Got M-m-m-m-management?

August 16, 2010 by Dick.

A lifetime ago in political terms I ran for state representative. I visited every dairy farm, rich and poor, in our then-two-Town district (Puffin East and North Puffin).

I spoke at some length with Etienne Chasseur, a North Puffin farmer milking about 75 head on 180 acres over on the Sweep Road.

“You need to sign on to the Canadian supply management system,” he told me. “I’m going broke here on an $11 milk check but my brother-in-law up north gets $18 U.S. for milking the same size herd.”

What, is he nuts? Etienne left out some of the story. I didn’t sign on then and would not now.

Vermont is a major dairy state with minor farms. The state defines a “large farm” as more than 600 cows; the median farm here now milks 120 head. Wisconsin, California, and even Nebraska dairy farms often milk 1,500, 2,000, or more. Many more. In 1991, a Vermont cow on one of our 2,381 farms produced about 15,000 pounds of milk per year. By 2000, average annual production per cow had risen to almost 17,500 pounds per year. (There were 11,019 farms here at the middle of the 20th Century.) Farmers measure milk production in “hundredweight” rather than gallons. About 12 gallons of milk weighs one hundred pounds.

Dairy farming here is unique because dairy farmers cannot set the price of milk and cannot pass along increases in operating costs. Neither Etienne Chasseur nor Wisconsin dairy farmer Paul Rozwadowski knows how much his milk sold for until the “milk check” comes in the mail. A month later.

Canada and the EU have a two-tiered system that offer farmers a (fixed) high price for “quota” milk, but a very low price for milk that is more than the quota for each farm. I’ve talked to some dairy farmers in Quebec. One compared his 150 cows to a 1,500 head herd in Wisconsin. Over the last dozen years, he made more total profit on 150 cows than the Wisconsin farm did on 1,500 for nine of those years.

The latest debate over dairy supply management began in 2007 and has picked up again.

The current milk pricing system is “inadequate, unfair and devastating family farms across the country,” Mr. Rozwadowski told the St. Albans Messenger. His last milk check brought in $13.80 per hundredweight for milk that he said cost $18/cwt to produce.

That price is based on dairy commodity sales. The USDA Federal Milk Marketing Order Office monitor the price of butter, dry milk powder, whey powder, and cheddar cheese sold on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange. The feds jinker with the numbers to come up with the mailbox price, or the price that the farmer actually receives.

So. What have we learned?

• The government sets the price farmers sell for
• Some farmers want to “level the playing field” by having the government also limit how much they can sell.

Where else could this plan this work? (1) Since the Obamanation owns General Motors, can we expect to see car sales limited to, say, 4 million units annually for all sellers and no more than 50,000 Chevy Volts sold prix fixe $65,000? If GM wants to sell more, the remainder must sell for $3,000 each. (2) Perhaps the feds should limit the oil companies to 15,680,000 barrels/day (about 5 million per day below current consumption) and fix the price at $180/barrel. Any production over the 15 million must be sold for $10/barrel. (3) Next, all manufacturers of men’s knit shirts will be held to 686 million units next year and the price set at $21 each wholesale. Anything over 686 million units must be wholesaled out for $6.

Did any of that really make sense to you?

Things that should be simple seldom are:
Try reading the Federal Tax Code

Got milk? Maybe, just maybe, farmers should look for a better way to price their milk instead of beseeching the feds for yet another set of regulations to hamper them.

Posted in What? Are They Nuts?, Marketing, Politics & News, Random Access | 3 Comments »

What Do We Pay Them For?

August 9, 2010 by Dick.

And why do we pay so much?

About a lifetime ago, I paid income taxes to both New York and Vermont. My job was with a manufacturer on the left side of the pond but New York had those baby-puke colored license plates at the time and I really didn’t want to live there; we moved to the home of the green plates instead.

I didn’t much like paying income taxes to New York.

I still wouldn’t.

The NY state legislature finally passed the 2004 budget. That’s not funny but it is nearly true. The NY state legislature finally passed the current 2010-2011 budget last week, 125 days late. The press spin department called it a “fiscally responsible budget” with higher spending and an additional $4 billion in new taxes. New York will spend $136 billion they collect from you and you and you. And me, since some of the counted revenues come from Federal coffers. It is the fourth latest budget in New York State history.

Read that again. It is one of the latest budgets in New York State history.

“It takes more than 20 months to repair more than 40 years worth of damage,” State senator John Simpson (D-somewhere-in-NY-but-not-for-long) said as he harped on how much worse things were under the former Republicans’ rule.

Horse puckey.

The pattern shows the legislature fritters when they aren’t afraid of the voters; they sort of buckle down when the voters are watching.

