Farm profits fell faster than Wall Street
When Wall Street stumbled, futures markets hit the floor.
Pigs have feelings, too
A reader — an actual pig, in fact — sent the following e-mail:
Sir: Recently you, others in the media and several politicians referred...
Big ag is making big money
On Aug. 28, the Thursday before Labor Day, the USDA released its updated forecast of what American farmers and ranchers will earn for laboring...
Drill, baby, drill: It’s costing us
On Sept. 7, the nation’s second easy credit party in the last 30 years ended exactly as the first one ended: A fiscally conservative...
On the road: WDC, Boston and old age
Somewhere along the 2,684-mile, mid August drive from central Illinois to Washington, D.C., Newport, Boston and back, I crossed an unseen line into old...
Nothing hotter than an August Sunday
The only thing hotter than the August nights on the southern Illinois dairy farm of my youth were the August days, and the only...
English for the English speaker
As a trained professional in most things English (the language, not the nation), and with the Labor Day kick-off to the election season just...
Seed giant flexes its muscles
In late March, Monsanto Co. sent a “Dear Valued Customer” letter to most U.S. corn and soybean farmers.
The reason, wrote Jim Zimmer, Monsanto’s...
It’s reasonable: Our money, our rules
The news from Geneva July 29 that the World Trade Organization's Doha Round of global trade talks had "collapsed" hardly came as news to...
The best of times, the worst of times
The American economy is downright Dickensian. If you're in investment banking, airlines, real estate or automobile anything, it's the worst of times. If you're...
