Big Sugar Money Is Turning Toxic To Florida Politics ... by gimleteye

Because of Big Sugar's chokehold on Florida politicians, what happened in 2016 -- massive toxic algae outbreaks -- will happen again. Know whose bank account is filling the campaigns of the candidates you vote for.

If you are a candidate seeking election and refusing money from Big Sugar, Eye On Miami wants to hear from you NOW.

We will feature any candidate who rejects Big Sugar's money; Democrat or Republican or Independent.

Here is our bottom line: sugar is not a food and sugar farmers are not farmers because no other crop in the United States is guaranteed protection before a seed is even planted.

Big Sugar does not put "food" on American tables. Big Sugar is a protection racket for two billionaire families and key employee/shareholders, mainly; the 200 plus family descendants of Charles Stuart Mott, founder of US Sugar, and the Fanjul family's Florida Crystals' fortune.

The same way a few gun manufacturers stand in the shadows of the NRA, these few Big Sugar families pull the strings in Florida politics. It is time for voters to make them stop.

Democratic candidate for governor Chris King just took on Big Sugar in his first television campaign ad. Watch it here:

Betraying my Husband, Fukushima's Nukes and All That Jazz. By Geniusofdespair

I always look in on Fukushima's nuclear disaster of 2011, when there was a meltdown of 3 of their reactors. It was a cascade of events that caused the meltdown; Tsumani caused by an Earthquake. The Japanese are trying to deal with a million tons of radioactive water. The fuel is somewhere in the reactor building but, after 7 years of searching, no one is sure where it is. So everyday the groundwater percolates up from the foundation -- 150 tons of water, and it becomes contaminated by what is left in the reactors:

To keep that water from leaking into the ground or the Pacific, Tepco, the giant utility that owns the plant, pumps it out and runs it through a massive filtering system housed in a building the size of a small aircraft hangar. Inside are arrays of seven-foot tall stainless steel tubes, filled with sand grain-like particles that perform a process called ion exchange. The particles grab on to ions of cesium, strontium, and other dangerous isotopes in the water, making room for them by spitting out sodium. The highly toxic sludge created as a byproduct is stored elsewhere on the site in thousands of sealed canisters.

The filtering system cannot capture strontium:

So for now, the tritiated water is pumped into a steadily growing collection of tanks. There are already hundreds of them, and Tepco has to start building a new one every four days.

you can wait for it to load or go to The Scene.

I wouldn't eat the flounder on the West Coast. Also stay away from Hanford in Washingon State...the most toxic nuclear place in the nation.

And on to our next subject "The Betrayal."

You guys aren't reading this so that is all you get on this one...the nuke part.

REFORM SUGAR SUBSIDIES NOW! Wall Street Journal Agrees With Eye On Miami! ... by gimleteye

A Chance for Sugar Welfare Reform
A bipartisan coalition could reduce the worst farm subsidy.
A Chance for Sugar Welfare Reform
By The Editorial Board
May 15, 2018 7:03 p.m. ET

Cognitive dissonance is common in Washington, but some cases truly are exceptional. One is the ritual of the farm bill, when Republicans who campaign on “free markets” whoop through corporate welfare for agriculture interests. But maybe there’s a stroke of sense coming on sugar subsidies.

Republican Rep. Virginia Foxx of North Carolina is making a run at reforming the U.S. sugar program with an amendment to the farm bill that may hit the House floor as soon as this week. This program is arguably the worst farm subsidy, which is saying something, featuring a menagerie of sweetened loans, restrictions on sales and import quotas for some of America’s richest people.

The point is to keep prices artificially high and enrich large sugar producers, who aren’t paupers but nonetheless demand this help to maintain their station. Many producers live in Florida, which is why Senator Marco Rubio periodically embarrasses himself by supporting sugar welfare.

All of this is a tax on consumers. In 2015 raw sugar in the U.S. ran 24.7 cents a pound, an 84% premium over the global price. Consumers lose anywhere from $2.4 to $4 billion annually, according to an analysis from the American Enterprise Institute.

Perhaps the worst result of the program is how the effects ripple across the supply chain and kill jobs. The program drives manufacturing jobs overseas—hello there, President Trump —where sugar inputs are cheaper.

Take Ford Gum & Machine Company, the last major manufacturer of gum balls in the United States. The president of the firm has said he could double his workforce, based in Akron, N.Y., if he could pay fair market prices for sugar.

