It's no secret that U.S. farm subsidies have devolved into a multibillion-dollar federal giveaway that has grown to exclude small farmers and instead pad the pockets of the wealthiest growers.

Unfortunately, the farm bill up for debate in the House today is proving to be no exception. The bill has rightly rankled everyone from environmentalists to small farmers to the White House.

It also has divided Congressional Democrats, who can't seem to reconcile the bill's high-income caps and emphasis on lucrative row crops, with the need to push for conservation, specialty crops such as fruits and vegetables, and truly help family farmers.

Corn farmers, for instance, would receive $2 billion in payments over the next five years — despite record-setting corn prices fueled by the ethanol boom.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has been roundly criticized for her version of farm-subsidy "reform" that allows subsidies for farmers earning up to $1 million annually. That's better than the $2.5 million cap, but hardly reasonable. The Bush administration, which suggested a $200,000 cap, has already threatened to veto the bill.

Since the size of the subsidy is based on acreage, the most aid has gone to the largest and wealthiest growers.

In the past five years, subsides have gone to Fortune 500 companies and to "hobby" farmers, including Ted Turner ($206,948) and David Rockefeller ($553,782), and even to members of Congress, according to the Environmental Working Group's farm-subsidy database.

Loopholes make limits meaningless. According to The Washington Post, Tyler Farms in Arkansas collected $37 million in subsidies since 1996 by legally dividing itself into 66 separate corporations.

Congress should consider an amendment from Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wis.). Kind's plan would lower income caps to $250,000, reduce direct payments over time and shift more funds to conservation, hunger assistance and rural business development.

That approach moves us far closer to reform than anything House leadership has put forth thus far. It deserves consideration.