Author: Randall Reeder

You may know that I grew up on a farm and I’ve been involved in agriculture ever since.  My grandparents farmed with a team of horses. They milked cows by hand (and so did I). Hens ran free during the day but were housed securely at night to protect them from raccoons and foxes.  Cattle and sheep grazed on hillside pastures about 7 months a year and the other 5 months we fed ‘em hay twice a day.

Were my grandparents organic farmers? Pretty much. They grew hybrid corn to fatten the hogs.  Fertilizer for the corn and garden crops was mainly supplied by the cows and chickens, if you know what I mean.  The main weed killer was a boy with a hoe. Having DDT to spray flies at milking time on a hot summer evening was welcome, but there would be just as many annoying flies the next day.

Why am I telling you this? Yesterday I saw a video put out by an organic group that slams modern farmers.  The video features innocent children singing enthusiastically to the tune of “Old MacDonald’s Farm.” But the words were changed to condemn agricultural practices developed over the last half century. Then the scene changes and a new verse sings the praises of a New MacDonald’s Farm with only organic foods.

Now, anyone who desires organic, and can afford to pay double or triple for their family’s food, is encouraged to buy organic. Those farmers deserve all the money they can get. But do not misrepresent the other 95 to 98 percent of American farmers who produce the safest food supply in history. And before you insist that ONLY organic food should be available to feed the world, think about this question:  who will decide which 2 to 3 Billion people will die of starvation. Think about that before blasting herbicides, insecticides, GMO crops, climate-controlled buildings for animals, and modern farm machinery.

If you want farmers to go back to 1950, then maybe you should consider giving up your cell phone, computers, color TV, and air conditioning.

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

            “I’m just an old country boy in a big town trying to get along. I have been eating pretty regular, and the reason I have been is because I have stayed an old country boy.” WA #90, Aug. 31, 1924

“You got to do more than just live in the country to be a farmer.” WA #196, Sept. 26, 1926

The economy is not coming back the way everyone wants.  We still have close to 50 million receiving food stamps and almost half the population don’t make enough to pay income taxes.  Wages for the middle class are stagnant.

But let me tell you about a big cross section of Americans that receives no financial aid from the government for food, no assistance for housing, and none for medical costs.  This may be hard to believe, but almost $60 Billion in expenses last year and not a speck of federal tax subsidies required. As near as I can tell, the entire amount is privately financed.  Amazingly, no one is lobbying Congress or conducting social media campaigns to get subsidies or to force price controls.

You want specifics? Food costs totaled $22 billion. And that included some high priced fancy foods such as gluten-free and gourmet meals. Medical care totaled $15 billion, including the latest life saving techniques and even plastic surgery.  Furnishings and other expenses for shelter and comfort totaled $14 billion. Another sizable expenditure was on day care, education, and various personal care services totaling $5 billion.

You may be thinking, these folks must be the Top One Percent that we all hear about and envy.

Not really.  The recipients of the $60 Billion in private dollar expenditures are 400 million pets. Yes, pets.  Dogs, cats, goldfish, parakeets, rabbits, lizards and other assorted creatures.

Now, I doubt the $60 Billion includes horses. Anyone who owns horses, or used to own horses, knows $60 billion would not touch their upkeep, even without gourmet food and plastic surgery.

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

“Personally, I have always felt that the best doctor in the world is the Veterinarian. He can’t ask his patients what is the matter. He’s got to just know.”  Ether and Me (page 10), 1927

“I love a dog. He does nothing for political reasons.”  DT #2288, Dec. 3, 1933

A pair of runaway llamas got more attention on some TV networks this week than ISIS or healthcare or illegal immigrants. The only thing that equaled it in coverage was a dress that couldn’t decide if it was black and blue or gold and white.

The llama roundup reminded me of a similar story years ago. In 1905, Zak Mulhall was putting on a big Wild West show in Madison Square Garden in New York.  Will Rogers was a prominent part of the show.  In the arena an 800-pound steer got loose, jumped a fence and charged up the steps into the crowd, all the way to the balcony.  According to a front page story in the New York Herald, Will Rogers ran after the steer and lassoed it in a corridor. Eye-witness reports were unclear whether Will dragged the steer back down the stairs into the arena, or vice-versa.  Although there were no TV cameras to record the chase, the publicity helped Will land contracts to perform his spectacular rope tricks on the top Vaudeville stages in New York City, catapulting his career.

