Perdue is victim of ethanol subsidies

RE: "Company loyalty vs. profit margin in hard times," Dec. 10

While not a Republican business owner, I found several points in Geoff Smoot's recent letter interesting.

Is he assuming Republican business owners are the only ones who make gut-wrenching decisions about employees, or that Democratic business owners never have layoffs?

I found it odd he chose to take Perdue to task for laying off a few of its more than 20,000 employees. I won't bother with details on the millions of dollars this local employer brings to the Eastern Shore. The term "biting the hand that feeds you" comes to mind.

Apparently Smoot is unaware the poultry industry's current malaise was directly caused by the federal government, which mandates a certain quantity of motor fuel be derived from corn-based ethanol. Massive tax incentives are involved.

Never before in our history has government created, supported and subsidized an entire industry. As a result, the cost of corn, a key ingredient in many food products, has doubled. The ethanol industry has raked in millions from this windfall.

Earlier this year, that industry sponsored a NASCAR race, the cost of which normally runs $7-20 million. It maintains a huge, well-funded lobby. It comes as no surprise the current administration supports ethanol. Never mind that it has been proved repeatedly ethanol is economically unfeasible and can damage engines when the blend rate exceeds 10 percent.

Meanwhile, skyrocketing costs continue to wreak havoc on poultry. Three poultry companies filed for bankruptcy protection in the last 12 months; several others are in severe trouble -- all thanks to government meddling in what should be a free-market system.

The Obama administration and congressional Democrats seem perfectly satisfied to let food prices rise and watch people lose their jobs, so long as the lobby money keeps flowing.

source: delmarvanow