Midwest Farmers

If farmers in the Midwest know that the estate tax repeal is not about safeguarding their family farms then why do/did they vote for Bush. Is this where "What's the Matter With Kansas" come into play?

I grew up in central Illinois. Their view is Liberals want to control everything through government and tax you to death. (period emphasized)

Fact is, many of them ARE downright Liberal in their hearts. They're the most generous, kind, friendly, compassionate people you'll ever know. But when it comes to politics, they're loyal to their soul with Republicans. I don't know...maybe it comes from identifying themselves as small business owners and thereby the Cons are the guys fighting for them, or if it's just the fear instilled that the Liberals are coming to get their guns and abort their grandchildren. :shrug:

They used to be Dems, but they were betrayed and they haven't forgotten.

quotas and regulations forcing them to sell below market prices to keep our food cheap also demanded that they do business with them. Started the endless cycle of debt that forced the sale of their lands to make ends meet, while subsidizing the corps to buy the land, leaving a little less every year on which to try to make it until they were legislated out of business.

Are you sure these farm had to go out of business because of the regulations? Many Republicans have claimed that the estate tax cost family farms, but could not give one single example of it happening.

imposed on them, but not on the corporations that they had to deal with (Monsanto, DeKalb, ADM, etc.) that raised their prices every year while the farmers had to sell their crops for the same prices. They were prevented from changing what they could grow, they were prohibited from selling directly to other countries that wanted to buy and were forced to go through brokers for the approved price. This is the kind of crap that killed the Democratic party.

This isn't a "blame the Dems" issue so much as a "politics as usual" issue, but when it hit hardest the Dems were the ones in control.

Agribusiness corporations have a profit motive to integrate operations vertically, so to keep all the money made to themselves. They're also in a better position than family farmers to lobby Washington decision makers, and to draft sample regulations. Those regulations, of course, would be something a corporate operation could comply with, but would be expensive for a family operation. This sort of thing happend over and over, not just with regulations but with taxes, crop subsidies, etc., policies pushed through in the name of saving family farms saw their benefits go disproportionately to big corporate farms (Think of Republican tax policies, in their training wheels phase).

Look up just about any overview of the decline of the family farm, and these factors will come up. And when the farmers were being hit the hardest in th 70s and 80s, nobody rode to their rescue. So they voted Republican for other reasons.

...I would firmly believe that "compassionate conservativism" was an oxymoron if it were not for my dear old Uncle Doc. A truly great man who devoted his life to the Lion's Club and a center that he co-founded called "Winning Wheels," a rehab and support center for young paraplegics and quadriplegics. It is in central Illinois.


http://www.winningwheelsinc.com/

who did not vote for Bush.

Are we the only ones?

think they'll have to pay it. I've seen numbers as high as 90% think they'll have to pay it.

But MidWestern farmers are "welfare queens" just the same.

That stings just a little.

Hope you aren't typing with your mouth full.

;-)

majority of folks in the USofA don't have a clue about.

Seriously, a huge majority worries about having to pay a tax that only the wealthiest one percent pay. It shows you how our views are distorted by politicians and the media.

...they the "Death Tax" affects them....

Heard a guy I know going on about what Rush told him the day before about this death tax. I asked him if his dad (who I know) was going to leave him more than 1/2 a Megabuck. "No." "Then WHY worry? you don't have to pay it!"

Because Gush Pfleghmball and his ilk have brainwashed the dittohead nation into thinking that EVERYBODY has to pay it, and it's 60%, too.

I grew up on a rural Missouri farm I'm 28 so this was fairly recent. I'll comment on what I remember from then and how things still are there now(my father still farms and in even a more rural area).

1.) The estate tax doesn't mean much to most 'normal' farmers.

2.) Lack of media outlets I think is the number one issue. Let me try to run through this. Back when I was doing the majority of my tractor work around 16 all I had was AM radio. Being outside of KC I had two choices.. sports or Dr. Laura and Rush. Let me tell you, if you get blasted with Rush everyday your out working over and over the brain washing process starts to work on you. I think this has turned a lot of farmers to the RW

3.) The rural farming communities are not all conservative or Churchy, they have pockets like all areas. Example my father and many others never went to church because they were too busy. The area I was originally in(Cass County) was almost always full bore Democrat in that rural section, a Republican couldn't get elected dog catcher there at one time.

4.) Backlash against city people moving out and scoffing up 40 acre plots. I don't think I can convey enough how much resentment this has created in many areas. Cheap 90s gas and a booming stock market led to folks up in the Kansas City area getting flush with cash. They in turn wanted to 'get away from it all' only to drive back each day but anyways they moved out into rural areas.

Now in the past a parcel of land would be sold in a larger chunks 80 acres was a small chunk at that time. Back then you could purchase an 80 or 160(very common chunk) for maybe 450-500 an acre. That was cheap enough you might.. might be able to pay it off via farming as long as you also weren't in debt on most of your equipment. Now along comes the couple from the city they will give 1500 an acre for a 40.. see where this is going? Farm land gets split into 40s or smaller and sold off, the farmer cannot afford to pay the price for this land because he has to pay it off with farming, not two 70k jobs in the city. He gets squeezed out and resentment forms against the 'city people' - the latte liberals with two cushy desk jobs.

This anger, this change of life, fosters conservative feelings a return to old times. I believe the RW taps this very effectively. They give focus to this.

In addition most of the people moving out from the city have money and tend to vote Republican as well.

5.) Some Carter backlash. Carter took a lot of heat at least from my father over the grain embargo and insane interest rates(18% on a combine) that, coupled with a severe drought in 80 pushed my father to vote for Reagan. Talking to him now he regrets that decision so much, it was the first and only time he ever voted Republican. I'm guessing he isn't the only one and that a few of them stayed on the right.

in Hastert's district who were hit hard by drought. They were talking with Denny and asking him to push for federal assistance for their farms.

Meanwhile, I'm thinking, "Hell no. The Big Government shouldn't interfere with people's private lives! The Government shouldn't bail people out, it should be encouraging them to pick themselves up by their own bootstraps! Welfare is evil! These people started a business, and droughts are just one of the acceptable risks they will have to deal with."

Right?

Isn't that the conservative stance?