Despite politicians' constant gripes about wasteful government spending, Congress has long shown little willingness to downsize or overhaul the federal farm-subsidy program. In recent years, Presidents Bush and Obama each tried to trim the farm pork, but couldn't overcome the powerful ag lobby's sway over lawmakers.

Fortunately, Obama isn't giving up. He's rightly determined to stop federal payments to large corporate farms for crops they don't grow, as well as other excesses. His newly announced deficit plan calls for $33 billion in agricultural subsidy cuts over the next decade.

That's significantly more than the $9.7 billion in savings he proposed after taking office in 2009 by placing income limits on money paid out. The new, more-aggressive proposal is the better plan -- one that a deficit-minded Congress should get behind.

Reforming a costly and outdated program gives this Congress, its approval rating at an all-time low, an opportunity to put the needs of the American people ahead of the demands of the farm lobby and big-monied corporate agribusiness. Nearly 45 percent of Americans now think the farm aid is unnecessary, according to a Gallup poll.

The subsidies were started with the good intention of helping Depression-era farmers at a time when most were struggling and most farms were family-owned. The program has since spread into a seemingly endless weed field of costly benefits, including crop insurance, direct payments and low-cost loans, all benefitting numerous wealthy farmers. More than 50 percent of the direct payments go to farmers with annual incomes of $100,000 or higher, according to the White House.

Backing the president's subsidy reduction effort should be a no-brainer for Republicans in Congress who have said their mission is to dramatically cut federal spending. In fact, a budget proposed by Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., who heads the House Budget Committee, included a $30 billion bite out of agriculture subsidies, also within a 10-year framework.

"We shouldn't be giving corporate farms -- these large agribusiness companies -- subsidies," Ryan told reporters earlier this summer. He's right. The way the program works now, subsidies are paid out even when commodity prices are high and to farmers who don't need the help.

It's worth noting that Minnesota Congresswoman Michele Bachmann, a presidential contender, is among the most vocal critics of the subsidies, but also a beneficiary. She's a partner in a family farm in Wisconsin -- valued in 2010 at between $500,001 and $1 million -- which received nearly $260,000 in federal payouts from 1995 to 2008, largely from dairy and corn subsidies.

"The most controversial of these programs are the $5 billion in annual so-called direct payments to farmers of corn, soybeans and other crops, awarded simply for owning tillable farm land, even if they do not plant it," the New York Times reported.

This kind of waste underscores why the shorthand for the subsidies is the "money for nothing program." It's wasteful spending that needs to be curbed. The time is now.