Thomas Mott Osborne: “I represent a rural area. We lost 1,000 farmers last year, lost 5,000 over the last 6 years, and have the three poorest…”

“I represent a rural area. We lost 1,000 farmers last year, lost 5,000 over the last 6 years, and have the three poorest counties per capita in the United States. I have not seen Scottie Pippen out there, and some of those who have received $200,000 payments broke even or lost money. We are currently in the worst year of 5 years of record low prices. The European Union supports their farmers $350 per acre, Japan well over $1,000 per acre. We provide $43 per acre, and we say that is too much. I do not understand that. I would have liked to have maybe seen some tighter payment limits, maybe more restrictive rules on packer ownership. It is easy to throw rocks and cast stones and say I do not like this or like that, but I do not think most people realize how difficult it is to coordinate all of the different agricultural regions in the country and to write a comprehensive bill. Somebody earlier complained about the process. This thing went on over 2 years, 47 hearings. It was done in the full committee. The ranking member and the chairman could not have been more fair. Everybody had their shot. There was nothing done behind closed doors. It could not have been a better process. So what the bill does is this: it eliminates emergency payments. The last 4 years we have spent $24 billion a year on agriculture with emergency payments.”