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Talking Versus Doing
nytimes.com — Barack Obama ’s vote for a recent farm bill may help him win Iowa, but it will lead to higher global food prices and more hunger in Africa.
davidmesaaz- 31 diggs
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- TruthMinister, on 05/20/2008, -4/+3If McCain is so righteous, why did he propose a summer gas-tax rollback, the ultimate in political pandering?
- CaptainRant, on 05/20/2008, -2/+6I'm sure Obama doesn't want to starve Africans, but his "change" will have unintended consequences which will all be neutral at best. He's proposing nothing new...just recycling old socialist and fascist ideas that failed in the past. The cult of personality growing around him despite any new or even close to ideas is chilling.
I could say the same things about Old Man McCain. - bubba9999, on 05/20/2008, -0/+4http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_li ...
Check the vote. All three candidates abstained from voting on this bill (both times) when push came to shove. Does speaking out against something, then chickening out on the vote, mean that you're actually for change?
By the same logic, I'm a little confused by David Brook's position that Obama supported the bill. He didn't mention, in his op-ed piece, how he came to that conclusion. Maybe Obama spoke in support of it on the floor?
But if the article is about walking the walk, what does the lack of a vote mean?- steelytrip, on 05/21/2008, -0/+1
You can argue that McCain didn't rally up the 15 (is that right number? not sure.) Senate votes he'd need to support a Bush veto and therefore isn't an effective agent of change, doesn't/won't/can't 'walk the walk'. Not sure it's a fair argument, but you can make it.
But you can't obfuscate the candidates' stated positions based on the fact that they didn't show up to cast votes that clearly would have been moot in either direction.
But let's talk about change for a second. What needs to change? Washington, because it's become a self-sustaining cess pool of waste, rent-seeking, and compromised interests. Well, you'd be hard pressed to find a bill that better represents what needs changing than this farm bill. It's interesting, then, precisely because each candidate's position on the bill was so unambiguous (and because one of them paints himself as a change messiah):
OBAMA
10/25/07:
“I applaud Chairman Harkin for his tireless efforts on this bill, and for gaining important ground on many of the priorities for our family farmers... ...I am pleased that it includes a provision I cosponsored to expand E-85 fuel infrastructure to help the ethanol and biofuels industry succeed."
http://obama.senate.gov/press/071025-obama_stateme ...
5/15/08:
"This bill is far from perfect," Mr. Obama said. "But with so much at stake, we cannot make the perfect the enemy of the good," noting, "By opposing the bill, President [George W.] Bush and John McCain are saying no to America's farmers and ranchers, no to energy independence, no to the environment and no to millions of hungry people."
http://www.thebulletin.us/site/index.cfm?newsid=19 ...
MCCAIN
5/19/08
"I would veto that bill, and all others like it that serve only the cause of special interests and corporate welfare," McCain said in remarks prepared for a speech in Chicago.
http://www.reuters.com/article/vcCandidateFeed7/id ...
Oh, and, even though it's kind of irrelevant:
CLINTON SLAMS MCCAIN ON FARM BILL, May 2008
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/05/15/politics ...
- steelytrip, on 05/21/2008, -0/+1
- AlwaysAwake, on 05/20/2008, -0/+3The main benefactors will be corporate farmers, Cargill, and others reaping enormous record profit from high grain and fertilizer sales. Regular farmers are caught in the middle, and allow land to go fallow, because it is too expensive to plant and reap the harvest. Truth is that more and more, Obama is looking like a sellout. Can't really blame him too much. THEY'D kill him in a second if he made waves now, and I'm sure he knows it.
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