The pain I felt late Sunday, Jan. 7, was hard to pinpoint until I realized exactly when it had struck: just moments after hearing news of a tentative, 2024 budget deal between U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives negotiators.
As such, it soon became apparent the pain wasn’t physical. Most likely, it was emotional.
What was the emotion, though? Was it anxiety? Was it bewilderment? Maybe sorrow?
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That was it: sorrow.
It was for Kevin McCarthy, now in early retirement because the Jan. 7 deal was almost the same as the one he had struck with the White House last October. That deal inflamed enough House Republicans to make him a former Speaker and a former House member.
Poor old Kevin, I thought, gone and forgotten because he woke up one day wanting to legislate, not bloviate. “Silly pragmatist,” said the House Knucklehead Caucus and, within hours, McCarthy was tossed aside only to have his deal resurrected weeks later.
By nightfall my cranky old self had re-emerged.
The U.S. Congress, too, seems to have returned to its institutional senses, at least temporarily, to ensure it doesn’t allow the fringe elements of either party into a la-la-land abyss of foolish, even stupid, policies most of America abhors.
Daringly, the first task its leaders took on was a budget deal.
That’s smart, because as soon as the presidential primary season begins in Iowa, every House and Senate vote will be weighted even more with political implications for Nov. 5, the day of 2024’s local, state and federal elections.
The U.S. isn’t the only country that will hold crucial elections this year. “Globally,” reported Time magazine Dec. 28, “more voters than ever in history will head to the polls as at least 64 countries (plus the European Union) — representing a combined population of about 49 per cent of the people in the world — are meant to hold national elections…”
Moreover, the publication added, the “results … for many, will prove consequential for years to come…”
Some of the most affected nations include the world’s most populous country, India, and its neighbours Bangladesh and Pakistan. Other countries holding national elections are the United Kingdom, Mexico, Iran, Cambodia, Jordan, and both Ukraine and its battlefield opponent, Russia.
All make 2024, “not just an election year” but “perhaps the election year,” Time adds.
U.S. Farm Bill
This year could also be the Farm Bill-writing year in the U.S. for at least two reasons. First, it’s already a year late. Also, the Democrats may be running out of time to influence any final bill.
The delay is typical of recent Farm Bills fights. Deep differences between the Republican-controlled House Ag Committee and the Democrat-controlled Senate Ag Committee over food assistance have delayed past bills.
Stark differences remain for the-now 2024 bill, and no one in either party or chamber returned from the holiday break in a charitable, let’s-get-this-done mood. In fact, remarkably little news emerged from either camp in the last six weeks.
Looming over any bipartisan compromise is the pending retirement of Michigan Senator Debbie Stabenow, the Democratic leader of the upper chamber’s ag committee and the key figure in passing the year-delayed 2018 Farm Bill.
Stabenow has vowed to fight proposed House GOP cuts to food assistance and to protect the Biden administration’s long-term “green” ag spending.
Her planned November retirement hangs over any deal this year. Continued delays by House Ag Republicans, combined with the probable retaking of the Senate by the GOP in November, would be a blow to both Stabenow and any hope for a bipartisan Farm Bill.
First, however, the U.S. Congress needs to pass the 2024 federal budget. Can this year’s renewed sense of institutional urgency move members to work through their personal and political differences to complete this straightforward responsibility?
Only time – and the Speaker-chucking Knucklehead Caucus – will tell.
The Farm and Food File is published weekly throughout the U.S. and Canada. Past columns, supporting documents and contact information are posted at farmfoodfile.com
