Ron Kind: “I have as much respect and admiration for my family farmers back home in Wisconsin, too. The gentleman from Arkansas is…”

“I have as much respect and admiration for my family farmers back home in Wisconsin, too. The gentleman from Arkansas is exactly right; these are hardworking individuals playing by the rules in a market that is set out for them. But when I have producers in my district in western Wisconsin coming up to me and saying, Ron, why are we still receiving these direct payments when the market prices are so good right now? I say, You know, you're right. We should be looking at this anew. The gentleman from Minnesota pointed out that the first time direct payments were introduced in a farm bill was back in 1996 as a transitional program to get away from these direct subsidy payments to the farmers. Now we are into the third farm bill, and instead of at least holding them constant, as the gentleman's motion would have us do, we are talking about increasing the reliance on these direct payments over the next 5 to 10 years.”