Everybody has an excuse. Whiners.

Legislators disagreed about capping property taxes. They disagreed about letting SUNY raise tuition. They disagreed about budget cuts if the hoped-for/planned-for/wished-for “FMAP” Medicaid supplements fall through. They disagreed about tens of millions of dollars of pork-barrel grants NY Gov. Paterson already vetoed (the legislature wanted to restore them in the final budget deal).

Incumbents called it the “most responsible budget” in a couple of decades.

Wow again.

Remember the veto? Gov. Paterson vetoed 6,709 line items of spending the Legislature tried to add, including $190 million in pork-barrel spending. Six thousand seven hundred items.

What are they, nuts?

We elect peeps for pretty much one reason: to spend our money on the things we want them to spend it on. We don’t elect them to fritter away their time or that money.

Former New York City Mayor Ed Koch got it right about members of his Legislature: “The good ones aren’t good enough and the bad ones are evil,” he said.

Sounds like a national sentiment to me.

Posted in What? Are They Nuts?, Throw Da Bums Out, Politics & News, Random Access | 2 Comments »

Short. Not Sweet.

July 26, 2010 by Dick.

I must be a racist. After all, I’m white and conservative, and I don’t think we should have an African-American president.

There. I said it.

I AM™ absolutely convinced we should not have an African-American president.

Read the next sentence in full because regular readers know what I think of Mr. Obama’s ability to govern. I’m perfectly OK with Barack Obama as a black man or a “person of color” or a purple man with pink polka dots but we ought not have an African-American president.

We should have an American president. Period.

Anyone who thinks we should have a hyphenated president is just plain nuts.

“No person except a natural born Citizen … shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty-five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.” Not a natural born citizen of Europe. Not a natural born citizen of Antarctica. Not a natural born citizen of Africa. A natural born citizen of America. Those who become citizens here by birth or immigration are no longer citizens of somewhere else. They are Americans, darn it, not European-Americans nor Antarctic-Americans nor African-Americans.

Americans.

This whole argument irks me. Are there racist idiots in the Tea Party? Absolutely. Are there racist idiots in the Communist Party of the United States? Positively. Have the Lefty Loons trotted out the race card every day since 2008 to deflect us from their failed policies? Without doubt. Have the Tighty Righties stupidly responded to those slurs over and over again? Right again.

Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean called Fox News “absolutely racist” on Fox News Sunday. Vermont state veterinarian Robert Johnson also says there have been an unusual number of fox attacks this year, but it’s not cause for alarm. The latest attack happened a couple of weeks ago in Bennington when a rabid fox bit 8-year-old Rimmele Wood on the leg. His father killed the fox with an ax.

Some of our liberal friends are probably considering that solution for Fox News.

Perhaps everyone, not just the Wood family, needs the rabies shots. As my roofer friend Dino likes to say, sometimes I think I fell down the rabbit hole and we’re wandering around with Alice in Blunderland.

Posted in Society, What? Are They Nuts?, Politics & News, PC, Media, Random Access | 1 Comment »

Attention Sympathizers!

July 11, 2010 by Dick.

I had a dream. I can promise you that no pepperonis died in the making of my restless slumber.

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Sympathizers, Listen up. I dreamed that Vermont has passed a law requiring Vermont cops to arrest Asian people they suspect of passing counterfeit money in Quick Stops. The Secret Service reports that producing or using illegal counterfeit money is a federal crime that carries a maximum sentence of death (life imprisonment is usually the maximum penalty).

The ACDL (Anti Counterfeiting Defamation League) has organized the first of a series of simultaneous marches in Montpelier and Burlington to protest the law; Sen. Bernard Sanders (I-Vermont) (no relation to the Colonel) has written the Justice Department to insist that they sue the state to block its enforcement law.

Sen. Sanders charged that the Vermont law “crossed a constitutional state line” and threatens to launch a “patchwork of state and local anti-counterfeiting policies throughout the country” banned when federal law usurped local authority. Further, Asian rights advocates say the law improperly targets Asians based solely on their race and ethnicity.

The hits just keep on coming. I dreamed that Florida has passed a law requiring cops to arrest black people they suspect of using stolen credit cards in Quick Stops. Illegal credit card fraud is a federal crime that carries a maximum sentence of death if you are black in the South (life imprisonment is usually the maximum penalty).

The ACDL has also organized the first of a series of simultaneous marches in Tallahassee, Miami, and Key West to protest the law; Sen. Sanders has written the Justice Department about this one, too, to insist that they sue Florida to block its enforcement law.