Drivers are saving on lower gas prices, but economists are puzzled on what they are doing with all that extra dough. I’ll tell you where the money is going: paying heating bills. If you haven’t noticed it’s been a long cold winter. Electric rates have jumped, mostly because Washington decided wind and solar energy are preferred over coal. Pipeline construction has not kept up with all the oil and gas wells that are being drilled. Maybe in a couple of years the lower priced gasoline will pay off for our economy, but for now we’re happy to break even.

President Obama says “the economy is growing under my administration.”  But not everybody agrees with him. A Gallop poll found that the real unemployment rate is closer to 10% than 5%. More than half of Americans feel pessimistic. Too many are unprepared for a financial emergency. Even if they have a job they are not confident it will be there long term.

The president vetoed the Keystone XL pipeline. He’s been saying for six years he was against it, so at least he’s consistent. Remember in 2008 he said he wanted to “fundamentally change America.” And he has. For decades America was the respected leader of the free world. Friends trusted us; enemies feared us. Now instead of leading, we are content to sit in the back row and whittle. The president seems to trust Iran more than Israel.

The Secretary of State says we are safer than ever; the director of the CIA says we’re not.  Who are you gonna believe? Well, the CIA is supposed to keep an eye on our enemies and tell us the truth. On the other hand the Secretary of State is our top diplomat.  In 1928 “I” wrote that “a diplomat is a man that tells you what he don’t believe himself, and the man he is telling it to don’t believe it any more than he does.”

Feb. 22, 2015

This is George Washington’s Birthday.  As Will Rogers wrote in 1928, “George Washington was a farmer, Civil Engineer and a gentlemen.  He made enough at Civil Engineering to indulge in both the other luxuries.”

Washington was the General of our Army that won the Revolutionary War, and he was elected our first President.  He wrote and said a lot of important things about winning a war, but I doubt he ever imagined he could have defeated the British by offering jobs to the Redcoats.

The spokesperson for the Secretary of State announced this week that the way to defeat our current enemy, ISIS, is to offer them jobs.  That received a lot of commentary, especially by comedians and Republicans.

But Marie Harf also said you can’t win a war by killing the enemy.  And no one has commented on that bit of wisdom.  She graduated from the University of Virginia, that excellent school founded by Thomas Jefferson.  Is it possible she could have earned an advanced degree without reading anything on how to win a war by the likes of Washington, Stonewall Jackson and George Patton?

When it comes to war, “General” Putin in Russia is demonstrating one way to win: simply say to the other side, “What war? I’m not at war.” I think he is following Hitler’s example in the 1930s, “Let me have Ukraine and I’ll leave the rest of you folks alone.” Well, once Putin takes the whole of Ukraine in a couple of years, he’ll move on to Poland. Maybe when he advances into East Germany, the rest of Europe will pay attention.

The Academy Awards are being televised tonight.  The best movie is “American Sniper.”  As I write this, the best movie has not been announced. I don’t know if it will receive one of those little statues, but the American movie goers already voted: it is the Best Movie.

When Will Rogers was the M.C. of the 6^th Academy Awards in March 1934 he described those “little statues” as “lovely things (that) were originally designed for prizes at a nudist’s colony bazaar, but they didn’t take ‘em. It must be terribly artistic, for nobody has any idea what it is.”

Will Rogers admitted, “I have never seen any of these (nominated) pictures. They don’t look at mine, why should I go see theirs?  But he complimented everyone on their acting, “There is great acting in this room tonight, greater than you will see on the screen. We all cheer when somebody gets a prize that everyone of us in the house knows should be ours. Yet we smile and take it. Boy that’s acting.”

Islamic terrorists slaughtered a few more people this week. In Denmark a young hoodlum shot up a gathering of “free speech” cartoonists and then went to a synagogue and shot a few more.

Not to be overshadowed by a lone Islamic gunman in Europe, ISIS in Libya beheaded 21 Christians at Tripoli and threw their bodies into the Mediterranean. We’re still waiting for reaction from the White House on these “random acts of violence.”  Perhaps someone in Washington will show President Obama a report on how President Thomas Jefferson reacted two centuries ago when Islamic terrorists were pirating cargo ships in the Mediterranean Sea.

Last week Susan Rice, the self-appointed Secretary of Defense, declared that ISIS is not a threat like the Nazis and the Japanese were before World War II. She may be right, but she is really just hoping they wait two more years to attack us; then a different president will get blamed.

Europe is more concerned about Islamic terrorists than they are about Russia taking over Ukraine. Europe needs to be reminded that Ukraine has almost 20 percent of the best farmland in the world.  And most of that land is in the eastern Ukraine where it is most vulnerable to Putin’s army. Yes, Europe depends on Putin for natural gas, but if he takes over eastern Ukraine, they will be more dependent on Putin for their food also.

