Environmental Working Group president, Ken Cook, has challenged former House Agriculture Committee Chairman, Larry Combest (R-TX), to a series of nationwide debates on 'agriculture policy, including the purposes and impacts of farm subsidies, agricultural trade, conservation, rural development, and the shape of the next farm bill.'
Cook's challenge arrives on the heels of a Washington Post series that lambasted the wastefulness of the current farm bill. According to the Washington Post investigation "the federal government has paid at least $1.3 billion in subsidies for rice and other crops since 2000 to individuals who do no farming at all..."
Combest, the main architect of the 2002 farm bill, has yet to rise to the challenge and was unavailable for comment to Andrew Martin of the Chicago Tribune.
Cook's Letter to Larry Combest : Farm Subsidy Database Keith Good of FarmPolicy.com calls this 'The 'Rumble in the Jungle' of Farm Policy Debate' Traci Bruckner of Center for Rural Affairs offers her vision of the 2007 farm bill A Food Fight Over Farm Subsidies
