Declaring Independence! ICON Annual Meeting 2010

Annual Meeting 2010

Declaring Independence!

By Mike Callicrate

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It was an exciting

experiment, and

for a short time

provided an

opportunity for

freedom and hope

for mankind, until

the government was taken over by

monied interests and corporate power.

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Self interest before National interest Profit before people

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Wall Street over Main Street

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The smartest guys in the room!

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Deregulate! Deregulate! Deregulate!

people [NCBA Executive Committee]

that are knowledgeable about the issues

facing our industry. The large group of

grassroots producers we are always

hearing about are not informed enough

or knowledgeable enough to

understand these issues.” - Jon Ferguson, January 31, 2000 - Past KLA President, NCBA Governance

Task Force, NCBA Executive Committee, Checkoff Executive Committee

“It is important the decisions

of the cattle industry be made

by this group of educated

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The smartest “cowboys” in the room?

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Upgrading the round, By Alan Newport

New research in Oklahoma may help upgrade one of the

largest segments of the beef carcass: the round.

Meat scientists have been working with a system that injects

finely ground fat and lean tissue combined with a brine solution

essentially to add marbling to the lean muscles in the round.

The smart “cowboys” manufactured, pretend meat

Agribusiness Political Contributions to Signers

Total for 115 Signers D Total R Total

$48,605,199 $20,212,782 $28,392,417

Anti-GIPSA rule letter to Vilsack

$1,970,447 $1,177,644

Collin C. Peterson , D-Minn. Frank D. Lucas, R-Okla.

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Data is based on the All Fresh Choice Beef price – USDA – ERS

Producer Share of the Consumer Beef Dollar

Proof of Abusive Market Power Reducing income at the farm and ranch gate…

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While costs to the middlemen have decreased…

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$450

$500

$550

$600

$650

$700

Weekly

Earn

ing

s

Month

Average Weekly Earnings for Animal Slaughter Plant Workers.

BLS Data Adjusted for Inflation (in 2009 dollars)

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Grocery Manufactures Association

There is money in the food business…

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N7100C – Cargill N199HF – Hormel Foods N97SJ – J.M. Smucker N1897S – J.M. Smucker N135FT – Albertson’s N46E – Hunt N604CL – Hershey N654CM – Crossmark Corp. N457H – Bank of America N606RP – Nestle Purina Pet Care Co. N102CX – Clorox N545CS – Wells Fargo N604MU – Dean Mfg. Group

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Trucks in St. Francis, KS Sept. 6, 2009

Old Calnon place, So. of St. Francis

Winter day on Webster St.

Meanwhile, back on the farm…

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Photograph from the book, Great Ranches of the West ©2007 Jim Keen, All Rights Reserved Read a sample chapter and order the book at www.greatranchesofthewest.com – 800-363-5336 17

It’s the national security issue no one is talking about.

Poorest counties by per capita income

Statistics derived from U.S. Census Bureau data; U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of Economic Analysis, Survey of Current Business; and DataQuick Information Systems, a public records database company located in La Jolla, San Diego, CA. – July 2010

Ben Franklin 1706-1790

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There seem to be but three ways

for a nation to acquire wealth. The

first is by war, as the Romans did,

in plundering their conquered

neighbors. This is robbery. The

second by commerce, which is generally

cheating. The third by agriculture, the only

honest way, wherein man receives a real

increase of the seed thrown into the ground,

in a kind of continual miracle, wrought by the

hand of God in his favor, as a reward for his

innocent life and his virtuous industry.

Now you (U.S. cattleman) will know how Canadians feel with Cargill and IBP/Tyson in our midst. Tom C. – Canadian cattleman

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Please, please Mr. Batista, will you give my starving children something to eat?

