Minonk has cooled off but not the White House

      Editor: Dave Uphoff

The high temperature and drought combined to make the crop yields substantially lower this year. I've heard reports that farms north of Minonk yielded 25 - 30 bushels per acre on their beans and 60-80 bushels an acre on corn while farms south of Minonk had around 40 bushels an acre on beans and 120 bushels an acre on corn. This is in contrast to normal yields of 45-50 bushels for beans and 180-200 bushels for corn.

Many farmers will receive payments from their crop insurance to cover the decline in the yield. However, the increase in gas prices will hurt the farmers income. Not only has gas prices for running the machinery gone up but the gas used to run the corn dryers at the elevators has also increased in price.

I guess we can consider ourselves fortunate compared to those who suffered through Hurricane Katrina and Rita. However, the increase in gas prices will definitely hamper our life style.

The increase in gas prices and the hurricanes in the South have put pressure not only on the consumer but also on the White House. The gas price increases are largely out of the control of the government and in the hands of global forces. The hurricanes show how unprepared the government is to handle large natural disasters. While one cannot expect the government to be on top of such an unexpected disaster of the magnitude of Hurricane Katrina, it didn't help any by having an incompetent person appointed to be the head of FEMA.

One of President Bush's biggest faults is his cronyism. Michael Brown was appointed to be the head of FEMA because of his political connections to Bush. Having previously served as head of an Arabian Horse Association which is now defunct he obviously was not qualified for the job. Now President Bush has nominated another crony, White House Counsel Harriet Miers, to replace Sandra Day O'Connor on the Supreme Court.

Even Conservatives are howling over the President's pick as Ms. Miers apparently has no judicial experience whatsoever. She has been quoted as saying that the President is the most intelligent man she has ever met. That statement alone disqualifies her to be a credible nominee for sitting on the highest court in the country.

While it may be natural and even inevitable for the President to appoint his assistants and department heads from those whom he knows and trust, this also means that the quality of our government is based on the kind of friends the President keeps. This may have had a big influence on his decision to invade Iraq. This is one of the problems of government versus private enterprise. In private enterprise you pick the best person you can for the job because if you don't, you could end up losing money and going out of business. In government, persons are picked based on their loyality and connections. If they screw up, the government is not going to go out of business or lose money because it is not a profit making enterprise.

In a nutshell, profit making organizations are compelled to hire the best people they can because they have to make a profit. Governmental institutions are not governed by the laws of economics and people are hired based mostly on who can be trusted and controlled. Therefore, the less trusting and more insecure the politician the greater the chance that he will be surrounded by yes men and political hacks.

I sense that the rigors and toil of the Oval Office are getting the best of our President. To pick a person for one of the most important jobs in our country based mostly on friendship and connections rather than on ability suggests a high level of insecurity. So while the heat has subsided in Minonk, the political climate is getting hotter at the White House. I hope that the President can muster up enough self-confidence to make rational decisions on the future of our country.

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