The 2016 Democrat Convention is going to Philadelphia, not Columbus.  Democrats held an auction and Philadelphia bid $90 million and one Liberty Bell. Columbus could only come up with $85 million and a national championship football for every delegate.  A few months ago Cleveland agreed to finance the Republican convention. Since I’m in Columbus I’ll stay in Ohio and corral the Republicans, and turn the Democrats over to Ben Franklin. The way things look today for the Democrats, they could conduct their convention by postcard.

On the other hand Republicans have a slew of Presidential contenders to choose from. I have no idea who will win the nomination, but the way things are looking in Washington here’s the slogan he or she will use: “It’s time for a Leader; I’m a Leader for the times. Vote for ______ in 2016.”

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

            “The (Republican) Convention opened with a prayer, a very fervent prayer. If the Lord can see his way clear to bless the Republican Party, the way it’s been carrying on, the rest of us ought to get it without even asking for it.” Convention Articles, June 12, 1928

Did you see the President’s speech at the annual Prayer Breakfast?  Seeing that Jordanian pilot burned alive made him so mad he compared the “ISIL organization” to Christian crusaders of a thousand years ago in Europe, and to Southern slave holders. President Obama still refuses to utter the words “radical Islamic terrorists” but he came mighty close to blasting “radical Christian terrorists.”

Vermont voted to ban “GMO food” unless it is labeled. The person who wrote the bill also considered including “DNA”, and if they had it would have passed by 80%. Well, it passed anyway, and a judge is deciding whether the bill means no one in Vermont can eat unlabeled GMO food, or only that no one in Vermont can sell it. That’s a big difference; in the first case you’d have to drive to New Hampshire 3 times a day to eat, and in the other, only once a week or so to buy groceries.

Personally, I think the Vermont judge should use tobacco as his legal precedent; any Genetically Modified food that has been shown to have caused serious disease such as lung cancer or liver disease or gall stones should be labeled, “This product is harmful to your health!” Otherwise, no label required. You might be interested to know, especially if you live in Vermont, that billions of meals have been eaten with food containing GMOs (and DNA) and not a single person got sick or died as a result, unless maybe they ate way too much food.

You may think because of my life in agriculture that I am being unfair to consumers who want food produced the way it was 50 years ago. As a farm boy, I ate mostly organic food. It was good, nothing wrong with it. But today I prefer watermelons and oranges with no seeds and corn-on-the-cob with no worms.  If our food was grown the same today as back then, it would cost twice as much.  What would that do to your family budget? Ironically, many of the same people who demand old fashioned food would hate to have a TV from 50 years ago (21-inch, Black & White, $500) or a telephone that required an Operator.

Brian Williams of NBC News got in hot water when he embellished personal stories from Iraq and Hurricane Katrina.  He is a newsman making $10 million a year who sees himself as a part time humorist and story teller.  His problem is that humorists can embellish stories to add laughs; a newscaster cannot. And as Will Rogers said, “I have always noticed that people will never laugh at anything that is not based on truth.”

Embellishment to add laughs makes you a humorist. Embellishment to add drama makes you a politician.

Men, remember Valentine’s Day is this Saturday. That’s the day after Friday the Thirteenth, so buy her a nice present or you’re liable to have two days of bad luck.

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

“Vermont has got (hills). Black ones, Green ones, White ones, any kind, color, shape or size hill that you want…  A Vermont farm don’t lay. It hangs. When your corn grows up big enough to gather you go up on the farm and shake the ears off and they fall in the barn.” WA #235, June 12, 1927

Is the economy improving or not? The last few months our prospects looked brighter. But now, not so sure.

President Obama is certainly optimistic, taking credit for recovery, adding jobs and lowering oil prices. But all the added jobs in the private sector are in Texas. And all additional oil drilling has been on private and state land; none on federal land that he controls. The economy is growing at a 3% rate but that is only adequate because the rest of the world is doing worse. Actually, as Steve Forbes said, “in the sixth year of a recovery, never before in history has there been such a punk recovery from a sharp economic downturn.”

Congress passed a bill to allow construction of the Keystone XL pipeline. But the President says he will veto it. He is also determined to shut down the Alaska pipeline by permanently prohibiting drilling on federal lands in northern Alaska. If Saudi Arabia had not declared a price war on other oil producing countries (by keeping production high) we would be paying $4 a gallon for gasoline and even Democrats would vote to override the veto.

