It’s amazing what can happen with the wheel that gets a little
squeaky.

Like I’ve heard my friend Trent Loos say many times, it doesn’t take a majority to change things, just a loud minority. In the past few weeks we’ve seen that loud minority play a role in agriculture, and it has sent government officials backpedaling on what they say: “That’s been blown out of proportion, we never said that!”

The word about an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) gas tax on livestock spread like a wildfire in the desert of California, and it didn’t take long for EPA officials to start backing up while shaking their heads, telling us they didn’t really mean that.

All it took was a few farmers and their friends in high places to start rattling some cages, and the EPA knew that if they even thought about a gas tax they’d find enough opposition that even they weren’t willing to die on that hill.

For those of you who aren’t familiar with the story that evolved around Thanksgiving (ironically, the time of year when people are focused on eating turkey and ham), in 2007 the Supreme Court ruled in Massachusetts that the EPA cannot categorically refuse to regulate greenhouse-gas emissions under the Clean Air Act.

On July 30, 2008, in response to this, the EPA began the process of considering regulations by issuing an Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking. This is typically a precursor to a proposed rule and the first in several steps in creating a new regulation.

Basically someone with enough foresight could see the idea formulating that the EPA wanted farmers to pay an emissions tax per head of livestock because they produce methane gas, and that’s bad for the world – and the amounts differed among species: Beef cows would’ve been around $87, and dairy farmers would’ve had to pay $175 per cow.

Knowing this would put us out of business and that there would be no milk to drink, ice cream to eat and eggnog to slog down at Christmastime, I think everyone came to their senses. But this isn’t the only place where the outcry of the public has been noticed.
When the auto executives flew in on their private jets to ask for money, they hardly went unnoticed – and when the American workforce gave them the “you have a lot of gall asking for us to bail you out” look, their next trip to Washington was in their own company-made vehicles.

When our President-elect Obama’s Senate seat was (allegedly) put up for bid by the entrepreneurial-spirited governor of Illinois, America didn’t really appreciate his moneymaking technique – and boy, have the dominos started to fall in that state.
So the moral of the story is: If you don’t like something, speak up. Don’t expect things to change without the changing agent of an unsatisfied voice. There is nothing like a loud voice to get someone’s attention.

There are times when we need to get out of our comfort zones and let our voices speak for our values. Whether it be in your family, your church, your school district or in Washington, D.C., if you see things need to be changed for the better, then there is no better person to get the ball rolling than the only one you can take responsibility for – YOU! Remember, the squeaky wheel gets the grease … but silence is just as loud.

Readers with questions or comments for Melissa Hart may write to her in care of this publication.

December 31, 2008