Heitkamp Blames Berg For Stalled Farm Bill, Doesn’t Blame Reid Or Conrad For No Budget

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Written By:
Rob Port

Sep 26, 2012
10:10am

Democrats in North Dakota have been blaming Rick Berg for the fact that the Republican-controlled House won’t be passing a farm bill until after the 2012 elections.

I won’t get in to whether or not those accusations are fair (I will note, however, that even the reliably liberal Fargo Forum editorial board is buying it, calling the accusations “politics over substance”), but here’s a question for Heitkamp and her fellow Democrats: When are they going to criticize Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, and Senate Budget Committee chairman Kent Conrad, for the Senate not passing a budget since 2009?

Certainly a budget is a lot more important than a farm bill. In fact, it’s hard to imagine how we can even be debating a farm bill in the context of a total lack of budgeting.

Heitkamp has accepted thousands of dollars in direct campaign contributions from Senator Reid, and has benefited from millions of dollars in independent expenditures on political advertising by Reid’s “super PAC.” Heitkamp is also running to take the seat currently held by the retiring Senator Conrad.

Yet, while Heitkamp rails against the lack of a farm bill, her silence on the lack of a budget is deafening.

America is running a budget deficit of over $1 trillion for the fourth consecutive year, and just weeks ago the national debt surpassed $16 trillion total. Yet, Heitkamp doesn’t want to talk about that problem or her party’s refusal to budget.

That’s something the candidate ought to answer for.