BRRRR! SNOW BLANKETS LONDON AS HOUSE OF COMMONS APPROVES GLOBAL WARMING BILL

(The UK Register) -- Snow fell as the UK's House of Commons debated Global Warming yesterday -- the first October snow fall in the London metropolis since 1922. The Mother of Parliaments was discussing the Mother of All Bills for the last time, in a marathon six hour session. In order to combat a projected two degree centigrade rise in global temperature, the Climate Change Bill pledges the UK to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 80% by 2050. The bill creates an enormous bureaucratic apparatus for monitoring and reporting, which was expanded at the last minute. In the Commons, there wasn't an out-and-out skeptic to be found. It was 90 minutes before Member Peter Lilley, in amazement, asked why there hadn't been a cost/benefit analysis made of such a major change in policy. He was told to shut up by the Deputy Speaker. Lilley was one of only five out of 653 Members to vote against the Climate Bill in its second reading.

FARM SUBSIDIES MAY BE IN FOR A CHANGE

(Omaha World-Herald) -- Little is being said about farm policy during this year's presidential race, with bad economic news from Wall Street overshadowing most other issues. But Midlands farmers and ranchers are nervously looking for clues about their economic futures. Billions of dollars could be at stake. John McCain says he would eliminate subsidies if he could -- including the ethanol subsidies and mandates that created new markets for corn and raised prices for the grain. Barack Obama supports ag subsidies but says he would shift some dollars from the biggest and richest farms to do more for small family farms, organic farms and young farmers starting out. Farmers said they are craving more details. "We haven't heard enough about agriculture in this country, from either candidate," said Jeff Metz, a wheat farmer from Angora, Neb. who is a Republican supporting McCain because he fears that Obama will raise taxes. Joy Philippi, a 51-year-old Obama supporter who raises hogs and grain on 400 acres near Bruning, Neb., also has questions about inevitable budget cuts. But with a farm bill that will remain in place until 2012, the next president may have little opportunity to significantly change U.S. farm policy, according to Brad Lubben, a policy specialist at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Still, Nebraska, Iowa and Illinois each collected more than $1 billion in crop subsidy payments in 2005, a recent peak year for subsidy payments, according to an analysis by the Environmental Working Group, a nonprofit research organization that maintains a Internet database tracking farm subsidies. Metz said farmers' willingness to spend their payments on anything from a new combine to home repairs means that farm payments benefit Main Street as well as the countryside. Meanwhile, the Environmental Working Group contends that subsidies should be directed toward the farms "that are really struggling and really need help." During Senate debate on the 2008 farm bill, both Obama and McCain supported provisions that would have more strictly limited benefits paid to wealthy farmers and landowners. The final version of the 2008 farm bill included a $2.5 million total cap on the income a farming couple can earn and still receive subsidy payments; and a $340,000 total limit on most crop subsidies.

AURORA ETHANOL PLANT OPENING DELAYED

(Lincoln Journal Star) — Aventine Renewable Energy Holdings Inc. will delay the opening of its new ethanol plant in Aurora by roughly three months because of cost concerns. The Pekin, Ill., company had planned to open the 113-million-gallon plant next March but now is shooting for June. Aventine’s Daniel Trunfio says the company is still committed to completing its Nebraska project. But he says the construction delay will help Aventine stretch its resources.

EDITORIAL FROM THE WALL STREET JOURNAL - ARE WE READY FOR A LIBERAL SUPERMAJORITY?

(Wall Street Journal) -- Friday's Wall Street Journal editorial states that if the current polls hold, Barack Obama will win the White House on November 4 and Democrats will consolidate their Congressional majorities, probably with a filibuster-proof Senate or very close to it. Without the ability to filibuster, the Senate would become like the House, able to pass whatever the majority wants. "This would be one of the most profound political and ideological shifts in U.S. history," writes the Journal. "Liberals would dominate the entire government in a way they haven't since 1965, or 1933. ... If the U.S. really is entering a period of unchecked left-wing ascendancy, Americans at least ought to understand what they will be getting, especially with the media cheering it all on." The Wall Street Journal lists several policy proposals that "have very good chances of becoming law in 2009 or 2010" if current polling is accurate. They include: Medicare for all ("The Obama plan would shift between 32 million and 52 million from private coverage to the huge new entitlement. Like Medicare or the Canadian system, this would never be repealed."); Overhaul of the business sector ("The financial industry will get an overhaul in any case, but telecom, biotech and drug makers, among many others, can expect to be investigated and face new, more onerous rules."); and union supremacy ("One program certain to be given right of way is 'card check' ... trashing the secret-ballot elections that have been in place since the 1930s. The 'Employee Free Choice Act' would convert workplaces into union shops merely by gathering signatures from a majority of employees, which means organizers could strongarm those who opposed such a petition.") The Journal also claims that "taxes will rise substantially, the only question being how high" -- adding he wants to lift or eliminate the cap on income subject to payroll taxes that fund Medicare and Social Security.

ECONOMIC GALE BLOWS INTO NEBRASKA CORNFIELDS

(Lincoln Journal Star) -- The financial crisis gripping Wall Street has spilled over into grain markets. It got much of the blame for the corn price falling the daily limit last week on the Chicago Board of Trade and for many of the state’s grain elevators, in the middle of harvest, not to post cash bids. The more immediate concern to corn farmers might be a sustained price slide that had wiped out much of the gain set in motion in 2006 by robust demand from the ethanol and export sectors.

From Oct. 13, 2006, the value of a bushel of corn at Frontier Cooperative in Brainard, Neb. rose from $2.83 to a high of $7.18 on June 27. It dipped below $4 on Oct. 7 and has lost another 30 cents since then ($3.70 on Monday).

A year ago, Auburn Mayor Bob Engles was promoting a 12-mile-long pipeline to the Missouri River as an important step toward hosting an ethanol plant there. Now the sense of urgency for that $7 million to $8 million project has diminished and possibilities for a $200 million ethanol outlet have stalled out with the dirt-work stage. The credit market for ethanol dried up last year, Engles said. “With the recent developments on Wall Street, that certainly hasn’t improved that.” Todd Sneller of the Nebraska Ethanol Board conceded “the most difficult period in recent history to secure new financing for a new ethanol plant.” That’s particularly true if the project team has no other operating ethanol plants. But Sneller said he can feel good about new plants opening at Wood River and Bridgeport, to a third getting close at Atkinson, and to a federal ethanol mandate that calls for 15 billion grain-based gallons by 2012.

SOME THINGS NEVER CHANGE

Did you possibly think that we were the first to have problems? Some things never change!!

“The budget should be balanced, the Treasury should be refilled, public debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest we (Rome) become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living on public assistance.” Cicero — 55 BC

WORDS OF WISDOM

The happiest people don’t necessarily have the best of everything. They just make the best of everything. - Author Unknown