SWEET LAND OF SUBSIDY.  Some things are so bizarre even P. J. O'Rourke can't conceive of them.  Here's a meditation on the farm price supports, from pp. 143-144 of Parliament of Whores.

You see, if the weather's bad and we have lots of droughts and freezes, we'll have to give disaster aid and crop-insurance payments to farmers, and the farm bill will end up costing us more.   On the other hand, if the weather's good and we have plentiful harvests, we'll have to buy up surplus commodities and pay farmers to cut down on planting, and the farm bill will end up costing us more yet.  And if -- God forbid -- the weather is good some of the time and bad some of the time -- in other words, the weather is normal -- then we can all just start backing toward the barn door and mooing for frozen bull sperm.

Twenty years after Parliament is published, an investment advisor (via Instapundit) is recommending frozen bull sperm as a hedge.