Speaking of foreign competition, the cotton subsidies are shameful not only because U.S. farmers should have to play by the rules of the market but because this welfare program for the well-to-do has a ruinous impact on poor farmers in other countries who do not enjoy such largess. By artificially boosting the cotton supply, subsidies depress world prices, driving farmers in countries such as Mali, Benin, and Burkina Faso out of business. Oxfam estimates that U.S. subsidies cost cotton-growing African countries $300 million a year.

For American cotton farmers (whose average net worth is about $800,000) the subsidies may be the difference between growing cotton and growing something else, or between farming and pursuing a different line of work, assuming they can't compete without the government's support. For African farmers who earn something like $800 a year, the subsidies can be the difference between eating and starving.

Given this reality, the anger of African leaders is perfectly understandable. Referring to U.S. and European subsidies, Mali's finance minister told the BBC: "The money that those countries put into agricultural subsidies is five times what they give as development assistance. And we've always said to those rich countries, 'You're hypocrites.' You tell us to play (by) the rules of the open market at the same time as you subsidize your farmers."

The U.S. refusal to reconsider its cotton subsidies was one of the main reasons for the collapse of the World Trade Organization talks in Cancun. Brazil, joined by several other countries, has filed a WTO complaint challenging both the direct farm subsidies and the Step 2 payments to cotton buyers as unfair trading practices.

The National Cotton Council, which says the Step 2 program is "vital to U.S. cotton's competitiveness," complains "there is nothing new" in the Environmental Working Group's report on the program. The same could be said for the pathetic excuses offered by those who profit at the expense of others instead of making an honest living.