It’s easy to shrug or laugh off political proposals in the first few months of an odd-numbered year. Newly elected politicians hit the airwaves with all sorts of ideas that they campaigned on, blissfully ignorant of how the process of passing a bill through Congress is actually supposed to work.

But when it comes to the so-called “Green New Deal,” farmers and ranchers shrug and scoff at their peril.

Championed by socialist media darling Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, this “deal” calls for an end to fossil fuels and 100 percent adoption of “clean” energy by 2030, according to the proposal’s full language as provided on the Green Party’s website.

It doesn’t take long to imagine what this shift would mean for agriculture.

“Going to 100 percent clean energy by 2030 means reducing energy demand as much as possible,” the document reads. “This will require energy conservation and efficiency; replacing non-essential individual means of transport with high-quality and modern mass transit, and eliminating the use of fossil-based fertilizers and pesticides. Along with these steps it will be necessary to electrify everything else, including transport, heating, etc.”

So your pickup and family sedan are now “non-essential individual means of transport.” And those fertilizers and pesticides? Don’t even think about bringing them out of the shed.

Welcome to organic agriculture, if you can find a light rail line that will take you to your farm.

The “Green New Deal” document complains that federal programs now “benefit large agribusiness corporations”, timber giants and other industries “at the expense of” small producers and the environment. Instead, the government would “redirect that money to the real job creators who make our communities more healthy, sustainable and secure at the same time.”

And that’s just the beginning. These folks won’t stop with controlling agriculture or even the energy sector; they’re after the whole American economy and form of government.

They pledge to end unemployment “once and for all by guaranteeing a job at a living wage for every American willing and able to work,” with government jobs picking up “the slack.” Big, new federal agencies would “(i)nvest in sustainable businesses including cooperatives and nonprofits” while corporations would be stripped of key legal rights.

The document may not ban cow flatulence as was widely feared, but you can bet its proponents are thinking about it. A companion document from Ocasio-Cortez’ office obtained by National Public Radio notes that the goal is net-zero, rather than zero, emissions by 2030 “because we aren’t sure that we’ll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast.”

What growers need to remember is this isn’t some opening negotiation on a new clean energy bill whose proponents will take half a loaf. These people are serious.

They don’t particularly like our Constitution, they don’t like free markets, and if you’re a commercial farmer or rancher who grows conventionally, they don’t like you.