Posted July 23rd, 2010 6:00 am

Does anybody here think Kentucky farmers will be impressed with a U.S. senate campaign whose manager doesn’t know what a co-op is?

Very few things make someone sitting at a laptop laugh out loud again and again over a period of several minutes.

But by God, Wile E. Coyote, Super Genius, Rand Paul and his band of merry elves can do it, and are doing it. It is difficult to type when the laptop is actually moving back and forth from the laughter.

Rand Paul did his level best to educate these simple Kentucky folk about why they need to accept less income, and realize that hundreds of thousands of Kentucky farmers just need to get chewed up and spit out by the demands of libertarian doctrine. Never mind that other countries stabilize their food production as a matter of national security. Paul remains convinced that all he has to do is explain it in terms that these simple country bumpkins can understand, and they’ll see how much better they’ll feel if many of the farmers have to go out of business, if Oxycontin and meth-heads take over Eastern Kentucky, and if a half-million Kentucky children go hungry because school lunches are cut. Over the top? Hyperbole? Actually, no. Rand Paul actually did renew his attack on Kentucky farmers. Incredibly, he did it before a forum of … Kentucky farmers!

Paul this time tried to claim that his opposition to farmers was aimed at three big corporations getting billions in subsidies. But his basis for that was identifying three co-ops, which served tens of thousands of farmers with an average federal subsidy of $4,100. Seems Rand Paul’s campaign manager doesn’t even know what a co-op is! Marion County Line has a great take on it all. (h/t to Joe).

That means the Farm Bureau debate happened yesterday, and indications are that the bi-weekly spontaneous combustions of Rand Paul seem to be accelerating.

Renewing his attack on federal farm subsidies, Republican U.S. Senate nominee Rand Paul told a Kentucky Farm Bureau audience Thursday that three agriculture companies have received a total of more than $1 billion in aid.
“It is really galling to people that three companies in the U.S. got a billion dollars,” he said in an appearance with his opponent, Democratic nominee Jack Conway, at Farm Bureau headquarters in Louisville.
But, in fact, the “companies” are all cooperatives that are owned by thousands of farmers. And the federal payments have gone to the farmers who own them over the past 15 years — as the Paul campaign later acknowledged in an interview.
…
In a Kentucky Educational Television debate during the GOP primary, Paul first broached the subject of farm subsidies, saying, “I don’t think federal subsidies of agriculture are a good idea,” and, “I’m not in favor of giving welfare to business.”
Since then he has criticized giving subsidies to “dead farmers” and millions of dollars to huge companies.
Paul has stopped talking about “dead farmers” since it was reported that the basis of his comments came from an article in Reader’s Digest that the USDA has disputed.
He has now turned his attention to corporate farmers.
The three entities he referred to Thursday are Riceland Foods Inc. of Stuttgart, Ark.; Producers Rice Mill Inc. of Wynne, Ark.; and Farmers Rice Coop of Sacramento, Calif.
All three are cooperatives that are owned by thousands of farmers. In the case of Riceland foods, for example, more than $500 million federal subsidies during the past 15 years went to 9,000 farmers in five states. That’s an average of about $4,100 a year for each farmer.
Jesse Benton, Paul’s campaign manager, said the campaign stands by his statements during the forum.
“I don’t know what a co-op is,” Benton said. “But it certainly doesn’t change the point that farm subsidies are often full of waste, fraud and abuse by corporations at the expense of the farmer.”
…
The farm bureau represents some 483,000 farming families in the state and has a presence in all 120 counties.
…
Paul, a Bowling Green eye doctor, told the group that farm programs may have to be cut in an effort to reduce the federal debt.
…
Conway, on the other hand, called for the preservation of farm programs, which he said allow American food prices to stay low. He said he favors free trade agreements but only if they require other countries to meet minimum environmental and wage standards.
Conway also defended USDA programs that pay for school lunch and breakfast programs for low-income children.
“About 75 percent of the Farm Bill of 2008 goes to nutritional programs,” he said, noting that 500,000 Kentucky children are enrolled in the federal school lunch program. “Are we going to do away that in these difficult economic times?”

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“Ever heard of Plato, Aristotle, Socrates? MORONS!” Never go against in a Sicilian when Death is on the line!

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