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 Post subject: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 3:44 pm 
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gone completely wrong

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U.S. cotton farmers took in almost $2.3 billion dollars in government subsidies in 2009, and the top 10% of the recipients got 70% of the cash. Now Uncle Sam is getting ready to ask taxpayers to foot the bill for another $147.3 million a year for a new round of cotton payments, this time to Brazilian growers.

We realize that in today's Washington this is a rounding error. But the reason for the new payments to foreign farmers deserves attention. If it becomes a habit, it is unlikely to end with cotton.

Here's the problem: The World Trade Organization has ruled that subsidies to American cotton growers under the 2008 farm bill are a violation of U.S. trading commitments. The U.S. lost its final appeal in the case in August 2009 and the WTO gave Brazil the right to retaliate.

Brazil responded by drafting a retaliation list threatening tariffs on more than 100 U.S. exports, including autos, pharmaceuticals, medical equipment, electronics, textiles, wheat, fruits, nuts and cotton. The exports are valued at about $1 billion a year, and the tariffs would go as high as 100%. Brazil is also considering sanctions against U.S. intellectual property, including compulsory licensing in pharmaceuticals, music and software.

The Obama Administration appreciates the damage this retaliation would cause, so in April it sent Deputy U.S. Trade Representative Miriam Sapiro to negotiate. She came back with a promise from Brazil to postpone the sanctions for 60 days while it considers a U.S. offer to—get this—let American taxpayers subsidize Brazilian cotton growers.

That's right. Rather than reduce the U.S. subsidies to American cotton farmers that are the cause of the trade fight, the Administration is proposing that U.S. taxpayers also compensate Brazilian cotton farmers for the harm done by the U.S. subsidies. Thus the absurd U.S. cotton program would dip into the Commodity Credit Corporation to pay what is a bribe to Brazil so it won't retaliate.

Talk about taxpayer double jeopardy. As Senator Richard Lugar (R., Ind.) said recently, the commodity credit program was established to assist U.S. agriculture, "not to pay restitution to foreign farmers who won a trade complaint against a U.S. farm subsidy program."

Mr. Lugar wants the subsidies to U.S. farmers cut by the amount that will have to be sent to Brazil. He adds that a better option would be to take on the trade-distortions of the cotton program. "I am prepared to introduce legislation to achieve these immediate reforms," he wrote in an April 30 letter to President Obama.

This is probably tilting at political windmills, since Mr. Obama has shown no appetite for trade promotion, much less confronting a cotton lobby supported by such Democrats as Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln. But we're glad to see that at least Mr. Lugar is willing to call out the absurdity of U.S. taxpayers subsidizing foreign farmers to satisfy the greed of a few American cotton growers.


So...


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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:01 pm 
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First, eliminate the cotton subsidy to our farmers.

Next, send a Ranger battalion to WTO headquarters and destroy it, all its paperwork, records, computers, etc, and kill anyone who resists.

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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:06 pm 
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Diamondeye wrote:
First, eliminate the cotton subsidy to our farmers.

Next, send a Ranger battalion to WTO headquarters and destroy it, all its paperwork, records, computers, etc, and kill anyone who resists.


This.

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Ezekiel 23:19-20 


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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:10 pm 
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Diamondeye wrote:
Next, send a Ranger battalion to WTO headquarters and destroy it, all its paperwork, records, computers, etc, and kill anyone who resists.


/boggle

I've never understood the intensity of some people's opposition to the WTO and other international and transnational organizations. I have some concerns myself about the "democratic deficit" and so on, but why the h9?


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PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:12 pm 
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The organization is detrimental to American sovereignty.

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19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. 20 There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.

Ezekiel 23:19-20 


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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:35 pm 
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Diamondeye wrote:
First, eliminate the cotton subsidy to our farmers.

Next, send a Ranger battalion to WTO headquarters and destroy it, all its paperwork, records, computers, etc, and kill anyone who resists.


Why cost the taxpayers money?

Lets go. You me rynar, well grab a few more and then bbq.

