HOW MANY SENATORS DOES IT TAKE TO SCREW A TAXPAYER

[traelin0]

“Today, the government decides and they misdirect the investment to their friends in the corn industry or the food industry. Think how many taxpayer dollars have been spent on corn [for ethanol], and there’s nobody now really defending that as an efficient way to create diesel fuel or ethanol. The money is spent for political reasons and not for economic reasons. It’s the worst way in the world to try to develop an alternative fuel.” - Ron Paul

When bipartisanship breaks out in Washington DC, check to make sure your wallet is still in your pocket. Every time you fill up your car this winter you are participating in the biggest taxpayer swindle in history. Forcing consumers to use domestically produced ethanol is one of the single biggest boondoggles ever committed by the corrupt brainless twits in Washington DC. Ethanol prices have soared 30% in the last year as the supplies of corn have plunged. Only a policy created in Washington DC could drive up the prices of gasoline and food, with the added benefits of costing the American taxpayer billions in tax subsidies and killing people in 3rd world countries.

The grand lame duck Congress tax compromise extended a 45-cent incentive to ethanol refiners for each gallon of the fuel blended with gasoline and renewed a 54-cent tariff on Brazilian imports. The extension of these subsidies, besides costing American taxpayers $6 billion per year, has the added benefit of driving up food costs across the globe, causing food riots in Tunisia, and resulting in the starving of poor peasants throughout the world. This taxpayer boondoggle is a real feather in the cap of that fiscally conservative curmudgeon Senator Charley Grassley. He was joined in this noble effort by another fiscal conservative, presidential hopeful John Thune. It seems these guys hate wasteful spending, except when it benefits their states. The bipartisanship in this effort was truly touching, as Democrats Kent Conrad and Tom Harkin also brought home the pork for their states.

Read more here.

[fairlycrazy23]

Well to screw us only a majority, but to really stick it to us it usually takes a super majority.

[rockon]

I have a feeling this is one of the lesser screwing we've had and have coming. There is even the possibility that although using corn to make ethanol with todays technology may not be cheaper then buying oil from Arabs. It could turn out to be cheaper in the long run. For one thing we could make dramatic technological advances in the processing or find better product to make it from like switch grass that could be grown in less productive ground that we currently pay the farmers not to use. Any analysis would also have to include the total cost of our gas which means adding the cost of defending our foreign oil.

[fairlycrazy23]

Drop sugar tariffs ,drop corn subsidies (including ethanol) and then if ethanol takes off it takes off.
We do need to get closer to being energy independent, but corn ethanol is not it and is not really even a part of it.

[rockon]

Being energy independent will likely have many parts in the beginning and apparently corn ethanol is part of it like it or not. Now might be a good time to make better suggestions if you have them.

[fairlycrazy23]

drop the subsidies and tarrifs and we will see how long corn ethanol stays around. There are many better things, first there better alternatives to ethanol than corn, especially considering corn should be eaten or drank not used for fuel. Right now all corn ethanol seems to be doing is helping the Senators and ADM's bottom line.

[handyman2]

Several years ago I was invited to join a group that was going into the ethynol business. I did an indepth review from the corn supply to the processing to delivery. I politely turned it down because all the numbers came out bad.
When about a year ago I posted that it was a economic and impractical boon doggle I was pillored. Well maybe the light is dawning but it first needs to dawn on Congress. It is simply a financial white elephant.

[fairlycrazy23]

Handyman, because of the subsidies you might have made out for a while.

[Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ]

I seem to recall about 2...maybe 2 1/2 years ago everyone was screaming to ramp up ethanol production using corn. Most of us were against this and were lambasted. We said this would cause food prices to sky rocket. We were laughed at.
Corn to ethanol was put in place, and food prices went to the moon.

[Deleted]

Hey, Trae-- I had an older gentleman customer that grew switch grass, whatever that is, and had been using it to fuel his truck for a long time. He lives out in the boonies in Marana, AZ, in what is almost a shack-- had not bought gasoline for years. He said the gov't was not happy with him. That was the first I ever heard of this. He had the equipment to refine it, (if that is the correct term) small scale. Said he sold some to select friends out in the sticks with him.
Yeah-- I BET the gov't was pissed at him. He told me his old truck ran just fine on his fuel. True story, by the way.

[fairlycrazy23]

Maybe they didn't like the "other" things he refined?

