FOXNews.com: 'UNBRIDLED PORK':$$ for Brazilian Cotton Farmers Part of Farm Bill

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'UNBRIDLED PORK':$$ for Brazilian Cotton Farmers Part of Farm Bill Jun 18th 2013, 22:28 WASHINGTON –  Americans could be on the hook to send Brazilian cotton farmers millions of dollars if Congress passes the current version of the farm bill making its way through both chambers.  The measure is just one of dozens of provisions and amendments tucked into the sprawling 1,000-page bill which some critics are blasting as a pork-filled government giveaway. While lawmakers on the House side began debating their version on Tuesday -- with much of the debate centered on the bill's funding for food stamps -- others are raising alarm about the subsidies that remain in the package.  The yearly $147 million payout to Brazil, for example, is part of the international fallout stemming from U.S. government subsidies for domestic cotton farmers. About a decade ago, Brazil sued the U.S. before the World Trade Organization. In its complaint, the South American country claimed the U.S. government had subsidized American cotton farmers so much it would make it impossible for other countries to compete. The WTO sided with Brazil in 2004 and said the country had a right to impose punishing trade measures against America.  "Instead of fixing the problem, the U.S. decided to pay off Brazil," Christine Harbin, a federal policy analyst at Americans for Prosperity, told FoxNews.com. "We send Brazil $147 million a year. So not only do we pay domestic farmers not to farm, we are paying foreign farmers to look the other way." Harbin, who has spent a year studying the farm legislation, says both the current House and Senate versions still allot for the yearly payouts to keep Brazil quiet. "Little programs like this fly completely under the radar," she said. "We've subsidized the cotton industry so much that we are become anti-competitive." Paying off Brazil isn't the only problem Harbin and others have with the farm bill. She says sticky-rice growers, which provide the rice used for sushi, and catfish farmers could hit government pay dirt if the House votes this week to reauthorize the five-year bill. The bill is projected to commit nearly $1 trillion in taxpayer money over the next decade on food stamps, federal subsidies and crop insurance. But some are threatening to oppose the bill unless Congress starts trimming the fat.  Slipped into the spending bill are a number of amendments that offer subsidies to groups that may be financially steady without additional government help. One such subsidy would force the government to guarantee Japonica Rice farmers near-market prices. If farmers don't make the money, the government will make up the difference. The rice measure comes courtesy of California Republican Rep. Doug LaMalfa, a freshman lawmaker, fourth-generation Japonica Rice farmer and member of the House Agriculture Committee. Calls to LaMalfa's office for comment were not immediately returned. The government is also offering handouts to some of the country's richest rockers-turned-farmers. Between 1995 and 2012, the government gave American farmers $256 billion in subsidies. Two people who benefited are millionaire musicians Bruce Springsteen and Jon Bon Jovi. Springsteen benefited because he leases land to an organic farmer. Bon Jovi, who raises bees on his estate, benefited from a government program where he only had to pay $100 in property taxes. Scott Faber, vice president at the Environmental Working Group, calls the House version of the bill up for a vote this week "terrible" and a "windfall" for already profitable farmers and insurance companies. "If it fails, it will be because it contained too little reform and too much unbridled pork," he said in a statement.  The massive farm bill has slowly chugged through Congress for two years without gaining any real traction. The current five-year authorization of the bill passed in 2008 was extended last year until Sept. 30 because Congress couldn't agree on a plan. Last week, the Senate passed its version of the bill which would spend $955 billion over 10 years. The price tag in the House -- $939 billion -- is  less than the Senate version mostly due to variations in food-stamp spending. The House version cuts deeper into the program than the Senate version.  On Monday, the White House warned that President Obama would veto the House bill because it cuts too deep into the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program – commonly called food stamps. Conservative lawmakers, though, argue the bill doesn't cut enough from the program aimed at helping low-income families. Another major provision in the bill involves crop insurance. While the crops are made in the U.S.A., though, they are being insured by private companies in Japan, Switzerland, Australia and Canada. According to a report by Environmental Working Group, Americans forked over $7.1 billion between from 2007 to 2011 to sell crop insurance policies to 20 foreign insurance companies.  The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Risk Management Agency picked up the administrative and operating costs for the federally subsidized crop insurance program.

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