The proposed bailout package for the Manitoba farmer is as effective as treating a hemophiliac with a band-aide. A $50 million lifeline may prevent a few farmers from pulling the plug but it won't put the agro-industry on the road to recovery.

The subsidy will more likely be a shot in the arm to politicians hoping to torque the bailout package into a positive publicity event.

The optics of farmers at the steps of the Legislature with cap in hand couldn't have been better scripted by the government itself.

Politics is about clever spin and positive press. And politicians love nothing more than to be seen extending a fist full of cash to their beleaguered subjects, especially at a rally. The photo-op is fantastic.

The formula works something like this. Government harvests a bumper crop of farm taxes, filters it through bureaucracy and throws some crumbs back in the form of a cash bailout all the while expecting great press and thunderous applause.

The Agriculture Minister and the Premier give dozens of media interviews with their "awe shucks we've given it our best for the family farm" diatribe and then demonize an insensitive federal government for playing scrooge with the surplus.

It's public relations 101. Curry favour by redistributing money and blame someone else (Ottawa) for the shortfall. And in the meantime, why not deflect some of the bad press onto the farmer's protest.

The media commented on the irony of the country's most rugged individualists and entrepreneurs asking for government money. Hidden from the cameras was the more genuine message that farmers would have preferred to communicate: "Get government off of my back so I can make an honest living."

The attitude was summed up in a Sun guest column by Rolf Penner who says, "farmers really hate subsidies." And that the federal and provincial governments should "untie our hands and get out of our way."

Government is a relatively recent pest to the prairie farm. When the plow first broke earth in Manitoba, farm income was threatened by natural disasters like drought, frost and hail.

Nowadays the drought comes in the form of slack prices in commodity markets. Killing frosts take the form of regulatory red tape. A hail of user fees pelts down mercilessly, and swarms of tax collecting locusts sweep across the land.

The farm income crisis is an enormous challenge but subsidies are never the solution. Canada doesn't stand a chance to win a subsidy war with the American and European treasuries. But aggressive action at the World Trade Organization backed up with some diplomatic muscle could help level out the subsidy playing field.

The other part of the solution is to reduce the growing tax burden on farmers. Between 1986 and 1999, Manitoba property tax increases outpaced farm input costs by a factor of 3 to 1. The property and education tax burden is fixed and way out of proportion to topsy turvey farm incomes.

Farmers will breath a sigh of relief once government removes education from the property tax bill, cuts red tape and relaxes taxes on fuel, fertilizer and seed.

Instead of relying on cash bailouts as a farm income panacea, Ottawa and the province must lift the oppressive tax burden and over-regulation that is crushing the Manitoba farm.