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The Farm Bill is making it's way through Congress and the Senate this week, with a threatened presidential veto in the wings. The Democratic party, and a few from the Republican party back the bill that would, among other things, increase the amount of food stamps available to $10 billion, and continue to give farmers subsidies on their farm products, even though this is a bumper year for crops.

There is a lot of opposition to the idea of paying farmers (who could, if they were a husband and wife company, still receive money as long as they make an adjusted gross income of under $1.5 Million dollars) when things seem to be going so well.

Since I've worked at the Farm Services Agency, I have a bit of an insider's view on the subject. But I would like to hear from the readers, their take on the bill.

Question: Should the Farm Bill be passed, or should it be modified in some way? And if modified, how?

Let us know what YOU think. Leave us a comment with your opinions!

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I'm not normally a (very) pessimistic person, more like someone that looks at ALL angles, both good and bad, so when I got our stimulus package I decided to do something a little different than I had originally planned.

You see, recently my company went through some layoffs, and that along with the way the economy is at the moment, makes me want to 'hedge my bets' somewhat so that even if the worst should happen, we'll be ready.

SO when our check came in (along with my most recent paycheck AND the tax return), I put everything directly into my investment account. I'm not SO worried that I am unwilling to take a little risk to make a little more money, so it's investments rather than a savings account.

What Triggered My Save Gland

The one thing that really caused me to turn on saving again instead of paying off more bills was gas prices. I drive a LOT more now than I used to, and I end up filling up the tank about every other day. That alone keeps me sensitive to the price of gas. Over the last month alone, local gas prices have gone up almost $.60/gallon. Since I have quite a commute, I also have quite a while to think about things, and the thought that kept going through my mind was "no one's coming up with any good ideas to lower the price!"

It seems that most people are resigned to the fact that $4.00/gallon gas is either here or will be here shortly, and that it is never going to be lower than that. That worries me because I don't think we've seen the shift in economics that will come with a 'permanent' higher energy price. Prices are just now starting to hit the markets with increases because of shipping and transportation costs. The ripple effect is still moving outward from higher gas prices.

Good Side-effects of a Savings Fund

With my recent contributions to the family fund, we're fully funded to survive 6-9 months of zero income should it come to that. With my savings gland happy, and the wife's risk levels satisfied, there are a few benefits to this as well.

Housing Market Still Going Down - Over the next two months, the housing market is facing another record increase of subprime mortgages. That I believe will translate to ANOTHER wave of foreclosures and price reductions in houses. I'm aiming at continuing the savings throughout the next year, with an eye to buying a property or two in mid-late 2009, when I'm predicting prices might be near the bottom of the curve.

Upswing in Foreign Markets - While the U.S. is still suffering through a lengthening recession, I believe that there are still emerging markets with quite a bit of steam left in them. Latin America, China, and other upcoming countries' stocks is where I'm putting my bets for a good return short-term. I'm diversified with my retirement holdings, but I'm going to concentrate some of the savings into funds focused on these areas.

Saving for Home Improvements - I know that this year we're going to have to replace the back fence and probably the deck, and neither is going to be particularly cheap, so this emergency fund can partially pay for those repairs, if and/or when I see some improvement in the economy. 

Happy Wife, Happy Life - As I mentioned earlier, having an extended emergency fund has given my wife a lot more peace of mind as to what would happen if I suddenly lost my income. I keep telling her I could blog full-time, but for some reason she doesn't seem to think that'd be enough.

Saving for a Rainy Day, Not Hiding in a Cave

The main reason I switched this to savings, other than the reasons mentioned above, is this was a HUGE AMOUNT OF MONEY (at least for me) to have at one time. With the credit cards under good control already, it seemed a shame to take this particular one-time windfall and use it on bills. This is my version of 'splurging' with my money. It felt good to put another five-digit amount of money into my account and realize that it's there if I need it. And if any of the bills act up again, I can just pull it out and kill them on the spot.

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If' you're a customer of Countrywide Mortgage, you've probably got your share of "Easy Refinance Today" offers through both regular mail, and phone calls. I finally got tired of screening the calls and decided to pick up and tell them no.

On a lark, I decided to get the 'free, no obligation mortgage account review' just to see what would happen.

I was transferred to one of their 'mortgage specialist' who took a look at my balance due, interest rate, and payments.

You Live WHERE?!??

I knew things weren't going to go well when the strange silence came after he started looking up prices for comparable homes in the area. I know for a fact that no homes have sold in the past year anywhere near me, with many houses on the market, so I wasn't expecting much.