Ms. Foxx’s proposal wouldn’t eliminate the program but would curb some of its worst features, such as repealing “marketing allotments,” which are restrictions on sales. Another is ending a program that allows the Agriculture Department to buy surplus sugar and sell it to ethanol companies at a loss.

The agriculture lobby is treating the mere mention of reform as a surprise land invasion, and the politics are splitting Republicans. But this should be an easy yes for progressives who harp about corporate welfare in theory but too often vote for it in practice, and the amendment could win with a cross-party coalition.

Republicans are struggling to get the votes for their bill, in part because they have added a modest work requirement for food stamps, which eat up about 80% of farm bill dollars. This is a worthy policy change, but Republicans would have more credibility on reforming welfare for people if they did the same for politically powerful agribusiness.

Tampa Bay Times Editorial Board Cheers For Sugar Policy Reform (Just Like Eye On Miami!) ... by gimleteye

The Tampa Bay Times says it just like we do, maybe a little more diplomatically: Big Sugar poisons people, poisons Democracy, and poisons the Everglades. Call your Congressional representative TODAY: Support Sugar Policy Reform!


Editorial: U.S. House should end sweet deal for Big Sugar

Editorials

With a new farm bill coming up in Congress, now is the time to reset the board on sugar policy to allow market forces to set sugar prices and bring relief to Floridians who are paying dearly for this sweet deal.

Longstanding U.S. sugar policy pummels consumers and taxpayers in three ways: We subsidize growers, pay higher food prices and then pay even more for environmental damage sugar production causes in South Florida. The only winners are Big Sugar and the politicians who rake in its campaign cash. With a new farm bill coming up in Congress, now is the time to reset the board on sugar policy to allow market forces to set sugar prices and bring relief to Floridians who are paying dearly for this sweet deal.

An amendment to the new farm bill, the Sugar Policy Modernization Act, would reform price supports that keep domestic sugar prices artificially high. Studies show that American-grown sugar costs up to twice as much as other countries’ sugar. The outdated policy also limits the amount of sugar that can be imported, slaps a tariff on imports that exceed certain quotas and requires the Agriculture Department to buy back excess sugar to prevent prices from plummeting. It’s a formula that guarantees perpetual profits for U.S. growers by pick-pocketing U.S. consumers.

Floridians are robbed even more. The two main growers in Florida, U.S. Sugar and Florida Crystals, are responsible for millions of gallons of phosphorous used on their farms annually running downstream and causing enormous harm to the Everglades. Guess who pays to clean it up. And don’t forget the green algae that befouled beaches on both Florida coasts during the summer of 2016. That polluted water came from Lake Okeechobee and should have filtered south as nature intended — through sugarland. Instead, it was diverted to the east and west, creating a neon green nightmare for tourism-reliant businesses.

Sugar growers and their defenders point to the jobs that would be lost if prices crashed. Some estimates say sugar production is responsible for 30,000 jobs in Florida, many of them concentrated in the high-poverty area around the Everglades. But like other protectionist actions, for every job saved, one more (at least) is lost. Candy makers and others have been moving operations overseas to escape high domestic prices and taxes on imports.

One factor explains the staying power of such malevolent policies. Between 1994 and 2016, the sugar industry spent $57.8 million in direct and in-kind contributions to state and local political campaigns. So far this election cycle, no other U.S. senator has taken more money from Big Sugar than Democratic Sen. Bill Nelson, who is in a heated battle for re-election. His challenger, Republican Gov. Rick Scott, has reaped millions in contributions from sugar interests over the years. Not surprisingly, Nelson has done little to break the industry’s grip on the domestic market, and Scott surely wouldn’t do any better.

The only House member from Florida who has committed support for the Sugar Policy Modernization Act is Rep. Brian Mast, a Republican who represents an area from Fort Pierce to Palm Beach. The farm bill and the sugar modernization proposal is scheduled to be taken up this week in the House. It’s long past time for Florida’s elected representatives to stand up to the industry and do what’s best for the state’s job market, environment and consumers.

There’s no valid argument for continuing to prop up the sugar industry in favor of the broader economy, and everyone except the growers and the politicians they enrich seems to understand that. Reforming the federal sugar program is a rare point of unity among such disparate groups as environmentalists, consumer advocates and free-market adherents. That’s because crony capitalism is never in the public interest.

