They made you look

For better or worse, these are the people who made you look - the people who made a difference for better or worse - during the twelve turbulent months of 2007

· Michael Chertoff, the man from ICE and Homeland Security Chief. He finally took the immigration bull by the horns in a massive but Scrooge-like pre-Christmas raid on a half dozen Swift plants. He corralled 1300 workers but only a handful were ‘keepers.’ Let’s see if his bold maneuver keeps the issue front-and-center on the political stage long enough for the beltway banditos to finally do something about immigration reform.

· Leo McDonnell, R-CALF’s original rabble rouser. This cranky child he brought to the American ag scene in 1998 helped slap down the vaunted NAIS program and threatens to revive a moribund COOL. The noise made by combined roar of 18,000 angry cattlemen gets heard even if it has to travel all the way from rural Montana to annoy policy-makers in Washington, DC.

· Jiro Kawasaki, Japan’s recently departed Health Minister. He ‘technically’ reopened the Japanese market to U.S. beef in mid-summer. Paying lip service to the science, he kept an eye on local politics and succeeded in creating a de facto ban on U.S. imports, anyway. Come on guys – politics or science - which is it? The same goes for South Korea's Trade Minister Kim Hyun-jong.

· John Stewart, snake-bit Creekstone Farms CEO and founder. Even though he headed up one of the most technologically advanced plants in North America, he couldn’t seem to catch a break on 2006. He made the first shipment of beef to Korea in 3 years only to see it refused. He wanted to test every animal that trotted through his plant for BSE, a reasonable free market response to a scientifically unreasonable demand by his Japanese customers. The USDA, quoting an obscure century old regulation, impolitely told John he wasn’t operating in a free market. Damn the beltway politicos, he said. Full speed ahead! He took it to court. Let the third arm of American politics decide.

· Jamie Willrett, Malta, Illinois cattleman, vice-chairman of NCBA’s Live Cattle Marketing Committee, co-chair of the Beef Industry Checkoff Task Force and NCBA’s Task Force representative. It’s been a busy year, Jamie. He helped guide 18 people to a more or (occasionally) less unified agreement on a short list of suggestions to improve the checkoff. More like herding cats than cattle, it was the first such effort since the beginning of the often controversial program.

· Bill Kurtis, Grass-fed cattle rancher, ex-news man. Not the first but certainly one of the most visible people in this ‘devolution’ of the beef industry. They’re shunning feedyards and the very efficient system that grew to dominate the industry in the 50’s and produced mountains of low cost beef to go back to the way it was pre-WWII. Time magazine recognized the grass-fed boomlet in June, predicting it could comprise as much as 20% of the marketplace in a few years.

· Mike Johanns, USDA secretary and consummate politician. He was everywhere in 2006, speaking to just about every organization that would extend him an invitation. He fought valiantly (if in vain) to reopen Japan and Korea to American beef and pushed NAIS hard but knew when to back off. Possibly the most approachable secretary in at least the last half century, here’s to bigger and better things for him in 2007.

That’s my list. If you’ve got someone in mind who made a difference, drop me a line at crjolley@msn.com. It’s your chance to applaud or send a verbal raspberry. Just tell me who it is and what he or she did that excited or annoyed you.