But switchgrass would make a good ethanol fuel

[Deleted]

He was an older man, did not strike me as the pothead type, really, if that is what you are inferring. LOL-- I could be wrong, but I do think it was his grass for fuel the gov't objected to. Sure would not want it getting around that you could grow your own fuel.

[fairlycrazy23]

Well, you can make corn whiskey from corn, so i was just kinda jokey about that, I think you can make something drinkable from switchgrass, but I'm not sure.

[Deleted]

Nice to meet you, fairlycrazy. Welcome.

[floridayankee]

Jan 18, 2011 19:22:08 GMT -5 @traelin0 said:

When bipartisanship breaks out in Washington DC, check to make sure your wallet is still in your pocket. Every time you fill up your car this winter you are participating in the biggest taxpayer swindle in history.

Please tell me this is not breaking news to you, Trea......

Side Note: Watch for E-15 coming to pumps near you. Due to the subsidies, this fuel will likely be cheaper per gallon but unless you have a fairly new (or Flex Fuel) vehicle made to handle high ethanol fuels, it WILL ruin your vehicle in time! I know this 10% ethanol plays hell with my lawn equipment. I'm on my second lawn mower and third weed whacker in 6 years.

E15 ethanol approved in US for 2007+ model years: critics, supporters react

[Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ]

Just a question for you guys who know motors and cars... you are mentioning gas powered lawn equipment, typically, what, two cycle engines with carbs.
Don't all cars on the road today have fuel injection?

[burnsattornincan]

He lives out in the boonies in Marana, AZ, in what is almost a shack-- had not bought gasoline for years. He said the gov't was not happy with him.

Seems to be a pattern with government. They do not like it when you raise your own livestock either. Something about "food safety". All signs point to tyranny, just like what was predicted by the founders. They also had a remedy for this inevitable situation. What a joy it is going to be to see.

[floridayankee]

Jan 19, 2011 9:25:56 GMT -5 Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ said:

Just a question for you guys who know motors and cars...Don't all cars on the road today have fuel injection?

I'm not really a motor-head but, other than the problem with gummed up carbs, I doubt FI makes much difference. I believe that this issue is more I-Bob's realm.

Where the hell is he when we need him?

Some of the problems with ethanol:

• Short "shelf live"(As dem mentioned...it degrades fairly rapidly)
  
• It is hydroscopic (absorbs water)
  
• It is a solvent (dissolves plastic, rubber, fiberglass, etc...)
  
• More expensive to distribute (cannot be shipped via existing pipelines)
  
• Less efficient than gas (30-40% less for E-85)
  
• Only a small net energy gain (questionable at best)
  
• Effecting worldwide corn availability and prices.
  

you are mentioning gas powered lawn equipment, typically, what, two cycle engines with carbs.

Carbs...yes, but the weed wacker that I just replaced was a 4-cycle, 29cc Troy-Bilt that cost me nearly $200. I got about 2 years out of it. So, I went back to an $89 2-cycle because if I have to replace it every year or two, I'm not going to waste my money on a good one.
Ethanol In Gasoline Reportedly Wreaking Havoc On Small Engines

[floridayankee]

Jan 19, 2011 9:40:02 GMT -5 deminmaine said:

I was speaking about small engines. I had the same problem with my generator. But in both cases they had sat unused for a long period of time with the fuel getting older, which isn't recommended even with pure gasoline.

I believe letting any engine sit unused for long periods shorten the life of that engine. I noticed that when I lived on my boat in RI. The boats that saw a lot of use ran better and required less downtime for repairs (although they did require more maintenance (tune-ups, oil change, etc...).

Now I make sure to put Stabile (gas stabilizer) in the mower and the snowblower at the end of their seasons, and the things I only use intermittantly, like the generator, I make sure are drained.

According to the article in my previous post..."And heads up to you maintenance junkies: draining the tank every season won't prevent problems. The deposits and damage apparently occur independently of the "gum and varnish" issues previously associated with old, stale gasoline."

[burnsattornincan]

Where the hell is he when we need him?

He seems to have a problem with the fact (real) food prices are rising rapidly due to inflation so I'm not sure what his opinion is worth on anything.

[floridayankee]

Jan 19, 2011 10:13:24 GMT -5 burnsattornincan said:

He seems to have a problem with the fact (real) food prices are rising rapidly due to inflation so I'm not sure what his opinion is worth on anything.

