Wendell Berry and Genetic Modification

Wendell Berry is co-author of a NYTimes op-ed today, arguing for a 50-year farm bill. The focus is on erosion, and surprising, at least to me, he comes out in favor of perennialization of major grain crops, like wheat, rice, sunflowers. I see the logic, but I wonder whether some of the organic folks will really like the idea of genetic modification to that extent.

NRCS and FSA

"Also on the horizon is a possible reorganization of USDA. Hagstrom says that Peterson has said he wants to reorganize the department, but that he may be more concerned with the contentious relationship between the Farm Service Agency and the Natural Resources Conservation Service.“He thinks they don’t work together very well. Well, here is a secret: They don’t want to work together very well. They want to remain separate,” Hagstrom says." Agweek

"Farm Service Agency Administrator Teresa Lasseter said streamlining the agency will continue under the Obama administration, with fewer offices available to serve ranchers and farmers across the country. Southwestfarmpress

Most Surprising Sentence Today

"So it was that the former secretary of war decided to kill the former secretary of the treasury."

American Lion, by John Meacham, page 178
[No, not Rumsfeld out for John Snow's blood, but Eaton after Ingham--in Andrew Jackson's time politics was for keeps, not the namby-pamby sort of stuff of today.]

Government Bailout for Organic Farmers

That's what Tom Philpott suggests for British organic farmers here (who have been hurt by the economic downturn and want a temporary switch to conventional feed):

For me, the situation calls for strategic government intervention. Rather than a "holiday" on organic standards to weather the storm, why not temporary payments to organic farmers to cover losses while the slump continues? And in the long term, the government could bring down organic feed costs by creating incentives for organic grain production -- and disincentives for environmentally destructive conventional grain farming.

Federal Web Sites---Recommendations for Obama

Ran across this paper, which is supposed to be submitted to Obama's team. (I don't see it on change.gov, but that's probably because that site only covers recommendations from outside the government, not the things recommended from within the bureaucracy.)

The recommendations seem rather unexceptional. However, it's a truth universally known and never acknowledged that within the bureaucracy every set of bureaucrats will argue for more attention and more funding. And there's little attention to integrating web sites and agency operations.

Oaths of Office [Revised]

In helping my cousin with a bit of research, I stumbled on a long paper outlining the evolution of the oath of office taken by British MP's. Then onto this wikipedia article, which covers oaths in a number of countries. And of course Mr. Newdow is suing over the oath of office for Obama.

Because the oath touches on a number of issues: religion, loyalty, nationalism, history, it's an interesting subject:

• in Britain the oath for MPs has a long history, going from short to long to short. At different times Quakers, Moravians, Jews, and atheists who were elected had problems with the existing oath, which normally led to a modification to accommodate the problems each had. But because the oath is still one of allegiance to the sovereign, some Ulster MPs still refuse to take the oath. So the live issue in Britain seems to be which functions of an MP require the oath, and which don't.
  
• by comparison to the Brits, the writers of the Constitution look pretty good. They prescribed the oath for the President in the Constitution, permitted affirmations and didn't include: "so help me God". And they kept it short.
  
• I barely remember the oath I had to swear when I became a bureaurcrat, but here it is: "I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God". It would be nice for Mr. Newdow to try to shorten that oath.
  
• As a side issue, oaths used to be big for the Reformed Presbyterians. And in the first part of the 19th century they'd refuse to take the oath because the government was not covenanted with God. (That's part of my family history.)
  
• skimming the wikipedia article is fascinating--consider the differences in oaths between the President of Pakistan, which combines religion and government, and the President of India, which is secular.
  

E-Government? Pardon My Skepticism

Those who know me know I can be easily seduced by the lure of the new, by the possibilities in the future of this or that. But I'm not entirely stupid, so I have learned over the years to have some skepticism.

Here's an example: Brownfields does a piece based on an interview with Steve Johnson, an Iowa State extension guy, talking about signup, changes in the programs, SURE and ACRE. He mentions some new forms, which the FSA county office should have in draft.

All fine, all correct. But... And it's a big But.

Under the e-government concept, FSA's forms shop has been posting FSA/CCC forms to the Internet for the last 10 years. One would think by now what Steve Johnson would have said is something like this:

"Farmers are going to have a new set of forms to fill out this year. The CCC-926 covers payment limitation information. The CCC-902 (I) and 902 (E) are also new. Now all three forms are available on FSA's forms site--click on the "forms" link off the FSA main site. You can print off copies to read, or fill them out on line..."

Steve does, in the recorded interview, mention using the Internet to research the SURE and ACRE programs. I'm probably being unfair to Steve but these are the possibilities:

• He doesn't know about the FSA forms site
• He knows about the site, but didn't think to use it
• He knows about the site, but was on vacation for the holidays and didn't check it before the interview
• He knows about the site, knew the forms were on the site, but was confident the Iowa county offices would not have pulled off the forms.
• He knew all of the above, but thought he would be more in tune with his audience if he didn't suggest they should check the FSA site, but instead should talk to the nice people in the county office.
  

My point? I don't intend to criticize Steve, who just happened to be the extension person interviewed. My point is 10 years or more after FSA started posting forms, the web of habits, norms, expectations, training, etc. by which FSA, extension, and farmers implement farm programs hasn't adjusted to the change.

Why? I don't know why. It's a reminder that people and institutions are far more resistant to change than those of us who are seduced by the new like to think.

[PS: I note the government forms site doesn't have the CCC-902 or CCC-926 forms yet, which suggests a problem in the way the site works--ideally an update to the USDA/FSA forms site should automatically update the government one.]

Stimulus--What's the Exit Strategy?

The Post has an article on the outlook for the national debt (it will go up, steeply, although the ratio to the GNP would still be below other countries). But the "vicious circle" which Clinton faced may come back--the debt is big enough that the Treasury must pay high rates of interest to sell its bonds, which means interest payments make up a big portion of the budget, which means it's hard to balance the budget, which means more debt, which means more interest....

This ties into another headline--the nation's governors are looking for a trillion dollars.

One problem of the stimulus package, and one problem of "aid" in general, whether it's foreign aid or domestic, is looking towards the future. To the extent the stimulus builds things, that's good, but it also implies a continuing burden of maintenance. To the extent the stimulus bridges a gap in the states' budgets, that's good, but it also implies the gap will end. Often we see in foreign aid dams and highways are built, but fall into disrepair because there was no system to maintain them. Often we see domestic programs sold as "stop-gap" measures which continue on and on.

So my lesson for Obama is the one which Bush didn't learn--determine an exit strategy before you make a big commitment.

A Better Start to the New Year

Is analyzing lessons from the past year, at least if you can do it with the sense of humor Erin shows here. For example: "Never wipe your nose with the same glove that you just used to swat the behind of a cow down the chute." Lots more.

Most Interesting Sentence of the Day

"Often CIA security will call asking to have the bull removed from their property."

From Slate., Emily Yoffe's piece on being an "interpreter" at a colonial farm.