Sen. Sanders charged that the Florida law “crossed a constitutional state line” and threatens to launch a “patchwork of state and local anti-credit card fraud policies throughout the country” banned when federal law usurped local authority. Further, black rights advocates say the law improperly targets blacks based solely on their race and ethnicity.

Number 3. I dreamed that Arizona has passed a law requiring cops to card anyone they suspect of being in this country illegally. Illegal border crossing is a federal crime that carries a maximum sentence of death if you are an al Qaeda representative but $10-15/hour for life if you are Hispanic (a free plane ticket to anywhere in the world as long as it is Mexico is usually the maximum penalty).

The ACDL has also organized the first of a series of simultaneous marches in Phoenix and neighboring Scottsdale to protest the law; Sen. Sanders has written the Justice Department about this one, too, to insist that they sue Arizona to block its immigration law.

Sen. Sanders (busybody that he is — hey it’s my dream) charged that the Arizona law “crossed a constitutional state line” and threatens to launch a “patchwork of state and local anti-immigration policies throughout the country” banned when federal law usurped local authority. Further, Hispanic rights advocates say the law improperly targets Hispanics based solely on their race and ethnicity.

Attorney General Eric Holder said he wants to nip the state laws I dreamt up in the bud because they “contravene federal policy where it comes to enforcement.”

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On Face the Nation this morning, General Holder called the ten unregistered Russian agents “illegals.” The FBI, he said, spent 10 years investigating them.

The Feds sent the Russians packing last week, something Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer says the Feds can’t seem to do with any other illegals.

If you see yourself in my dream examples, you might ask yourself WHY ON EARTH ANY AMERICAN CITIZEN WOULD CONDONE LAWBREAKING.

It is worth noting that the term “illegal” in a person’s description usually connotes “breaking a law.” And that’s no dream.

Posted in What? Are They Nuts?, Politics & News, Random Access | 3 Comments »

Guest Post: Fanny calls Challenger Challenge Challenging

February 11, 2010 by Special Contributor.

The Messenger reported yesterday that Missisquoi Valley Union High School students may get “the opportunity to send probes into Jupiter’s atmosphere and look for signs of life in the water beneath the ice on Jupiter’s frozen moon Europa” if the school can get funding for a Challenger Center for Space Science Education.

That is an exceptional opportunity. I hope it can happen but we need much more to make the experience fair and equitable.

Two simulators form the heart of the center, one at NASA and one at the International Space Station. The Learning Center simulators duplicate the mission control experience to give students the same audio and visual information the NASA scientists and engineers use. Students prepare for their missions with curricula designed in conjunction with NASA.

Students also work in teams to solve mission problems such as designing space probes, analyzing data, and calculating the maneuvers and trajectories for their space ship.

The Challenger Center for Space Science Education is an international organization founded by the families of the Space Shuttle astronauts who were killed on mission STS-51-L. Their charge is to kindle an interest and joy in science in young people.There are currently 45 Challenger Learning Centers spread across the United States from Kenai, Alaska, to Hazard, Kentucky, to Wheeling, West Virginia. A new building to house the center will cost around $3.1 million but the center might use an existing building for a total cost including the simulator office equipment, parking lot expansion, and other expenses of about $1.5 million. The simulator costs $825,000 plus another $10,000 to ship it to Vermont. Gov. Jim Douglas has included the proposal in the state application for federal Race to the Top education funds. President Obama announced his plans to continue the Race to the Top grant program this year as a part of the Democratic Congress’ G.R.A.F.T. Act spending. Race to the Top winners will develop and showcase school reform concepts or pilot programs and “provide examples for States and local school districts throughout the country to follow … that can transform our schools for decades to come.” Overall, $4 billion will be awarded in two Phases with an estimated Range of Awards of $20 million-$700 million. Vermont is in Category 5 and is most likely to receive $20-75 million.

That is an exceptional opportunity for some 1,112 Vermont students at MVU but only one Vermont school can possibly receive this center and that limits the opportunities for the 89,739 other students. That’s bad for the kids and bad for the state.

After all, the Equal Educational Opportunity Act of 1997, known here as “Act 60,” makes “educational opportunity available to each pupil in each town on substantially equal terms, in accordance with the Vermont Constitution and the Vermont supreme court decision of February 5, 1997, Brigham v. State of Vermont.”

Kids in one school district like MVU are restricted from getting anything kids in the other district cannot have.

The State will either have to arrange for a Challenger Learning Center in every school district or forego the Center at MVU.

–Nola “Fanny” Guay

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Is it even possible that Vermonters would deny a school this specialized occasion to excel, particularly in science and mathematics? See the Liberislam series for Dick’s response.

Posted in Guest Posts, What? Are They Nuts?, Politics & News | 2 Comments »