Wednesday was a difficult day for The American Independent News Network, which is the larger entity that operates The Iowa Independent. Our chief executive and founder announced two of our sister sites would close and their content would be moved to The American Independent.
A recently introduced bill could have far-reaching impact on the U.S. sugar industry, including American Crystal Sugar, a farmer-owned cooperative that locked out 1,300 Midwest workers on Aug. 1.
The chairman for Herman Cain’s Iowa effort says the campaign “relied more on the word of farmers than Washington regulators” in deciding to run an ad containing claims the Environmental Protection Agency says are false.
The Iowa Senate will remain under the control of a slim 26-25 Democratic majority when it reconvenes in January 2012.
Congress will give the Farm Bill Conference Committee a week of breathing room to resolve its differences and finish the farm bill.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved a one-week extension of the current farm bill Wednesday, a signal that the conference committee will soon finish its work and produce a new bill.
All current farm programs are set to expire this Friday. Speaking on the floor of the House Wednesday morning, House Agriculture Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, D-Minn., said the one-week extension of current farm programs will give the conference committee “sufficient time to come to a resolution.”
The conference committee met Tuesday but still had not resolved disputes involving farm bill tax incentives passed by the Senate and disagreements about funding sources. House members had dug in their heels in opposition to the tax measures, including tax breaks for young and beginning farmers and a provision to reduce the self-employment tax burden on Conservation Reserve Program payments for the disabled and retired.
Farm bill conferees Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., who is the chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, and Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, were scheduled to hold a private meeting Tuesday afternoon to try to resolve their differences. “Chairman Rangel and I are going to have a little sit-down,” said Baucus during the committee meeting. “We’re going to talk about all of this to try to find a solution.” Baucus said that he and Rangel would also meet Tuesday with the ranking Republicans on their respective committees and resolve the issues.
Speaking Wednesday on the floor of the House of Representatives, Peterson said that once the bill is resolved he will likely ask for an additional extension to allow time for the bill to be signed by the president. “I do want to warn people that we fully expect to have these things wrapped up by the 25th, in terms have having the policy differences in the ag committee and the funding differences resolved,” said Peterson, “but everybody needs to understand that after that, we’re going to need an additional extension, probably of two weeks. This is a very complex, huge bill that’s going to take us time to pull together, to enroll, to get passed through the House and the Senate and to get to the president in time for him to read it before he signs it. So people can expect that we’re going to have to have another couple weeks after next Friday to get everything resolved, which I expect we will.”
The Farm Bill Conference Committee is scheduled to meet Wednesday afternoon to continue its work.
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