President Obama has prohibited anyone in his administration from using the term Islamic terrorist. He and his spokesmen are committing verbal contortions to avoid using the term to describe the Taliban, Al-Qaida, ISIS, Hamas, Hezbollah, Jihadists, and a few others with similar names.  He has even persuaded the Al Jazeera network to ban the term. So, what should they call a bunch of masked men with automatic rifles who shoot victims, cut off heads, while praising Allah? Are they deer hunters with bad eyesight? To call them “armed insurgents” or “militants” sounds too peaceful and tranquil for murdering thugs.

The ISIS terrorists have beheaded Americans, British, Japanese and a few others. They are threatening to behead a Jordanian pilot, but Jordan has offered to trade a female Islamic terrorist they captured in return for the pilot. Are they kidding? ISIS and these other Islamic terror groups put no value on a woman, zero. Even a woman willing to strap bombs under her Muslim dress and blow up an Army post gets no respect from Islamic terrorists.

Meanwhile 90 miles south of our Florida coast, the Castros are making fools of our negotiators. They insist that in return for our offer to help Cuba enter the 21^st century, we must give them Gitmo, pay a hundred billion dollars in cash, and hold the 2016 Democratic National Convention in Havana.  President Obama would love to let them have Gitmo, but he is pondering the other two.

Mitt Romney decided he did not want to be another William Jennings Bryan. So he turned the Republican horse race over to younger candidates. If we can convince the other Republicans to drop out at a rate of one a month, the race will be down to a manageable number by the time they land in Cleveland for their convention in July 2016.

The New England Patriots squeezed out a Super Bowl win, 28-24, over Seattle. This is not the first time a team won by stopping an opponent on the one-yard line. First time it was ever with an interception.

Historic quote by Will Rogers:

         “Can you imagine? This town of Cleveland wants the Republican and Democratic conventions both in 1928. The Republican Convention will be held further west… And as for the Democratic one, a sanity test will follow any town purposely asking for it.” DT #228, Apr. 15, 1927

After the State of the Union speech, President Obama granted interviews only to 3 young YouTube internet folks. He figured that’s the only way to reach young voters who would never watch an hour speech on regular TV.  One was named Glozell and she wore green lipstick. She attracts viewers who like to watch a woman eat Fruit Loops in a bathtub filled with milk while wearing a bikini. That’s an essential segment of voters. At least for American Idol.

I persuaded him to sit for an “interview” with me, so he could reach the old folks who likely went to sleep before the speech, or maybe in the middle of it. They eat their oatmeal in a bowl and do their swimming in a pool. And they vote! In elections!

Will Rogers: Mr. President, thanks for talking with me. You are the president of all the citizens. But some wondering, do you like representing the “right half” of the nation? Obama: “Of course I represent ALL Americans, left and right. Without the right, no way I could satisfy the left.”

WR: Do you favor people who save money by investing in the stock market and in savings accounts, such as a college fund for their kids?  “Yes, absolutely. I want them to invest and save and make money, so I can tax ‘em.”

WR: You have stated that everyone should pay their fair share. What is the fair share for the top 1%? They currently pay almost 40% of the total while the bottom 50% pays about 2%. Obama:  “As you know, I feel the half at the bottom should pay nothing. And the middle class has suffered with lower incomes, so they need relief. To be fair, the fat cats at the top need to contribute more, at least 50% of the total.”

WR: So for someone making, say a million a year, how much should they pay? Obama: “Oh, they should pay about 75% in taxes. They can afford it.”

WR: You know, in 3 or 4 years, you and Mrs. Obama will be making at least a million.  Obama:  “Oh shucks! Well, we’ll buy new houses in Hawaii and New York and California so the mortgage deductions will knock down what we owe. I hope tuition at Harvard for our daughters will be deductible, too.”

WR: A Japanese hostage was beheaded this week somewhere in the Middle East. Do you have any idea who did it? Obama: “We’re pretty sure it was terrorists.”

WR: Could it have been Islamic terrorists? Obama: “Well, that would be unfair to the Muslim community. Those terrorists wear black, covered head to foot, and all you can see is their eyes. Who knows, it could be Coptic Christians, or even Israelis.”

WR: You oppose the Keystone XL pipeline. I probably shouldn’t tell you, but they are planning big new pipelines in Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia. Any objection? Obama: “Really? Wow, I’ll call my EPA head and have her stop ‘em. Those things are dangerous, and contribute to Global Warming. That’s the biggest problem facing us, global warming.”

WR: Thank you, Mr. President. I know this information will be appreciated by my readers. Both of them.

Mitt Romney is pondering a third run for President. He’s kinda taking after William Jennings Bryant who ran in 1896, 1900 and 1908. Do any of you remember reading about President Bryant?  Well, no, because he lost each time, to a man from Ohio.  Bryant was a good, honest man and so is Romney, but whether he could win in 2016 I’ve got my doubts.

