onpoint
Active member
http://mankatofreepress.com/columni...n-Reserve-Program-losing-ground-to-quick-cash
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Yes I do:thumbsup:
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Yes I do:thumbsup:
This is a tough issue. I am a staunch suppoter of proprty rights. However when I see land abused year after year and watch the soil blow and am leary of driving on the hiway when there is blowing snow because you know when you get to a certain farmers land there will be worse visibilty and more danger, it makes even me think there has to be a better way. I do not have the answer other than education and some can not or will not be educated. Government trying to force the issue is the last thing we need and would be the worst possible solution. When I was a kid the gov. made us have summer fallow and it had to be black irregardless of the erosion. Goverment regulation regardless of the good intentions, normally makes things worse. Just look at the health care bill. It has not even been fully implemented yet and it is raising the cost of health insurance. Education is our best chance.
You are one of the "great" ones. You do it because you believe in the issue. Your outnumbered. If soil responsibilty is mandated on farmers, it applies to builders ripping up farmland for housing subdivisions, chemical abuses, suburban lawn/gardeners too, lawn maintenence on golf courses. Some of these are bigger problems that the farmer! If farming, golfing on a sea of green, a mosaic of green squares on the lawn, with fescue, the fast buck people will be gone, the homeowner will stop due to cost, the hanger-ons like chemical companies,will find some other potion they can peddle. Leave the real work to do. You know that most of the Universities were financed by farmers? Some where it got lost, the lawyers, and business interest with a little money in the right places ruined it all. Now our new farmers are taught on the sipping jug, that we need clean field crops, massive chemicals to boost up yield, use and abuse everything to be "successful". All us old guys are hopelessly out of date. Maybe. I am happy to hear a lark, listen to the wind in the cottonwoods, feel the cool breeze of a spring creek when you get close. Wonder if they will ever be happy, running ahead of a debt spiral heading down the track like a herd of elephants. Used to be people became doctors to heal the sick, now to become millionaires, farmers WERE the source of self resourcefullness, new what the ground would support, and balance it within it's capacity. I don't think a lot have had their boots in the field, these days, they "see" it on a 4wheeler, or when the get into the tractor or the pickup in the driveway, a lot haven't seen the property in years, cash the rent checks.