programs it enacts, we are forced to recognize that government spending is no less than the confiscation of one person's property to give it to another to whom it does not belong – in effect, legalized theft.

Well, there it is in a nutshell. Sen. Blanche Lincoln has been receiving Farm subsidies via her corporation for years. We reported about this three years ago. Under the Obama administration, she voted out of committee the infamous take over of the healthcare industry which establishes the forced purchasing of medical insurance by all Americans. Her reward, the Chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee. Subsequently, the USDA headed by an Obama appointee decides that they need to save money by reducing transparency (not farm subsidies) thereby stopping the reporting names of farm subsidy recipients and the amounts they receive. This action thus shields Sen. Blanche Lincoln from further disclosure of the farm subsidies she or her corporation(s). trusts or family and friends receive. 

Lincoln wants to be re-elected and even brags about her chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee as being good for Arkansas. Well, her prior membership on and her now chairmanship of the Senate AG Committee combined with selling out Arkansans has provided successful access to money and power for herself and her liberal elite friends. Lincoln has played Plantation Politics to hilt. It is time for Sen. Blanche Lincoln to receive the just rewards for abusing of power. It is time for her to be forced retired in November.

Unfortuantely, she will still be able to receive her already excessive Congressional retirement at her Virgina home. I have no doubt, there are already other plans for Lincoln. She played the game on the behalf of Big Government and limiting freedoms of Americans. Just a guess, but her buddies Clinton, Biden, Reid and Obama may even give her the key to Plantation Management Center - the USDA.

In conclusion, I leave you with this interesting items. The Arkansas Democrat-Gazette which seldom offers negative comments about any democrat in office stated in a recent editorial: "What’s remarkable about Blanche Lincoln is not only her insatiable appetite for ever more perks for agribusiness - for any senator from a rural state like Arkansas might share it. What’s remarkable is her pose as a defender of the little guy as she prepares to turn her senatorial campaign into another exercise in class warfare against those evil grabby Republicans. It’s the hypocrisy of it that rankles most, not just the wretched excess."

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Tags: Blanche Lincoln, USDA, pork, farm subsidies, transparency, reduced transparency, Ag Committee, plantation politics, 2010 election To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!