The Affordable Care Act has riled up the professors at Harvard.  The same elite faculty that helped write it and get it passed through Congress are now complaining because their health insurance costs went up.  The university pays 90 percent of it, but they object to kicking in their 10 percent share.  If those cantankerous professors teaching such essential classes as Ancient Greek or English Literature or something called Women’s Studies are not satisfied with their current status, Harvard may cut ‘em back to 29 hours a week and not pay any of their health costs. Anyway, when it comes to Women, a man can study women for fifty years and still not understand enough to get even a D minus.

The State of the Union speech is this week. I heard President Obama will propose that 2-year community colleges will be free to the students. It won’t get passed by Congress so I have a better idea: let high schools and vo-tech schools teach the same courses as those community colleges. Teach ‘em common sense and something useful to get a good job. Skip ancient Greek. Any student that feels compelled to learn Greek can pay his own way to Harvard. Or to Greece.

I wonder if President Obama will talk about Social Security and other entitlement costs. Most of us old folks don’t want to hear any bad news about Social Security, including what year it’s projected to go broke.  We paid into it so we ought to keep getting our share.  The only problem is too many of us are living a long, long time, and way beyond 65. I read in the newspaper that we have been adding a year to our lifespan every four years. We like living longer but no one wants to work longer.

When Franklin Roosevelt started Social Security in 1935 about a third of workers lived long enough to collect a check. And we have stuck with 65 as the retirement age, except lately nudged it to 67. Here’s something for you to ponder: if the other President Roosevelt (Teddy) had started Social Security the age to collect would have been about 58. Or suppose Lincoln had included a retirement plan in his Emancipation Proclamation; the age to start collecting retirement checks would have been around 40. Of course back then almost everybody was a farmer, and it wouldn’t matter because farmers seldom retire.

Football season is winding down.  Ohio State beat Alabama and Oregon for the college football championship. And in the NFL the Seattle Seahawks return to take on the New England Patriots in the Super Bowl.  East Coast vs. the West Coast for only the second time in 30 years.

Historic quotes by Will Rogers:

“My old friend William Jennings Bryant is the greatest character we have in this country today.  No one has ever been able to understand the unique and uncanny power that he seems to hold over the Democratic Party. Since 1896 he has either run himself or named the man that would run.” Convention Articles, July 10, 1924

“Mr. Hoover delivered his prescription to Congress yesterday on the ‘condition of the country.’ It was 12,000 words long. That’s how bad shape we are in.” DT #1048, Dec. 4, 1929

Starting a new year, California and New York are leading the country in peculiar decisions. California voted to give a laying hen almost twice as much floor space as she has been accustomed to. So egg producers were kinda forced to get rid of half their Leghorns (probably sold ‘em to Col. Sanders) and now there is a severe shortage of eggs.

See, the voters were fooled into thinking that if you give an old hen twice as much space she’ll lay twice as many eggs. So why don’t they just buy eggs from another state? Well, the California legislators took it upon themselves to pass a law that farmers in the other 49 states had to get rid of half their hens, too. That is, if they wanted to sell eggs in California.

Now, whether Californians will ever vote to eliminate half the hogs, I got my doubts. They might give up some eggs, but not bacon.

California also banned plastic bags from grocery stores. The store can give you a choice of empty cardboard boxes, which works fine if you have a cart full of groceries. (Sam’s Club has been doing this for years.) Of course, if all you wanted was a dozen eggs, and now you can only get half a dozen, just put ‘em in your purse.

In New York the governor banned hydraulic fracturing for gas and oil wells. I wonder if he also banned gas and oil (and gasoline) from fracked wells in other states from crossing New York borders.

President Obama started this whole idea a few years ago when he decided to eliminate electricity generated from coal. He knew the price would jump, but I read today that as those power plants shut down in a couple of years we are likely to have blackouts.

Who knew that 2015 is an election year? Jeb Bush, Hillary Clinton, Mike Huckabee, Chris Christie, Joe Biden and a dozen others are already gearing up for a run with a finish line 22 months away.  Ohio is in the thick of this super marathon. Republicans have announced they will hold their convention in Cleveland. And there’s a 50-50 chance Democrats will meet in Columbus.

Back in the 1920s and 30s Will Rogers proclaimed proudly that he had helped keep the Presidential Conventions out of his state of Oklahoma. So I feel like I have let down my fellow Ohioans.  The only previous convention in Ohio, or at least the most recent, was the Republican convention in 1924. Will was there, and I’ll tell you more about it later.