Kent Conrad: “I rise today to talk about farm policy. We have just now heard that the administration has endorsed Senator Lugar's farm…”

“I rise today to talk about farm policy. We have just now heard that the administration has endorsed Senator Lugar's farm plan, which fundamentally, in my judgment, abandons family farms and the rural economy. The farm plan that the administration is now supportive of is radical and it is ruinous. I don't know how to sugarcoat it. This is an absolute unmitigated disaster for the rural parts of the country. The President is, in essence, backing a plan that eliminates farm programs--this at a time that our major competitors, the Europeans, are outspending us 10 to 1 in support for farm producers, and in terms of export support they are outdoing us 30 to 1. It is no wonder that these are hard times in farm country. It is no wonder that when I go home to North Dakota--one of the most agricultural States in the Nation--farm producers tell me they wonder why they should stay in agriculture when there is virtually no financial return. There is enormous risk. The plan the President has endorsed is an absolute abdication. It says we are going to eliminate AMTA payments immediately. It says we are going to eliminate in just a few years the marketing loan program. It says we are going to eliminate the sugar program, the dairy program, and the peanut program. For all of that, it substitutes a voucher system that is woefully inadequate, and which will leave tens of thousands of farmers in a position of financial failure. That is the plan this President has endorsed.”