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01/30/2005: "Bush – A Cottonmouth That Attacks Liberty"

In just one government program Bush subsidizes the rich, hurts the poor at home and abroad, pollutes the environment and subsidizes terrorism. While the cotton subsidy program has bi-partisan roots Bush has sought to continue it in the face of international opposition. The cotton plantations, whose roots are embedded as one of the few industries that began with slavery supposedly cannot survive without subsidies. There are only 25,000 of these farmers who divide up 3 billion dollars of our money. This does not include free government help on plant diseases, pests and marketing. As in the case of most agribusinesses most of the subsidies goes to old, large plantations that stretch from the old South to Arizona. Many of these landholders get over $100,000 a year from subsidies.

The situation has become so obvious internationally that in order to expose the hypocrisy of the US’s attempts to open poor countries markets while keeping the US’s closed and subsidized that a suit was brought up in the World Trade Organization. After the WTO concurred that this was a travesty and a sabotage of the efforts to bring about a truly free market they decided to make a decision against it. The Bush administration has decided to appeal.

It is bad enough that the government is taxing poor people to subsidize the rich. The damage goes much further. Cotton is one of the few cash crops that can be raised in Egypt, Pakistan and sub Saharan Africa. Many of these farmers are Moslem and are small subsistence farmers. What do you think their reaction will be when they find that they are competing with below cost cotton from rich farmers that is subsidized by the US government? Will they think that the US has their best interests at heart or will they listen to extremists?

It gets worse. Cotton farming in the US uses more chemical fertilizers and pesticides than any other crop in America. Sometimes the subsidy programs require the use of such chemicals, after all these chemical companies make political donations as well. The runoff goes into the soil, water table and rivers. Cotton is also grown in desert ecologies nourished by water from big dam projects that are again subsidized by taxpayers. What this could result in is the destruction of these fragile lands forever. There is also the fact that these farmers get subsidized water at one tenth the price of other users causing distortions in price that makes it more difficult for better, more sustainable industries to establish themselves in the booming Southwest. One reason the ancient Middle-East died out was that they were hydraulic societies, states with power literally flowing from the dam structure. After the irrigated water evaporated the ground became so saline that nothing would grow. Remember that this was before the use of artificial fertilizers and pesticides.

This call to end subsidies for cotton comes not just from free market advocates and environmentalists. It comes also from the protestors at Cancun who worry that the international agreements will not result in a free and fair trade but a domination of the world by the rich and politically connected. Is it any wonder why Bush is so hated?

There are alternatives to such farming. Hemp, sometimes known as marijuana is an ancient crop that nourishes and holds in the soil and doesn’t need pesticides. Hemp is a good substitute for cotton. The term canvas comes from cannabis. Clothing, sails, rope, paper, lubricating oil, animal and human feed, medicine and fuel are just a few of hemp’s uses that have been used for thousands of years. The Mona Lisa was painted on a hempen canvas. The Declaration of Independence was written on hemp paper. Bush has also tried to halt the production, distribution and importation of these products even though the active ingredient of marijuana (THC) is so minimal that it is impossible to get high on any of these products.

There is no explanation of these ludicrous, shameful policies in the conservative media. The conservatives have so copied the liberal establishment in the attempt to grab power that they have become indistinguishable from previous administrations in their arrogance and ignorance. It is hoped that the conservatives may learn from this critique and others before they find the rest of their ticket going down with Bush in 2004.

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