P. J. O'Rourke Quotes

As I've long said, the farm bill is in need of major reform. At first chance, I voted to remove direct payments. Both the House and the Senate passed bills that end direct payments, and as we move forward, I hope we can work out the rest of the issues to implement the necessary reforms.

Farm policy and food stamp policy should not be mixed. They should stand on their own merits.

Never in my life would I have expected USDA to be opposed to farmers and ranchers.

It was in the best interests of Zavala and other counties that we move forward with a farm bill and provide certainty to ranchers, farmers, food banks, and other providers.

As one of the nation's top agricultural states, Nebraska has a great opportunity to provide input that will help shape the 2007 Farm Bill, .. This legislation will help determine commodity price supports, priorities with regard to conservation programs, as well as rural development, renewable energy and beginning farmer initiatives for several years to come.

We need a strong farm bill that gives assistance to farmers during times of drought, creates markets for local goods, protects our environment, and helps struggling families bridge the gap between hard times and a full dinner table.

What in the hell would they do with the farm program without us?

Mr. President, it may surprise my colleagues, but I am no fan of federal disaster programs for agriculture. They are difficult to pass and often a disaster to implement.

Programs that pay farmers not to farm often devastate rural areas. The reductions hurt everyone from fertilizer companies to tractor salesmen.

I'm very concerned about U.S. food policy.

On the Agriculture Committee, I will be an ardent and strong champion for our farmers to ensure that they are treated fairly, particularly in regards to how their products are priced.

Do we need farm program reform? Absolutely.

Oh, what could be more delicious than replacing Chuck Grassley on the Senate Agriculture Committee?

As a chef and activist, I'm particularly concerned with food politics issues such as the farm bill.

The American government policy on what we supported and subsidised in agriculture was a social experiment on a whole generation of children.

I am willing to admit that if the agriculturists are oppressed by peculiar burdens, they ought to be relieved from them, or be allowed a fair and just protection equivalent to all such peculiar burdens.

Agriculture is a business that has been up to its bib overalls in politics since the first Thanksgiving dinner kickback to the Indians for subsidizing Pilgrim maize production with fish head fertilizer grants.

As the Republican platforms says, the welfare of the farmer is vital to that of the whole country.

The levels of poverty in 1933's rural America were unimaginable to us now. The 1933 Farm Bill, which introduced unprecedented government control over agriculture, was a reaction to the specific problems facing producers at that time.

We don't pay truckers not to truck, we don't pay miners not to mine and we shouldn't pay farmers not to farm.

The only thing I'd like to see hi [Jimmy Carter] do when he gets to the White House is appoint a working farmer as secretary of agriculture, that's all.

The only way to keep food prices down is to keep them [farmers] down on the farm after they've seen the parity.

Farm subsidies are a waste of money.

Farm subsidies are a matter of national food security

What our family has done is participate in the farm programs … programs I think essentially almost every farmer in South Dakota has participated in those, and they haven't been bailouts, they have been programs that the United States has put forward for farmers to participate in.