And from the BLS, he is correct. They show only a 1.5% increase for 2010. Sure there was inflation in food, but I would hardly call 1.5% rapid.

Once you get past the "shock and awe" of an increase in particular food items you personally buy (such as: holy crap, the price of fruit loops is through the roof!), it's pretty hard to argue real data. IMHO, data trumps opinion. It has no emotions to cloud the issue and it measures cost for ALL food products...not just the ones I might buy.

www.bls.gov/news.release/cpi.nr0.htm

Quite honestly, I don't really follow food prices. That's more DW's department....I have more important things to forget. Overall, I find I-Bob to be fairly straight forward and unbiased.

As far as his opinion goes, I value his opinion for an inside prospective in the fuel industry.

[rockon]

I'm not an expert on corn ethanol but have read reports that show it is not efficient and other reports that claim it is. It probably changes depending on the price of oil and availability of corn. i know some farmers were having problems with it degrading the fuel lines and etc. initially but think most manufactures have worked through those issues. Also I know a lot of farmers were happy to get $4.00 for a bushel of corn instead of 2.00 and a subsidy from the government. We still have thousands of acres that the government pays farmers not to plant just to keep the price above break even for the farmers. Supposedly switch grass is more efficient for making ethanol than corn so it seems now that we have subsidized this technology maybe we could stop paying people to plant nothing and use the crop to support some of our energy needs without using a food crop.

[rockon]

As far as claims that corn prices have driven food costs would have to be researched further since the price of the corn is actually a very small percentage of the cost of the processed food product and corn prices have fluctuated well above current prices before without driving food prices up substantially.

[Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ]

As far as claims that corn prices have driven food costs would have to be researched further since the price of the corn is actually a very small percentage of the cost of the processed food product and corn prices have fluctuated well above current prices before without driving food prices up substantially.

The following article was on msn.com about two years ago:

www.msnbc.msn.com/id/24380271

Siphoning off corn to fuel our cars

As farmers feed ethanol plants, a costly link is forged between food and oil

CHARLES CITY, Iowa - Erwin Johnson picks up a clump of the dark, rich soil that he has farmed for 35 years, like his father and grandfather before him. In a few months, this flat expanse of northern Iowa will be crowded with corn ready to be trucked to market.

A year ago, that market got a little closer -- and a lot better. Instead of sending his corn to a barge company to be shipped down the Mississippi River for export, Johnson now loads it into an open truck and sends it two miles up the gravel road to a hulking new ethanol distillery that he can see from his field. The plant is paying him $5.50 or more a bushel, more than twice as much as Johnson could get just a couple of years ago.

"This is a fantastic time to be farming," Johnson says. "I'm 65, but I can't quit now."

Across the country, ethanol plants are swallowing more and more of the nation's corn crop. This year, about a quarter of U.S. corn will go to feeding ethanol plants instead of poultry or livestock. That has helped farmers like Johnson, but it has boosted demand -- and prices -- for corn at the same time global grain demand is growing.

And it has linked food and fuel prices just as oil is rising to new records, pulling up the price of anything that can be poured into a gasoline tank. "The price of grain is now directly tied to the price of oil," says Lester Brown, president of Earth Policy Institute, a Washington research group. "We used to have a grain economy and a fuel economy. But now they're beginning to fuse."

Not everyone thinks it's fantastic. People who use corn to feed cattle, hogs and chickens are being squeezed by high corn prices. On Monday, Tyson Foods reported its first loss in six quarters and said that its corn and soybean costs would increase by $600 million this year. Those who are able, such as egg producers, are passing those high corn costs along to consumers. The wholesale price of eggs in the first quarter soared 40 percent from a year earlier, according to the Agriculture Department. Meanwhile, retail prices of countless food items, from cereal to sodas to salad dressing, are being nudged upward by more expensive ingredients such as corn syrup and cornstarch.

Rising food prices have given Congress and the White House a sudden case of legislative indigestion. In 2005, the Republican-led Congress and President Bush backed a bill that required widespread ethanol use in motor fuels. Just four months ago, the Democratic-led Congress passed and Bush signed energy legislation that boosted the mandate for minimum corn-based ethanol use to 15 billion gallons, about 10 percent of motor fuel, by 2015. It was one of the most popular parts of the bill, appealing to farm-state lawmakers and to those worried about energy security and eager to substitute a home-grown energy source for a portion of U.S. petroleum imports. To help things along, motor-fuel blenders receive a 51 cent subsidy for every gallon of corn-based ethanol used through the end of 2010; this year, production could reach 8 billion gallons.

