Agriculture Minister Shalom Simhon does not exactly fit in among the other Labor Party politicians. He supports a capitalist economy, reforms and privatization. He even supports lowering taxes and strictly keeping to spending and deficit frameworks.

When Labor Party chief Amir Peretz - supported by his party members - proposed financing the second Lebanon war by burdening the public with more taxes, Simhon objected, saying it was inappropriate, suggesting a one-time budget cut to pay for the war.

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In other words, Simhon is the complete opposite of Amir Peretz, Isaac Herzog and Yuli Tamir - and their anachronistic views.

Except, of course, when it comes to farmers.

This week, Simhon made a rather strange proposal. At a Knesset Finance Committee meeting, he said that the gap between what the farmer receives and the price the consumer pays is "unacceptable." Therefore, he proposed that supermarkets and fruit and vegetable stores be required to post the wholesale price alongside the prices of produce.

Simhon believes that once the public sees how large the gap really is, they will complain to the retail chains, which will be forced to lower consumer prices.

There are so many holes in the proposal that it is nothing but one big mistake. If Simhon's goal was to raise the price paid to farmers - it just won't happen - because even if the supermarket chains lower prices for consumers, the farmers will not see any of the money. And since when is a merchant required to tell his customer what he paid for his goods? Do clothing stores do it? Car dealers?

Certainly this is a joke when talking about a product with a short shelf-life, such as fruit and vegetables. Part of the stock is never sold, some goes bad, some is damaged, and the next day new produce appears at a different price.

And who knows how to budget for expenses, and who can determine the appropriate markup? What about trade secrets?

In short, this is a hallucinatory solution. Such coercion wasn't even tried in the old Soviet Union.

Instead, it would be more appropriate for Simhon to concentrate on the excessive market power of the supermarket chains. He should examine what has happened to the sector after Supersol bought out Clubmarket. He should look into Tnuva's monopoly. He should study the price of milk as a result of the monopoly, and learn about what really goes on in the egg and poultry business. No where else in the world is the quality - and taste - of poultry so poor.

It is true that Tnuva is owned by the kibbutzim and moshavim, but the agriculture minister should think about the good of the entire public.

Oh, and there is one more thing that needs to be taken care of - the quality of fruits and vegetables that reach the markets: It is so poor and inconsistent that we should be embarrassed about it when compared to the rest of the world. So maybe we really do need a reform, but it should start with the farmers.

The grand prize for cynicism undoubtedly goes to the report of a good deed done by Israel: establishing a high voltage power line from Netivot to Gaza in order to provide electricity to the Gaza Strip.

National Infrastructures Minister Benjamin Ben-Eliezer approved the power link. It will be 9.5-kilometers long, and will provide Gaza with 50 megawatts of power. What a wonderful minister. What a generous country.

What the reports left out is that Gaza has been half in the dark for months, because Israel bombed the small power plant there. It was one of the vicious ways of collectively punishing the Palestinians four months ago, which only increases their hatred, in return for the kidnapping of soldier Gilad Shalit.

The bombing of the power station, which provided half of Gaza's electricity, was ignored in Israel - even though it made the lives of over a million Gazans intolerable. Without electricity, it is impossible to even keep the water flowing.

As a result of international pressure over the electrical blackouts, Egyptian engineers are now fixing the power plant, and Israel is laying a new high-voltage power line.

And who will pay for the new line? Of course, Israel will unilaterally take the money out of the taxes it collects on behalf of the Palestinians.

We destroyed and we made money from it, too.