Exhibit 9.15

Well, I guess now we know why Johanns stepped down as Secretary of Agriculture when he did. It's not just that he wanted to run for the senate--though that was surely part of it--but also that he wanted to avoid having any association with a farm bill that would put him squarely between his constituents and his president.

Oddly, the president is mostly right on the farm bill though why he wants to fight subsidies and giveaways when it comes to farmers and not, say, the oil industry, erodes whatever high ground he might have on the issue. Everyone knows the farm bill is a bidecadal embarrassment but there doesn't seem to be any logic in taking a stand on it and it alone unless you are a lame duck president desperately searching for one positive in a legacy of criminally reckless (and just criminal) government.

Johanns was savvy enough not to stick as Secretary of Agriculture long enough to have to fight the losing side of this battle--a side he almost certainly disagrees with--but ultimately it might be the only way he loses this election. Johanns's greatest weakness is that he's an empty suit who seems to purposefully camouflage himself in his own blandness in the hope that no one notices he's slowly climbing the ladder. In his wake, he leaves a job unfinished and questions unanswered, but everyone forgets about it until his name pops up on the ballot for his next job. Quitting before the farm bill was passed calls attention to himself as just another political opportunist. Serving in the cabinet of a president who wanted to eviscerate a bill putting money in the pockets of Nebraskans calls attention to himself as a just another political opportunist. Forcing his competitors out of a primary by using his party connections calls...you get the idea.

It all leads to a pretty easy argument for a smart, principled candidate to make: It's one thing to not finish the job, but it's something else entirely to not finish the wrong job.