JBS Swift & Co. Chief Executive Officer Wesley Batista

Giving JBS the power to be ruthless…

TYSON

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“…there is no stopping it (concentration). This is an evolution that’s going to take place in spite of whoever is in the way.” Robert Peterson, IBP Chairman and CEO, July 1996 $20 Billion by 2001 article, in Meat and Poultry

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"You should be suing

Wal-Mart [instead of

IBP], they are the

problem. They tell us

what they will pay and

we have no choice but

to pay you less.“ - John Tyson, 2002

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Average return on equity before tax (ROE)

Retail grocery: ROE = 21% (last 6 years)

Meat packing: ROE = 17% (last 6 years)

All Farming & ranching: ROE = NEGATIVE 0.54%

(last 13 years)

Packers--for those with sales > $500k - Before tax ROE, 2002-2009: 17.38% - source: http://www.bizminer.com/industries/Meat-packing-plants-2011/ Retail grocery--food marketing institute book - http://www.fmi.org - 2003-2009 average: before tax ROE = 20.75% Cattle--for the farm typology "cattle" meaning primarily cattle operations in USDA/ERS annual surveys - http://www.ers.usda.gov/Briefing/ARMS/

There is an economic term to describe this phenomenon.

It is called…

STEALING

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- John W. Helmuth, Ph.D, Ag Economist. He warned early of the dangers of concentrated market power by packers and agribusiness. He died in November of 1999.

"These guys are nothing but old-time gangsters, thugs and thieves. They beat your brains in with their market power and take your money." - Mike Callicrate http://www.nobull.net/CattlemenLegal/news/2004/1-31-04MikeResponse.htm

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Defending the rich and powerful…

“Rhetoric and poverty abound: cheap writers and expensive sages have always dedicated themselves to absolving the guilty of all guilt.”

- Open Veins of Latin America, Eduardo Galeano, P. 148

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Andy Gottschalk

Chandler Keys, JBS

Touting for Big Agribusiness - mentally conditioning producers to take less…and to stay hitched!

Steve Dittmer, Agribusiness Freedom Foundation

Trent Loos, Loos Tales Land Grant Universities

Troy Marshall, BEEF Magazine

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Randy Blach, Cattle-Fax

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"Hear this, you who trample the needy, to do away with the humble of the land, [5] saying, "When will the new moon be over, So that we may sell grain, And the Sabbath, that we may open the wheat market, To make the bushel smaller and the shekel bigger, And to cheat with dishonest scales, [6] So as to buy the helpless for money And the needy for a pair of sandals, And that we may sell the refuse of the wheat?"" - Amos 8:4-6 - Days of prophecy 760 to 755 BC

The East India Company, created in

December of 1600, with Queen Elizabeth

as CEO, was the world's first

multinational corporation.

In 1776 the East India Company held a

virtual stranglehold on commerce and

politics in North America and used British

troops as its enforcers. 31

Corporate rule and tyranny

“Farmers need to raise

less corn and more hell.”

Mary Elizabeth Lease 1853-1933

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She also said, “Wall Street owns

the country. It is no longer a

government of the people, by the

people and for the people, but a

government of Wall Street, by

Wall Street, and for Wall Street.”

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She continues, “Our laws are the

output of a system which clothes

rascals in robes and honesty in rags…

The people are at bay, let the

bloodhounds of money who have

dogged us thus far beware.”

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“In the struggle for justice, the

only reward is the opportunity to

be in the struggle.” -American abolitionist Frederick Douglass

Pickett vs. IBP trial, Montgomery, Alabama , January 2004

From left to Right: Van Davis, Leo McDonnell, Sam Britt, Chris Abbott, Pat Goggins, Swede Calnon, Bob Rothwell, Johnny Smith, Herman Schumacher, Mike Callicrate, Lovel Blain, Stayton Weldon

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When we lose

our markets, we

lose our freedom!

A new food system of independent family farmers and ranchers fairly compensated in an open and competitive marketplace is our only hope for saving our rural communities, improving the national economy, and ensuring a prosperous future for our children.

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…until then, raise Hell!

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