(click link for full story)

[burnsattornincan]

And from the BLS, he is correct. They show only a 1.5% increase for 2010. Sure there was inflation in food, but I would hardly call 1.5% rapid.

There is your and his problem. I don't believe the government cpi on food and have demonstrated possible methods which they might use to manipulate it. I suppose you didn't see the many battles fought over this on MSN. Maybe we can go at it again sometime but not now.

[Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ]

There is your and his problem. I don't believe the government cpi on food and have demonstrated possible methods which they might use to manipulate it. I suppose you didn't see the many battles fought over this on MSN. Maybe we can go at it again sometime but not now.

Think of all the social programs(including Social Security) that have built in benefit increases that index to the CPI, or some other govt produced price index. Not to mention the 100s, if not 1000s of state, county, and local govt employee contracts that may have ties to these indexes.

[rockon]

Again you can find a link or article to support almost any opinion but it takes a much deeper analysis to fully understand how the price increase of corn affected the food price increase or did the price of oil or other things affect the food price more because food requires raw materials, processing, packaging and transportation. It is also affected by labor costs, taxes on profits, regulations and the list could go on for a while. For instance I think the corn cost in a pound of cereal is less then .10 so one would have to conclude that doubling the corn cost would have little affect on the box of cereal.

[Savoir Faire-Demogague in NJ]

Again you can find a link or article to support almost any opinion but it takes a much deeper analysis to fully understand how the price increase of corn affected the food price increase or did the price of oil or other things affect the food price more because food requires raw materials, processing, packaging and transportation. It is also affected by labor costs, taxes on profits, regulations and the list could go on for a while. For instance I think the corn cost in a pound of cereal is less then .10 so one would have to conclude that doubling the corn cost would have little affect on the box of cereal.

Back two or three years ago, food prices were escalating at an alarming rate. Various factors affected these rises, including the price of oil which was $150 per barrell. Also back then there were severe global droughts and rising demand, resulting in tight supplies. Siphoning off corn yields and re-directing to ethanol was a major variable.

[floridayankee]

Jan 19, 2011 12:00:06 GMT -5 rockon said:

As far as claims that corn prices have driven food costs would have to be researched further since the price of the corn is actually a very small percentage of the cost of the processed food product and corn prices have fluctuated well above current prices before without driving food prices up substantially.

Considering the number of products that use corn or corn by-product, I'd imagine that the effect is quite widespread even if the cost per unit increase is somewhat small.

i-bob posted to the old boards that he was going to try to use this board change to drastically decrease or stop posting because it wastes too much time.
A shame, he often has interesting and informed things to say

That's a shame because he usually provided some decent, unbiased input to a lot of off the wall discussions.

(even if I sometimes disagree with his opinions)

I always said that if everybody always agrees, then not much is getting accomplished.

There is your and his problem. I don't believe the government cpi on food and have demonstrated possible methods which they might use to manipulate it.

And that's why I value I-Bob's input because he doesn't use "beliefs" or "feelings" to make his argument...just hard, unemotional numbers. There is really nothing mystical about how the BLS comes up with the numbers...it's all right there. They even provide the "margin of error" at the bottom of their report.

The numbers are not universal across all products. Some saw higher inflation...some saw deflation. It's all right there if you can check your emotions before reading the data/report.

I suppose you didn't see the many battles fought over this on MSN.

I saw them and I preferred to stay out of them because, IMHO, it's hard to argue cold, hard data unless you can show proof that the data is flawed....not what you feel or believe.

....but not now

Agreed. And since I still prefer to stay out of it, I probably won't comment on it any more even in a separate thread.

Again you can find a link or article to support almost any opinion but it takes a much deeper analysis to fully understand how the price increase of corn affected the food price increase or did the price of oil or other things affect the food price more because food requires raw materials, processing, packaging and transportation. It is also affected by labor costs, taxes on profits, regulations and the list could go on for a while. For instance I think the corn cost in a pound of cereal is less then .10 so one would have to conclude that doubling the corn cost would have little affect on the box of cereal.

Also correct. And any increase in one raw material (corn in this case) may be offset with decreases elsewhere.

[burnsattornincan]

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