Just after I completed the previous reader-mail column in late December, a Christmas card, carrying a festive stamp, arrived.

The card’s message, however, was anything but festive. Big block letters wished evil upon me, my family and my work in language more vile than any I’ve heard from the many hired men that passed through my father’s farm. It was, of course, unsigned.
“This is awful,” my daughter Gracie said when she found it on my desk later that day. “What are you going to do?”

This, I replied, as I flipped it into the recycling bin.

It was the only piece of fan – short for “fanatic,” right? – mail that I pitched in six months. The rest, a thick stack and mostly electronic, rest at my elbow. Working backwards through the pile shows I irritated more than just my colorful Christmas buddy.

Like an e-mailer who was so animated over my taking to task the Farm Credit System for asking Congress to expand its lending authority that he composed, signed and sent his note of disapproval on “Saturday, June 16, 5:43 AM.”

“The FCS,” he wrote, “has been excellent to work with and deserves nothing but praise. They should be allowed to expand ... and challenge the overcharging lenders who oppose (the System’s) attempt to expand.”

Another e-mailer, this one perched high up the food chain at Farm Credit, was a bit more direct. “Why is it that you continue to publish the pabulum sent to you by our friends at the ICBA (Independent Community Bankers of America) without giving us the opportunity to at least provide you with some facts so that you can be accurate ...”

My reply allowed the writer to reload. The two major banker associations “have been playing very fast and loose with the truth during this (legislative) process and it is unfortunate that many seem simply willing to repeat their inaccurate statements.”

An April column that wondered why Farm Bill writers would rob poor Peter, the Conservation Security Program, to pay Paul billions more for the livestock-heavy Environmental Quality Incentives Program – brought wrath from conservation and environmental friends alike.

“...most EQIP $$$ are not going for lagoons,” wrote a well-respected, Washington, D.C. environmental expert. “Lots of reasons to pick on” – shift money away from – “conservation programs, not just not the reasons you gave.”

“I was disturbed to read your recent column,” wrote Craig Cox, executive director of the Soil and Water Conservation Society. “I think you have seriously misinterpreted my views and certainly misinterpreted the recent reports we released on CSP and EQIP.” (Did I? Both reports are on www.swcs.org under the heading “Assessment of Conservation Programs.”)

One e-mailer didn’t notice my tongue in my cheek when I opined back-to-back January speeches by Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns and House Ag Committee Chairman Collin Peterson, (D-Minn.), were more Lutheran than electric.

“My comment,” he rifled northward, “is that you must not be listening to the right Lutheran sermons.” He suggested I visit his church, St. John Lutheran in Athens, Texas, where I will “hear the law, gospel and electricity each and every week.”

(When and if I’m ever in the neighborhood, fellow follower of Luther, it’s a date. Late service, though, please.)

A South Dakota e-mailer, noting my penchant to partake occasionally of the frothy brew, wrote just before the New Year’s to wish me well in 2007, but to “Watch out for what someone hands you to drink!”

Which brings me back to my Christmas pen pal: If you’re still out there and haven’t broken all your crayons, try to be a bit more original this year, eh?

The views and opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and not necessarily those of Farm World. Readers with questions or comments for Alan Guebert may write to him in care of this publication.