I think you're misinformed about the environmental effects and the efficiency of both fuels. Production of ethanol from corn is 5 TO 6 TIMES LESS EFFICIENT efficient than producing it from sugarcane. (from the last entry)
corn ethanol
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http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/amory_lovins_on_winning_the_oil_endgame.html

winning the oil endgame

The goal in the near term is to have the cheapest fuel because current fuel prices are destroying the economy and causing high inflation which is very difficult to stamp out once it's ingrained in the economy. In the 70's Paul Volcker had to raise rates into the high teens to stop high inflation. Raising rates anywhere near that level would cause irreparable damage to the already bad housing market where most people have most of their wealth.

The best decision now is to remove tariffs on sugar cane ethanol. If corn ethanol is more efficient like you claim, corn ethanol wouldn't be hurt.. The fact that Obama opposes removing the tariffs on sugar cane speaks volumes about which is better. It's naive to believe a politician wouldn't protect an interest group at the expense of the the US people but many Obama supporters can't accept that their Savior can do any wrong.

Producing ethanol from sugarcane might be more efficient than producing it from corn, but that doesn't matter unless we had to choose between the two sources. So long as sugarcane ethanol cannot meet our needs, we will need to rely on corn-based ethanol for a major portion of our ethanol. Your criticism of Obama was that he was still supporting corn-based ethanol - which is a necessity at this point. If sugarcane was a less water intensive product, we would be able to grow it in more places and it would be great. However, we are not in that position now and we won't be for quite a while. Moreover, all of the economic reasons suggest additional reasons why Obama (or anyone else for that matter) wouldn't want to ignore corn-based ethanol. He can have principled reasons for continuing to champion corn-based ethanol production (other than your accusation of corruption).

You are right that corn-based ethanol isn't as clean as sugar-cane ethanol. My point in mentioning the environmental effects of sugar cane (greenhouse gases) was to temper your presentation of sugar-cane ethanol as a miracle cure that only a corrupt politician could ignore. While corn has problems with the environment, sugar cane offers its own issues. In reality, we are not faced with a choice between a poor source of ethanol (corn) and an excellent source of ethanol (sugar cane). Such a picture is misleading because we are not faced with such a dichotomy and the contrast is not as stark as you suggested. Instead, we have a much more complex situation.

In other words, you are focusing only on the good things about sugar cane ethanol, missing the shortcomings, and completely ignoring the fact that ethanol from sugar cane cannot replace ethanol from corn for at least a number of years (if from nothing else because of the scale of our corn production). Equally importantly, the economic incentives for producing ethanol from sugar cane are not yet favorable.

Actually, that source (if you are referring to the Truthout article "Corn Ethanol and its Consequences" by Juliette Anthony) notes that ethanol from corn is 5 to 6 times less efficient than cellulosic ethanol. You are confusing switchgrass with sugar cane.

Of course, the problem with the increase in efficiency is the volume of water needed.

I got my statistic on the ton:gallon ration of corn and sugar cane from one of the articles I provided.

I should note that I didn't include anything on the ratio of energy expenditure to energy output obtained or productivity of sugar cane to corn per hectare. Admittedly, I don't know enough about the factors involved (climate/geography, cultivation techniques, fertilizers, etc.,) to be able to make educated evaluations of how efficient each is this regard. High efficiency per unit of energy in Brazil may be due to climate, for instance. It seems that the information readily available to us suggests that Brazil's efficiency is higher, but the sources disagree on how much (ranging from 1.8 to 8 times as high) and why. If you can find some sources that could navigate this topic better for me/us, I'll happily read them.

No, I don't think you are. Actually, switchgrass looks awesome from everything I have seen as well. From what I have read, the only limitations on cellulosic ethanol like switchgrass is that the lack of interest in it has ensured that a market hasn't yet developed (as it has for corn-based ethanol), it remains water intensive, and that the technology involved in cellulosic ethanol production is as of yet underdeveloped. These limitations, however, can easily be overcome (in the case of the technology/market) with government assistance or remain problems for alternative ethanol sources (corn/sugar cane), so I think switchgrass is a very, very promising avenue.

Again, though, given the underdeveloped status of cellulosic ethanol, we have to rely on a more substantive energy source for the present time. Given this reality, corn-based ethanol seems to be a valid energy source and Obama's championship in favor of corn-based ethanol should not be subject to allegations of corruption.

