Not the cream of the crop

CORPORATE farming is so politically muscular that the industry has its own pet Cabinet department. In tapping former Iowa governor Tom Vilsack this week to run the US Department of Agriculture, President-elect Barack Obama made a conventional choice. But what's needed is radical reform.

Vilsack's record gives little indication that he will take on the farm lobby, which has supported bloated subsidies and price supports for industrial-scale agriculture.

Family farmers were once the backbone of the US economy. Today, the interests of agribusiness diverge from the needs of the eating public. The department is charged with recommending a healthful diet, but that duty conflicts with the department's usual role of promoting what US farmers produce. An ever-pudgier populace needs to eat more fresh vegetables, but federal policy promotes massive production of a small number of grains.

Distortions breed more distortions: A glut of corn spawned the corn-based ethanol industry, which spawned ethanol mandates, which have pushed up prices for grain. Yet from an environmental and energy-security standpoint, the benefits of corn-based ethanol seem questionable at best.

Obama has promised to cut subsidies for rich farmers. And in introducing Vilsack, Obama cited the need for farm policies that serve the public rather than "big agribusiness or Washington influence peddlers."

Then again, President Bush sought to cut subsidies also. But while his administration maneuvered deftly around the Constitution and Congress, it was no match for the farm lobby. Vilsack's knowledge of farm issues would give him credibility as an advocate for reforms. Whether he will be inclined to pursue them is another question entirely.