Several members of Congress are blasting the proposed Farm Bill, which will be up for a vote today in the U-S House, and there’ll be a bid to derail it. Jeff Flake, a republican Congressman from Arizona, has some of the strongest objections. He says the average American family will spend about 18-hundred dollars in higher taxes just to pay for the bill.The new Farm Bill would limit individual federal payments to 360-thousand dollars in any given year, but critics like Flake say the proposed exceptions “blow the lid” off that cap and allow payments to folks who aren’t truly “family farmers.” Flake says pro-basketball player Scottie Pippen, broadcaster Sam Donaldson, C-N-N founder Ted Turner, and David Rockefeller, an heir to a legendary American fortune, will all get farm subsidies. Flake said aside from military spending, the proposed Farm Bill will be the largest expansion of the federal government since the 1960s. He says commodities programs will expand to include apples, peanuts and onions with little discussion.There will be an attempt today to send the Farm Bill back to committee so the group of House/Senate negotiators will draft a lower payment cap in the range of 275-thousand dollars.
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