I think that this is the real argument that you want to get across. I suspect that the rest of the discussion is superfluous to you.

Also, I should refer you to a source provided by roubles: NY Times.

It says:

and

Emphasis added.

In case the point isn't absolutely clear: Obama supports switchgrass and other forms of cellulosic ethanol, which are seemingly better than either corn or sugar cane ethanol.

so what you're saying is that Obama just plain likes alternative energy sources in general?

that's always good.

You need to prove that Obama is protecting an interest group at the expense of the US, rather than asserting it on the basis of your ideology and then assuming that we will accept it without support. If Obama's support for the ethanol tariff is just a special interest group move, why did the 2008 Farm Bill (which upholds the tariff) pass through the House and Senate twice with enough bipartisan support to override a presidential veto even when Obama was not present to vote?

More importantly, I am not claiming that corn ethanol can compete easily with Brazilian ethanol. I don't fetishize competition. Instead, I am arguing that the intention (if not the result) of the tariffs are to protect our developing ethanol industry.

I didn't say we had to choose between the two nor did I say sugar cane was a miracle cure. Please argue against what I wrote instead of setting up straw men. I advocated removing the tarifs on sugar cane ethanol. Anything that could lower fuel prices should be done. You didn't address the much bigger problem I mentioned which that current fuel prices will cause high inflation and push up interest rates that will damage a housing market that is already the worst since the Great Depression. With large banks and Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac losing billions and facing insolvency, the first priority is to not acclerate the housing downturn by letting inflation and rates go higher than they are now.

Not to repeat myself, but the much bigger and possibly catastrophic problem for the US NOW is housing and whatever can be done to stabilize housing should be done. If you read my previous posts elsewhere, you'll see I place blame for the current economic situation on BOTH parties so the fact the farm bill received support from both parties does nothing to change my mind.
I don't care about the 2 major parties and I support whatver I think is best for the US and on this issue I think John McCain is right.

You are welcome to provide some evidence that suggests that Brazilian excess ethanol production is sufficient to lower American fuel prices in a meaningful amount (specifically, enough to offset the damage caused to our domestic ethanol industry). One source suggests that eliminating all of the US tariffs on ethanol would drop the price of corn by 14.5% while driving down domestic ethanol production by 11.5%. I can't seem to find a solid number of how much we would save at the pump per gallon if all the tariffs were removed, but I will try to do the math. That same source listed that removing the tariffs would cause a $3.5 billion loss for gasoline producers (by which I assume that they mean annually). The EIA says that the US consumes 20,687,000 barrels of petroleum per day (in 2006). If both of these numbers are correct, we would see a savings of $2.16 per barrel if the tariffs were removed (and no price gouging kept oil prices up).

Now, my numbers may be completely off, but if my calculations were right, then the drop in oil prices dropped more than that amount last Wednesday alone (and the change in price at the pump was an average of $0.01). Again, I could be looking at the numbers in the wrong way, but it appears that the drop in prices would not be sufficient to warrant slashing our domestic ethanol production. Perhaps it comes down to a question of values on the issue of the tariff, but I don't think that Obama is selling out the interests of the public over that $0.01 per gallon price difference.

If anyone else can find a more reliable estimate, I would welcome it. I am only doing the math myself in the absence of published estimates (that I could find).

Ok, let's look at your original argument. You wrote:

Your argument was that sugar cane ethanol is more energy efficient and clean than corn-based ethanol and therefore Obama must be corrupt to continue to support corn-based ethanol.

Now your argument is that Obama is hurting America by opposing lifting the ethanol tariff.

I will argue against your argument when you decide to settle on one. The only consistency in your argumentation is that you are trying to disagree with Obama no matter what the cost.

Sorry about the delay; I am going through your posts in sequence...

Arguing that the current economic system has something to do with the Farm Bill is quite different than saying that one could only support it if they were the pawn of interest groups. In that post I was asking if you were still willing to maintain your assertion that Obama is serving special interests (AG business), given wide support for the bill from people without such interests? In other words, not only those with AG business interests supported the bill, so the burden of proof falls on you to give reasonable grounds for belief that Obama's specific reason for supporting the bill is his link to AG business.