Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : The Obama - Clinton Disaster -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wayners who wrote (27186)	3/12/2010 2:38:19 PM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Respond to of 103300

"Sounds good to me." Me too. End the corporate welfare.

To: Wayners who wrote (27186)	3/13/2010 3:25:51 AM
From: DuckTapeSunroof	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 103300

Justice Dept. Tells Farmers It Will Press Agriculture Industry on Antitrust March 12, 2010 By WILLIAM NEUMAN nytimes.com ANKENY, Iowa — The attorney general, Eric H. Holder Jr., traveled to the heart of Midwestern farm country on Friday to declare that the Obama administration was serious about rooting out anticompetitive practices in agriculture. “Is today’s agricultural industry suffering from a lack of free and fair competition in the marketplace? That’s the central question,” Mr. Holder said. He spoke at an unusual public meeting called to discuss the concerns of some farmers and ranchers that a few large companies had come to dominate many agricultural markets, controlling the seed that farmers plant and the milk they sell and the livestock ranchers raise. Mr. Holder and the agriculture secretary, Tom Vilsack, who co-hosted the event, said their agencies would work together on antitrust enforcement. “You will see an historic era of enforcement that will almost inevitably grow from the partnership that we have established,” Mr. Holder said later in a session with reporters. The meeting was attended by about 500 people, including farmers, meat packers and public relations executives for some of the large companies that have come under Mr. Holder’s microscope, including the biotechnology giant Monsanto. The Justice Department had previously announced that it was taking a look at practices in the seed industry, which Monsanto dominates, that might be anticompetitive. The seed industry has become increasingly concentrated as large bioengineering firms snap up smaller companies. Farmers and regulators are concerned because seed prices for crops like corn, soybeans and cotton have risen sharply in recent years. Justice Department officials on Friday said they would not discuss details of the seed industry investigation. But Mr. Holder’s chief antitrust enforcer, the assistant attorney general Christine A. Varney, drew applause from the audience when she said the agency planned to keep a close eye on the coming shift to generic forms of biotech crop traits, as the patents that companies hold on those traits expire. Generic biotech crop seeds could save farmers lots of money. The first major trait to lose its patent, in time for the 2014 growing season, will be Monsanto’s best-selling gene for making soybeans resistant to a popular herbicide. Mr. Vilsack, a former Iowa governor, said the push against anticompetitive behavior meshed with a broader effort to bolster rural communities. “If we have a system that is not fair, is not making it easier for midsized operations to stay in business and therefore is leading to further declines in the number of farmers, then that’s something we need to address,” Mr. Vilsack said.