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PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:37 pm 
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I'll bring the steaks and ribs if you guys bring the automatic weapons and grenades.

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19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. 20 There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.

Ezekiel 23:19-20 


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 Post subject: Re:
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:42 pm 
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Rynar wrote:
The organization is detrimental to American sovereignty.


Then ignore them, there's no reason to attack them.


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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 5:43 pm 
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The United States is a founding member of the WTO, January 1, 1995. Thank you Bill Clinton.

Before we could ethically demolish the building and execute the we would need to resign our membership, declare war on the World Trade Organization and give the WTO an opportunity to surrender.

That isn't going to happen under Obama.

Should we decide to do so in 2013 or so, under the next President, rather than risk the lives of some of the 2500 troops we may still have in uniform we should just nuke it from orbit. It is the only way to be sure.

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 Post subject: Re:
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 6:57 pm 
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Rynar wrote:
The organization is detrimental to American sovereignty.


And why is that a self-evidently bad thing?


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 Post subject: Re: Re:
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 7:09 pm 
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RangerDave wrote:
Rynar wrote:
The organization is detrimental to American sovereignty.


And why is that a self-evidently bad thing?


Philoposhically, because our culture is important to freedom, and subjecting ourselves to the democratic whims of those less inclined to preserve our ideals is harmful to the Americans that those ideals exist to serve, and protect from tyranny.

Economically, because is isn't sound to allow those who don't contribute to the opperation of, and aren't even subject to the tax law of, our government to dictate or even influence economic policy.

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19 Yet she became more and more promiscuous as she recalled the days of her youth, when she was a prostitute in Egypt. 20 There she lusted after her lovers, whose genitals were like those of donkeys and whose emission was like that of horses.

Ezekiel 23:19-20 


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 Post subject: Re: Cotton subsidies
PostPosted: Fri May 21, 2010 10:16 pm 
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RangerDave wrote:
I've never understood the intensity of some people's opposition to the WTO and other international and transnational organizations. I have some concerns myself about the "democratic deficit" and so on, but why the h9?


How can you NOT hate a group that is telling us we cannot even attempt to give our own farmers assistance, but we should be sending some douchebag in another country money? We shoudl not be providing these subsidies as it is... but if they were neccessary.. why should we not be able to do it for our own countrymen?

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 Post subject: Re: Re:
PostPosted: Sat May 22, 2010 9:47 am 
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RangerDave wrote:
Rynar wrote:
The organization is detrimental to American sovereignty.


And why is that a self-evidently bad thing?


Because as much as we complain about our own government, it's still preferable to living under practically any other one out there, and certainly better than one that's an amalgamation of the various idiotic excuses for governments that make up most international organizations.

They really serve no purpose except to act as a way for international busybodies to stick their noses into other nations' buisness, perpetuating the illusion that international law is actually law, and worst of all, promote the stupid idea that the world can actually be effectively governed by a central organization or even by nations answerable to one.

Or, to put it another way, it's a way for Europe to exercise colonial power all over again without having to spend the money to actually colonize. They just engage in a lot of hand-wringing and lecturing, and since they have a bunch of mostly like-minded countries with their own snot-nosed little international union to get them all ont he same page, they use that vote block to dominate the organization.

This is just like all the various Latin American countries getting together to gang up on Britain over the Falklands, creating the impression that since there's 28 or so of them and one of Britain, that they must be right by appeal to popularity. They haven't got a chance in hell of taking them back forcibly, so they try to create the impression Britain is being unreasonable by getting a bunch of countries together with ethnocentric appeal.

By the way, I wasn't proposing actually killing anyone at the WTO unless they fought back. There's no need for gratuitous bloodshed. Obviously this isn't going to happen; the logistical problems of attacking a building in Geneva Switzerland are pretty much insurmountable, and Obama would never do it anyhow. If it weren't in such an inconvenient location though, and I were President that A) we're withdrawing, B) our subsidy will be going away anyhow and C) any attempts to actually enforce any decisions of this organization will meet with very unpleasent consequences.

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