Dairy Queen; Dairy Tyranny

Frank

Senator Patrick Leahy recently held a hearing of the Senate Agriculture Committee to address the fact that national policy overlooks small farms. The sad thing is: NO MEMBERS OF THE COMMITTEE SHOWED!!!! Except for Leahy himself of course. Luckily some heroes do exist - Senator Bernie Sanders and Congressman Peter Welch joined up to show some muscle on the issue and listen to comments as well. The problem is farmers need more and perhaps better federal aid if the government wishes to have a stronghold on the farm community big or small, whether it be Vermont or any other state for that matter.

Milk does a body good, got milk? Sound familiar? Those are a couple crafty slogans wittily thought up by some smart-ass genius with a milk mustache sold to corporate dairy that can afford to have perhaps even a gang of milk-mustachioed knaves brain-storming around the clock obsolete catch phrases to help push gallons upon gallons of the pearly white cookie partner. And yet the poor proletariat of the good 'ol VT farm community is having a hard enough time staying open for business let alone expand their marketing campaigns. It's no big secret (or scheme for that matter) that national policy favors big business and Vermont dairy farms take it in the "you know where" causing them to go under. The Farm Bill, which is updated every five years, is what spearheads federal policy on commodity farming, nutrition programs, rural development, logging, and conservation. This policy is also what controls the price that is paid to farmers for their product but does not in any way control their costs for feed, energy, and supplies to maintain their farms. With inflation and government control on milk "royalties" it doesn't take a genius to figure out why it becomes difficult for a small farm to stay alive in todays 'cow eat cow' dairy market. This poses a grave threat my friends, if local farms begin to sink then cooperatives as well will lose business and in the end the market will be dominated by a few feeding the many which......well......I think we witnessed the damage done earlier when a strand of e.coli made its way into a spinach farm and soon packed its bags for a cross-country trip. See what I'm getting at? It's important to eat local and it's important to support our local farmers.