Have you bought Milk lately?

the fact is it takes OIL and CORN to make ETHANOL

this makes the Oil men happy...... the Farmers happy

and the Cattle men happy............... gotta spread that wealth around

The price of corn is falling again. Ethanol producers have hit a block. Over a dozen ethanol production plants that are under construction or slated for construction have been shelved because oil companies wont install ethanol pumps at gas stations. Currently only 1% of stations in the country have ethanol pumps.

Personally, I'd rather see us use anything but oil imported from the middle east, but there are definitely better alternatives, i.e. ethanol made from sugar cane; it holds 10 times as much energy as corn ethanol and has already been tested and proven thousands of times over.

The price of beef and milk aren't the only things effected by the corn ethanol push. Consider the fact that we export millions of bushels of corn to impoverished nations and what ethanol does to them. If corn becomes the ethanol of choice, we pay more for beef and dairy, but they starve...

No. Prices go up when supply cannot meet demand. Right now the supply of corn outweighs the demand 10 times over. Shifting some of the intense oil demand to ethanol production will relieve the burden on the oil industry dropping those prices and simultaneously help our farmers as well as reduce the need for farm subsidies saving money all around. Cows have nothing to do with corn and are independent of corn consideration. They actually graze on grass. Have you never been to farm? So much for no child left behind.

The problem is govt attempting to subsidize industries the private sector doesnt want to touch! Ethanol being one of them, it isnt efficient and certainly not cost effective, in other words not profitable. One day a viable form of renewable energy will be found or invented and it wont be by the govt, it will be by the private sector. I guarantee it. The next wave of energy will make more billionaires and millionaires in new industries, watch out!

If the demand for ethanol was even roughly half that for oil now, the cost would be far more exorbitant than oil, defeating the entire purpose of fostering a new energy source.

Yes, but the milk producing cows eat more hay than corn. It's meat cows that will go up in price; they eat the corn.

And I'd rather not have any natural resource that is nearly required for the economy be generated by a foreign country, but that's maybe just me.

I'd also debate the evolutionary thing (lactose intolerance?), but that's not for here.

Corn based ethanol is a nice ADDITON to our fuel needs, but it is not the answer.

One bad crop and nobody drives? That's no good.

However, humans have only been drinking cow's milk for about 6,000 years, not enough time for it to be an evolutionary type thing. And in most of the world (you know, those places which AREN'T America), NO ONE over the age of 3 drinks cow's milk with any regularity.

BTW, Bush just allocated millions of dollars for ethanol research and biomass diesel (another whole different way of making fuel), this is not a Democratic issue, so stop politicizing your misinformation, please.

The corn shortage has already affected some prices..milk has gone up and so has eggs. Ethenol was already tried and failed an alternate fuel source back in the late 70's and early 80s...not enough vehicles and not enough fuel stations.

Looking for a link...This is the closest I could find.

I found an article about using ethanol from corn stalks, which would both be cheaper and more efficient to get out.

Tell me about it; I buy over a 100 gallons a week for my coffee businesses and the price has doubled in the past year. Stop pushing ethanol and start drilling in ANWAR and the Gulf of Mexico.

That is actually a huge lobby on both sides - it may even have more Rep supporters. I think any alternative energy fuel push is good although as you point out there will be some fallout.