Sharing a common sense paragraph from our friend, Vince Farrell of Scotsman Capital, from his note to clients this morning:
Lastly, there are signs the government may allow farmers to plant more corn on millions of acres of conservation land. The Agriculture Department has the authority to release farmers from contracts under which they agreed to set aside tracts of land as natural habitat. Also, the Environmental Protection Agency can roll back requirements for ethanol production. A quarter of the US corn crop is used for biofuels rather than animal or human food. Both ideas make a lot of sense to me. Now if we could only find some leadership...
Ah, yes, leadership... well, here's one person it won't come from: Obama Camp Closely Linked with Ethanol
Couple that with the fact that Obama is the candidate supported most heavily by PACs and lobbyists, despite his gross misrepresentations to the same about John McCain, and one can see that common sense and Barack Obama won't come within shouting distance of one another on the topic of ethanol.
Sensible-thinking people realize that diverting so much of our corn crop to a net energy loser (David Pimentel has shown for years that ethanol produces less energy than is required to make it) with gas above $4/gallon is absurd, but the presumptive Democratic nominee has no chance of figuring this one out.
Obama's all wet on this one. McCain should not only keep on topic about offshore drilling (maybe he'll even figure out ANWR along the way), he should take up the cause for Newt's "Drill Now" initiative. Advantage McCain on this one-- big time.
Most recent articles by this author:
http://globalcapital.blogspot.com
Another home run, Chip!
I'm neither a McCain nor Obama supporter. As a traditional conservative, I won't vote for either this fall.
But I must say that on this issue, McCain has been consistent. He has always wisely opposed the subsidies and ethanol mandates.
It's one reason he gave Iowa a "pass" last January during the caucuses. He knew that his opposition to the farm subsidies wouldn't win him any votes there. Sure enough. It didn't!