“Agriculture” on The Daily Caller

WASHINGTON (AP) — The heads of two Iowa egg farms linked to as many as 1,600 salmonella illnesses this summer gave Congress few answers in testimony about the conditions at their farms Wednesday, as one executive would not testify and the other did not answer many of the lawmakers’ questions. (more)

White lightning, mountain dew, firewater — you know it as the illicit substance made in secret by tax-dodging mountain men and drunk by people looking to alter their reality in a serious way. (more)

An op-ed in Sunday’s New York Times about the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals by rock singer Bono (yes, you read that right) was naive and misguided.  The minimal successes at improving the health and wealth of the poor he cited have been vastly overshadowed by negative policies and actions by UN agencies. (more)

MEXICO CITY — The movie that Mexican director Luis Estrada is putting out for his country’s bicentennial is bluntly named “Hell.” (more)

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — U.S. Agriculture Department employees worked full-time at two Iowa egg farms at the center of a salmonella outbreak and massive recall, but two former workers said they ignored complaints about conditions at one site. (more)

WELLINGTON, New Zealand (AP) — The reclusive New Zealand billionaire buying the U.S. maker of Hefty brand trash bags to create the world’s second-biggest packaging business started out as a tow truck driver and bounced back from the brink of bankruptcy more than a decade ago to become his country’s richest person. (more)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Food and Drug Administration officials said Monday that there is no evidence a massive outbreak of salmonella in eggs has spread beyond two Iowa farms, though a team of investigators is still trying to figure out what caused it. (more)

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — A judge’s ruling halting planting of genetically modified sugar beet seeds has left growers feeling uncertain as they wait for federal officials to decide the next step for a crop that provides half of the nation’s sugar supply. (more)

Police in Washington state said they arrested a banana-suited man who allegedly exposed himself in a Wendy’s before brandishing a shotgun near a golf course. (more)

WASHINGTON (AP) — An Iowa egg producer is recalling 228 million eggs after being linked to an outbreak of salmonella poisoning. (more)

NEW YORK (AP) — A dollar for a 40-ounce bottle of ketchup? Yawn. Four bucks for a 12-pack of Coke? No sale. (more)

SHIKARPUR, Pakistan (AP) — Victims of Pakistan’s deadly floods mobbed relief trucks carrying food Tuesday and authorities in the northwest warned of famine unless the region’s farmers got immediate help with planting new crops. (more)

ISLAMABAD, Pakistan (AP) — U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said he has never seen anything like the flood disaster in Pakistan, and urged foreign donors to speed up assistance to the 20 million people affected. (more)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Two American tobacco companies are paying nearly $30 million to settle charges that they bribed foreign officials to get lucrative overseas tobacco sales contracts. (more)

MANCHESTER, Conn. (AP) — Omar Thornton sat calmly in a meeting with union representative and his supervisors as they showed a video of him stealing beer from the distributor where he worked. (more)

Ruth Graham took a page from her favorite cable news host’s playbook this week and went on vacation. However, unlike Keith, she’s spending her time off away from the computer. By Tuesday night’s episode of Countdown, we realized that our interns hadn’t built up the mental and physical fortitude they’d need to cope with Ruth’s usual assignment, so instead, we decided to have them scour the keith@keitholbermann.com inbox for new entries in the KeithOlbermann.com Cornell College essay contest. Though we’ve already announced official winners and runners up, we think some of the other entries we’ve received are worth sharing. (more)

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — BP and the Obama administration offered significantly differing views Sunday on whether the capped Gulf of Mexico oil well will have to be reopened, a contradiction that may be an effort by the oil giant to avoid blame if crude starts spewing again. (more)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats and Republicans are framing the elections in starkly different terms, with GOP strategists painting it as a national referendum on President Barack Obama and the party in power, and Democrats working feverishly to make all politics local. (more)

Farmers claim that performing William Shakespeare’s plays to cows can help them produce more milk. (more)

WASILLA, Alaska (AP) — Prepare your palate for carnivorous cocktails. (more)