HERITAGE FOUNDATION SUMMIT

Yesterday I had the distinct privilege of addressing the first Heritage Foundation MAHA agriculture consortium.  C-Span ran it live.  For those of you who don't know, The Heritage Foundation is perhaps the largest conservative NGO think tank in Washington D.C.--big building and lots of cubicles. 

                  The staff was gracious beyond belief and highly professional.  The Who's Who attendance from the non-chemical ag community was profound.  Lively discussions, of course, kept the day moving along at breakneck speed.

                  Without divulging names, places, and specifics, the day did confirm for me my greatest concerns about where the healing movement and the classic disruptors in the non-chemical agriculture movement are focusing their attention.  Everyone seems to have a way to take spending from here and spend it over there.  Add millet to crop subsidies to spread farmers' options for other crops and cover crops.                  

                  One idea was a $300 billion school lunch, prison, and military program to start 125,000 new farms.  Another is to take half a trillion from health care and give it to farmers transitioning from chemical to non-chemical techniques.  You can't imagine how many ways the government could re-allocate expenditures and shower them on new projects. 

                  A long-road theme surfaced throughout the day, that this is just a start and we have years of undoing ahead of us.  What also surfaced was the real tension between folks who want to move fast and those who don't want to burn down everything and risk alienating strategic allies.  One idea was to make a bold executive order to ban all non-organic food by 2036.  I rolled me eyes when I heard that one--can you imagine the bureaucratic tyranny over such a mandate? 

                  Oh, and don't forget certifications.  This one versus that one; confused consumers.  Wouldn't it be nice to have one big fat beautiful certification for REGENERATIVE agriculture to replace everything?  I rolled my eyes again.

                  My overall assessment of the day is deep gratitude that conservatives are starting to talk about food.  Maybe we can actually get churches to quit putting fish crackers and gummy bears in their nurseries for snacks.  Calley Means, author of the book Good Energy and confidante of RFK Jr., addressed the group in an opening welcome, noting that Americans' life expectancy is now 6-8 years less than all our western nation counterparts.  He noted that 38 percent of American teens have pre-diabetes.  Some 30 percent of the U.S. budget is spent dealing with metabolic diseases. 

                  Wouldn't it be interesting if the $50 billion budget at the National Institutes of Health were used to get to the bottom of these problems rather than helping pharmaceutical companies get vaccine approval? These are ideas MAHA is floating, and it's truly a breath of fresh air compared to what's been going on for 50 years.  All these discussions are threatened by the upcoming mid-term elections, Means warned.  If Republicans don't make gains in 2026, MAHA is essentially dead in the water; that was the tenor of the day.

                  After listening and discussing for the day, here's my take:  I'm concerned that the wave of interest we're riding on will be completely squandered by factions within our movement arguing over what initiative to implement, what devil to tackle, and who to shower with government largesse. 

                  I come back to my theme:  FOOD EMANCIPATION PROCLAMATION.  All this Mickey Mouse argument might be moot if we just let farmers sell to their neighbors without having to ask the government's permission.  Why do we need to fumble around with herd shares to get a glass of raw milk?  Why do we have to exchange unpermitted goods in dark parking lots like some sort of contraband?  Why do we need multi-thousand-dollar Private Membership Associations to exchange homemade canned beef stew? 

                  Instead of arguing over this program or that program, how to spend this billion or that billion, how about we just unleash thousands of farm/food entrepreneurs on their neighborhoods and let market choice determine winners?  While we're at it, we could eliminate ALL government involvement in health care.  The combination of opportunity and responsibility could overflow the American psyche with freedom's healing.  I'll put cures with liberty over cures with bureaucracy any day.

                  Are you pleased or frustrated with the pace and performance of MAHA?