I understand your line of logic and think it has merit. The problem is with these types of solutions "that are good for the many" is it takes a socialistic type mentality to implement. And the historic success of socialism is, well, absent.

I do think ethanol should compete on its own merits without any subsidy. The early subsidies to get the industry on its feet I could justify only as far as the government has its sticky fingers in everything else so why not ethanol? I understand that big oil gets its own subsidies (no soldier ever died protecting a corn field in the US) so I could set aside my anti-big government hat long enough for them to help the industry overcome the lack of inertia to get a major industry on its feet. Now it needs to compete on its own merit. I believe it is doing just that.

I think we need to get used to the idea that the mandated use will some day go away. It is kind of hanging by a thread right now.

I think you are right about mature industries like farming moving toward cost of production. Nothing new there. The wild card is the weather and environment. If we are heading for a maunder minimum type weather pattern, farming in the right latitudes might become very lucrative. For Canadians, not so much so. You better hope the global warming crowd is right.

John