"It looks like according to my records, your house would only appraise at $170k. Is that right?!??"

First, how would I know without a professional appraisal, and second, even by rule-of-thumb estimates that sounded about what I'd guessed it would appraise for.

"At that rate, even if we reduced the interest by approx. a percentage point, the actual savings wouldn't work out, after the points."

I was pleasantly surprised to hear them being honest about my savings.

"Even if we were able to somehow get it appraised at $200k, that would just be barely enough to get rid of PMI, and give you a $480/year savings, but I don't know if we want to risk putting a few hundred into an appraisal that will probably come back short."

At this point I was more than a little impressed. I'd heard about much of the 'appraise-raise' practices where the companies made loans based on (possibly inflated) home values. And now that things were in the dumper house-wise, this Countrywide person was sounding pleasantly responsible in letting me know that the outcome probably wasn't worth the risk.

We made a bit of smalltalk and then said goodbye. He wished me luck in my refinance, and mentioned that they would continue to check back periodically to see if there was anything they could do to lower my payments/rate.

Score one for Countrywide. Even though they weren't able to lower the payments, they treated me straightforward and professionally.

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The meme is The Budget Busters Challenge, wherein I need to list five things that cause me to break the budget. I for the LIFE of me can't remember where I originally got 'tagged' for this, but it was too good a post to pass up anyway. If the person tagging me speaks up, I'll retcon this entry to include them.

We last left Joe searching for the CDO Monster. This week Joe examines the Modus Operandi of the Budget Buster Gang. There are five main members of the Budget Buster Gang, and in no particular order they are;

Computer Gizmo George

George is the little person that sits on my shoulder, telling me that I ought to get this new part or that new add-on for my home computer system. I say system, because we don't have just A computer at home. Let me explain;

I have 8 computers at home,

• My main box - An HP Pavilion with a Core Duo Quad processor, 8GB of ram, dual Raid 500Gb hard drives, Television in/out, connected to a 24" HP flatscreen LCD monitor which I just got last week. I have yet to max out all four processors on ANYTHING. The house lights dim for a moment when this beastie comes on, and the THX sound plays in the background while it starts up.
• The home server - EBay provided, old rack-mount 16 bay enclosure with dual processor motherboard. Older, but holds 16 drives. Currently only holds 8x500Gb drives Raid 5 striped.
• My son's computer - Another HP Pavilion Core Duo small-footprint machine, with my old 21" flatscreen LCD.
• The House laptop - HP Core Duo 17" DV9200 laptop.
• The Work Laptop - Lenovo Core Duo 15" laptop, not really used for work, so it gets double duty as another floating laptop.
• Three other 'shop' machines - An older Dell machine, and two self-built machines based off a Shuttle small-footprint ATX-based computers.

All are wirelessly connected (except my machine, gigabit ethernet baybee!) to my router/DSL access point, with an additional number of external drives hanging off of various machines.

The three shop machines get re-configured as needed, for me to play with testing, learning, and installing various software for my job.

George has an easy time of convincing me to go out and get more computer 'stuff' because my job is mainly computer-related. The better I am at everything computer, the better I do my job. It's a convenient excuse, and enables me to be on a first-name-basis with the guys down at the local MicroCenter store.

Eat-out Eddie

Eddie is another little person sitting on my shoulder that has a fairly easy time of persuading me off the frugal track. Since I travel a lot, and I've GOT to eat (and truth be known, I didn't marry my wife for her cooking), It's very easy to stop in and grab something at the local fast food.

Unfortunately, my weight and pocketbook BOTH suffer from this guy. I try to pick stuff that's somewhat nutritious, but the really good tasting stuff is also the stuff with the most calories/salt/unsaturated fats/tasty rat bits/etc.

There are times that my truck looks like the garbage bin of the local fast-food restaurants, what with all the wrappers, cups, and receipts that accumulate.

And yes, I am on a friendly-basis with most of the local fast-food stores. We have a nice conversation each morning as I get my croissants and coffee at Burger King. I even get asked if everything is ok, if I miss a few days. <sigh>

Little Mister May-I-Have-This

This is actually my seven year old, rather than any imaginary person sitting on my shoulder. My littlest one already has me figured out to a degree that scares me. He knows what buttons to push to get what he wants, and plays my wife's and my emotions like they're a musical instrument. He's got a great career in either upper-level management, or politics.

It usually starts out like;

Son: Dad, can I get _____? (insert toy he wants)

Dad: No, we came in to get something else.

Son: But big brother has three ____'s, and I've been really good. Haven't I been as good as he was?!??

