Goat Rodeo Cowboy said:FredLeonard said:
You need to do your homework, Hoss.
How many crops get subsidized by government support or pricing plans? Not many. And the farms that "milk" most of the Federal Farm subsidy money are corporate owned, kind of like radio. Farm magazines and journals are full of information about how most of the Federal money goes to benefit people who are part of the 2%... so fondly adored by the "Occupy" crowd that is being discussed in another thread here about radio. They live in some big city somewhere. They tend to be Venture Capital type folks who have been able to figure out how to finance the purchase of large blocks of farmland while young men growing up in farm country who would like to be lifelong farmers have as much fun trying to figure out how they can finance their farm.... just like some people who patrol our conversations here try to figure out they can finance their first radio station.
Radio in rural, remote areas does not just serve "farmers"... you know, the kind that wears overalls and drives a John Deere. Remote rural areas serve as affordable homes for the guys who drive long-haul semis that bring you your bananas and Budweiser... where ever you live. I have a "nephew-in-law" who travels the world doing exotic welding that I do not understand. He doesn't get to do exotic every day so he and my niece camp out on the back side of the farm property my sister and brother-in-law have in a very rural part of Arkansas. Guys who will eventually show up and dig the trenches when they get around to approving some version of the Keystone XL pipeline probably have a home base in one of these rural areas that you feel are milking your contribution to the tax pile.
I find Northern Wisconsin and the Michigan Upper Peninsula to be interesting places. A lot of folks up there apparently make a living with a chain saw and some small animal traps. The state of Wisconsin looked these people over through the years and decided that if they would let the part time school cafeteria employees and the part time bus drivers (women for the most part) participate in the school health insurance plan. But Governor Walker knows better. That's free-loading. Kick the part time employees off the plan. So what did he get out that bargain? Those people now go on Medicaid. Just look at how much tax money Wisconsin saves. I'm sure it is cheaper to pay their medical costs through Medicaid than through the school insurance plan. <insert bit look of sarcasm here :>
I'm sorry the people of rural America are making your life miserable by running up your tax bill. The good news is: your children do not have to participate in a Military Draft any more. Kids from the urban ghettos and kids who grow up in the land of small animal traps and chain saws find that military life gives them an escape hatch and opportunity.
Maybe figuring out how to get some radio coverage out in the boonies is not all bad news.
Another beautiful post, GRP. Even if it was troll food. ;D