Whaaaaaa? 60.2 BILLION?

I was reading some wonkish sites, trying to get a handle on the big January event (no, not the Iowa caucuses — though I wish at least one of those mediocrities and corporate mendicants would pay attention to agriculture while pimping for votes in an agricultural state… and, since they’re talking about immigration, look at the root cause). Corn and bean subsidies end in Mexico — but not in the U.S. or Canada — on January 1.

U.S. farmers will be in the bizarre situation of selling corn at less than production cost, thanks to THEIR subsidies, to the motherland of corn. And putting even more Mexican farmers out of work, forcing them to emigrate to… oh… Iowa, maybe?.

I’ll have a lot more to say about that tomorrow or Sunday, but in the meantime, I wanted to pass this odd piece of data along. It’s something I discovered looking at the very few sites that have paid attention to this issue — and maybe, just maybe, one of those “progressive” (or even reactionary) political bloggers who’ve been wasting out time trying to convince us to give a rat’s ass about the Iowa caucuses will pay attention:

The United States improved its trade balance with 165 nations, when compared to the same period of 2006, and saw its trade position falter with 73 nations.

The United States increased its deficit with China by $22.8 billion, from $190.7 billion to $213.5 billion; with Mexico by $6.4 billion, from $53.8 billion to $60.2 billion; and with a handful of other nations by less than $2 billion.

Its not by much, but the U.S. debt to Mexico is growing even faster than our debt to China! Unless the corn exports balance this out (and they may not — if Mexico has to import corn, there’s no law that says it has to buy from the U.S. and — if there is significant support for keeping genetically modified corn out, it may opt to purchase elsewhere), Mexico is going to pressed to invest those dollars somewhere — and maybe they’ll just buy out Iowa corn producers.