Dad: Well, yes, but,..

Son: So does that mean you love HIM more than me?

Dad: No, of course not,..

Son: So why can't I have _____? You know, I'm not going to be a little boy forever, and someday I won't even want to play with toys.

(sound of resolve cracking like the shattering of an ice floe from a glacier)

Dad: Ok, but just this once (which we both know is a lie)

Son: Thanks Dad!

I just hope that when he grows up, he'll use his powers for good and not evil.

The Ghost of Walt Disney

This is actually the monkey on my wife's back. For some reason, she takes the phrase "Happiest Place in the World" as a LITERAL truth. We end up going every couple of years, and it ends up being a HUGE cost. Admittedly we have a great time, but it still busts the budget like a supernova.

This is a delay-tactic thing for me. When we have discussions about vacations, Disney always comes up as a place to go. Sometimes I can deflect it for a while, but eventually the wife starts the psychological warfare, and I know it's just a matter of time before I hear another sound of cracked resolve, and give in.

The good thing about giving in to this one though, is then the wife goes into what I call Obsessive-Disney-Planning mode. She can spend weeks and weeks, poring over web sites, advertisements, television ads, star charts, tarot cards, various small animal entrails, and other means of intelligence-gathering resources that would put the National Security Agency to shame, all in the search for the ABSOLUTE best vacation.

To her credit, even though it's been expensive, it's always been a great experience.

Did I mention we're going back again THIS year? Yep, already planned, bought, and paid for.

The Sneak

This guy is the most insidious of the bunch. He's invisible, and whispers only a few words to you to get that extra money out of your pocket. He also works with all the others as well.

George and the Sneak: "Go ahead, upgrading the memory isn't that much more"

Eddie and the Sneak: "You know, if you supersize this, you get the larger drink. Aren't you really hungry?"

The sons and the Sneak: "If you get this for the little one, the older one will want one too. Better get two."

and of course

The Ghost and the Sneak: "If we get the room upgrade, we'll get the Kingsize bed, and the boys can be in the next room!"

The Sneak is diabolical, and the only way I've been able to track him is through the trail of devastation he leaves through my budget. I find traces of him as I go through the bank and credit card statements and wonder "When did I get THAT". I've actually almost called the credit card company a couple of times to dispute charges before I remembered that I HAD gotten the extra whatchamacallit on the list.

Of all the budget busters, the Sneak is the deadliest. He can swirl your resolve and willpower around his little finger with seemingly logical 'additions' to the bill. Every chance he gets, he convinces me to 'add this' or 'don't forget that' to the point I end up almost doubling my expenses.

The Whole Gang

Even recognizing that these guys are working to get my money, it's a day-by-day struggle to prevent them from sucking all the cash out of my account. Combined, they're a force to be reckoned with, a force of nature level threat to my finances. But the battle goes on.

What are YOUR five top budget busters? Join in the meme by either writing an article if you have a blog, or commenting with your top five.

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Welcome to the Saturday Roundup of Credit Withdrawal posts and other interesting posts around the blogosphere. Just got the stimulus check from the government as expected. They started sending them out a week early, but even at that I got mine on the LAST day of the promised delivery window. Oh well, it's here.

I don't care if it is next year's return (in part), it's a chunk of money that goes to Kill Bill(s).

(Great, now I've got a picture of Uma Thurman running around in a tight yellow outfit, calmly handing money to a group of bankers standing in a circle around her.)

From Credit Withdrawal this week

• May 9th: I, (State Your Name) am a Debtaholic (4)
• May 8th: Ask the Readers - What is Your Highest Interest Card? (8)
• May 6th: Why You Need an Emergency Fund - A Real World Example (1)

Carnival Activity

I forgot carnivals last week, as I was out for the weekend at Great Wolf Lodge, so I'll have to make sure I contribute this week

Blog Spotlight:

The Blog Spotlight is where I single out the best blog entry I've come across each week, along with a short description of why I liked it.

The Wisdom Journal - 7 Things I Learned As A New Manager

I went through all the thoughts and ideas listed here, and they're right on. Being a manager isn't all the beer and skittles that most people (that have never BEEN a personnel manager) thinks it is. It's a balancing act of keeping everyone happy, while trying to get as much work done as possible.

A good leader recognizes right off that he is part of a team. Even if he COULD do things better than any single person on the team, it's no longer his responsibility to do so.

"You're job is making sure things get done, not DOING things." It's a hard idea to get your head around sometimes. Lose sight of the big picture because of the details, and the whole project can fail.

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