Matt Haggman for Congressional District 27. By Geniusofdespair

Here is Matt Haggman on the Michael Putney show. Make your own decision for this blue wave US Congressional Seat 27. I will be voting for Matt Haggman. He is smart, articulate, my friend, and most importantly not Donna Shalala or Bruno Barreiro (even worse). I have to say, out of all the reporters I have known from the Miami Herald, he was the one I got along with best. He showed me respect, called me, etc. We just clicked. He has a great sense of humor and an innate ability to zero in on problems in our community. He never called me when he worked for the Knight Foundation, so for that he is a fair-weather-friend to me, but I still think he is the best person to fill this seat. And, I will bother him to death if he gets elected. He is getting too skinny. He needs to eat more. I know Donna holds a grudge since I hit her with that chair in 2008.



Never heard from Richardson. Not going to vote for him.

Here is what is on his Website so you can skip a link:

C-O-L-L-U-S-I-O-N ... by gimleteye

Really good piece, by Axios, summarizing the bill of charges against Donald Trump, not yet criminal indictments. Leads to question: Republicans, what in the world are you thinking by defending Trump and obstructing the US Department of Justice?

1 big thing: The public case against Trump
Mike Allen, AXIOS

One thing is true of all major political scandals: What we know in the moment is but a tiny, obscured, partial view of the full story later revealed by investigators.

That’s what makes the Trump-Russia drama all the more remarkable.

Forget all we don’t know. The known facts that even Trump’s closest friends don’t deny tell a damning tale that would sink most leaders.

Here's a guide that Jim VandeHei and I put together to the known knowns of Russia:

We know Paul Manafort, former Trump campaign chair, has been indicted on 32 counts, including conspiracy and money laundering. We know he made millions off shady Russians and changed the Republican platform to the benefit of Russia.

We know that the U.S. intelligence community concluded, in a report released in January 2017, that Russian President Vladimir Putin “ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election,” to “denigrate” Hillary Clinton and with “a clear preference for ... Trump.”

We know that in May 2016, Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos told an Australian diplomat Russia had political dirt on Hillary. "About three weeks earlier," according to the N.Y. Times, "Papadopoulos had been told that Moscow had thousands of emails that would embarrass Mrs. Clinton."

We know that in June 2016, Trump’s closest aides and family members met at Trump Tower with a shady group or Russians who claimed to have dirt on Hillary. The meeting was billed as "part of Russia and its government's support for Mr. Trump."

We know the Russian lawyer who helped set it up concealed her close ties to Putin government.

We know that in July 2016, Trump said: "“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 [Hillary] emails that are missing,” and urged their publication.

We know that on Air Force One a year later, Trump helped his son, Don Jr., prepare a misleading statement about the meeting. We know top aides freaked out about this.

We know Trump revealed highly classified information to the Russian foreign minister and ambassador in a White House meeting.

We know Michael Flynn, former national security adviser and close campaign aide, lied to Vice President Pence and FBI about his Russia-related chats. We know he’s now cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller. We know Trump initially tried to protect Flynn with loyalty and fervency rarely shown by Trump to others.

We know that during the transition, Jared Kushner spoke with the Russian ambassador "about establishing a secret communications channel between the Trump transition team and Moscow." We know Kushner omitted previous contacts with Russians on his disclosure forms.

We know Trump initially lied about why he fired James Comey, later admitting he was canned because of the “Russia thing.”

We know Michael Cohen was a close adviser and lawyer, the fixer and secret-keeper. We know Trump seethed when the FBI raided Cohen's office.

We know that in January 2016, just before Republicans began voting, Michael Cohen tried to restart a Trump Tower project in Moscow.

We know Mueller questioned a Russian oligarch who made payments to Cohen who used the money to pay off a porn star who allegedly had an affair with Trump.

We know that oligarch was a bad enough dude that the Trump administration sanctioned him.

Be smart: The undisputed known knowns about Trump, Russia and his associates are damning and possibly actionable. But the known unknowns of how much more Robert Mueller knows that is publicly unknown is what spooks Trump allies most.

Remember: No one in the media saw Mueller’s indictments of Russian oligarchs coming until the second they were announced, and no one knew until this week that Mueller’s team questioned AT&T five months ago about its payments to Cohen.

Mueller has every incentive to keep the public and Trump himself in suspense.