No Secret Farm Bills!

The House's Republican leaders say they won't schedule the Farm Bill for a vote before the old bill expires September 30, leaving it vulnerable to being used as a bargaining chip in the ongoing battles to cut the budget and extend Bush-era tax cuts for the wealthy.

Last Fall, the Farm Bill was caught up in the secretive super-committee process that ultimately failed, but there are Members of Congress who still insist on implementing  the cuts considered by the suprt-committee and some who would use these cuts to offset extending tax cuts. As the Hill reports, this would mean putting off the Farm Bill until after the elections and then it would be "wrapped into a giant lame-duck bill that also deals with expiring tax cuts and automatic, across-the-board spending cuts."

In addition to protesting the bill's substance, we must also demand that the House stick to the normal democratic process, with recorded votes on the issues that matter most, rather than letting Congressional leaders decide things behind closed doors -- no secret farm bills!