If you are an American and somehow think it's okay to gut food stamps as the majority of the Republican House just voted to do, you really ought to get more informed on who receives such aid and why they need it.
The argument the House rightie leaders had was most Americans want to work not accept help. Wow, what geniuses. Seriously they said that. So what are their programs to get more jobs? Nada. Absolutely no programs. The only thing I hear from them is something geared to give more profit and less taxes for the richest Americans.If anybody ever thought that would help, the years since Reagan have proven the lie of it.
It's hard to comprehend their rhetoric or to understand how people like this keep getting elected by Americans in any state. Yes, there has been fraud in food stamps but it's not by the poorest. It's by the richer element who have found a way to bilk the system like the grocery store owner recently charged. This is the kind of person who doesn't mind stealing from the poor to enrich their own coffers-- which is what they are doing by such cheating. It's not the norm and besides if it was, fix that, don't punish the children in poor families, who get most of the aid.
The truth of low incomes and why people end up needing something like food stamps is hardly anything a rightie cares about. The fact that the wealthiest Americans keep getting richer while the middle stays where it was and the poor get poorer, none of that matters to the kind of people who pay no attention to facts but want to justify their own greed. Those House Representatives know which side their bread (of which they have plenty) is buttered on. The irony is many who vote for this kind of leader are often poor themselves but they have been duped into voting against their own best interests by clever ads and people like the Koch brothers for whom there will never be enough money.
The solution by the right to inequality? They just voted on it-- take away more from the poor. It is enough to make any caring person cry.
Frankly, I don't know who Americans are; but if 2014 doesn't see the type of elected officials who did this get thrown out of office, if they continue to vote for leaders who are only there to help the rich, I can tell you one thing they are not-- Christians in words or action.
"For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me..." Matthew 25:35
23 comments:
Another good link on the hypocrisy of this-- Congress steak vodka and caviar
I can get over the meanness of this.
Why are these Patriotic mouthpieces not screaming about the wall street types taking our money?
It's hard to understand, Tabor :(
Tabor, because they are well connected to the Wall St. types! I think all of congress should have to live on food stamps for six months before voting on it.
So they are trying to reduce the benefits for able bodied people with no children. Maybe if they could find a job in Obama's America we would not need so many people on food stamps. The able bodied no kid crowd on food stamps has almost tripled under Obama, but as a Community organizer he sees that as a success. Most Presidents would see doubling the number of people on public assistance as an economic failure but not him.
Has it dawned on you, ingineer, that the problem is the downturn in the economy, more poor and programs they can use which the Republicans will end? So instead of trying to come up with ideas for jobs, the republican idea is end help for the poor. Brilliant for those who only care about themselves. Obama has tried to do a lot of things and been constantly blocked by those who only want to make him fail to somehow win in a partisan sense. They don't care about anybody but themselves and the rich who can give them money. This is also about drug testing which want that to be everybody? more government invasion? how about drug testing Congress? oh no, it's not them who need it only the weak and poor. Sorry but this is not about helping anybody but the rich.
You just keep voting for them. You will find out someday you aren't going to benefit from them either. It's like the frog in the hot water... eventually it'll be you because you let it happen thinking it only will be hurting someone else.
Another we were too nice to the hungry. Farm subsidies to corporate farms, food subsidies to Congressmen on lush 'fact finding' trips, but the poor, oh they have to be cut (from the little it is now) and humiliated by drug testing. Love how the party of little government likes vaginal invasions and extra cost for drug testing (treating the poor like someone on probation from a crime) and to their voters, they cheer. What kind of people want to humiliate others while they overlook the misuses by the fat cats? Oh I know, those who like to think that fat cats can't be touched but the weak and the poor, oh we can get them!
Being poor in America means that you have to buy the iPhone 5C instead of the 5S.
ingineer, you keep convincing me you don't genuinely know any poor people. You are a nice guy but that was a totally ignorant thing to say about those you only know about through your right wing radio programs :(
One thing that has come out of all this is that about half of the people currently on SNAP (food stamps) have been on them for eight years or longer. None of them started on the program because of job losses since the 2008-09 economy crash. For many it has indeed become a way of life.
I don't know what the answer is, or even if there is one, but the changes made to the general welfare programs in 1996 have reduced the use of those programs and encouraged some who had been on them to get a job. Those changes did not affect the SNAP program. Perhaps there are some things that can and should be done to the program and maybe this will start a discussion of what really does need to be done, if anything.
One thing that would help would be upping the minimum wage. If you have seen the way they calculate who gets what amount, it's a really low salary. These are often the same ones without health care and it's not going to get better so long as Americans are convinced somehow their fast food would cost too much if the workers in those places were paid a living wage.
It's not surprising that a lot of people are on them for a long time. What would improve their lives to get more income? What are Republicans suggesting that would help with that? If you see the charts for a mother and say two children, they don't get a lot of money toward food. Certainly not what Congress wants on any trip they take.
What gets me is how so many look the other way when the poor are told they need to have random drug tests to get food assistance. How about if they did that to seniors to get Medicare? You'd hear the yelling from everywhere but the poor and nobody cares because they blame the poor for being poor :( IF you know very many genuinely poor people, you know it's not a choice. It's often due to natural genetics, to opportunity, to family heritage, to mental issues. When I think of the ones around here, they are good people but they are poor. So they should starve because they don't have the ability to earn a good wage? You should see their homes, how they live and then tell me how well off they are.
The iPhone comment was a joke. But there are plenty of people on government assistance that have smart phones. Heck the government will help you get you one and a home phone too.
And I agree on the minimum wage. It should be $117,000 per year. That is what a freshman Congressman makes and they are only worth minimum wage. Of course a loaf of bread will cost $50 and a steak dinner $500 but who cares we will be paying a living wage to high school kids and low skill entry level workers. That is who used to make minimum wage. But in the Obama economy those jobs are being done by people trying to support a family and it is intended as a starting or training wage not to support a family. The only way to really help people get out of poverty is to get them a decent job. And there are not nearly as many of those as there were in 2008. The uncertainty of Obamacare and all the other big government economic decisions by the current administration has slowed the economic growth and prolonged the economic downturn. That is why millions of illegals have returned to Mexico. They can do better down there because the economy is in the tank up here. And now farmers are having trouble finding enough workers. And most white people won't do that work when they can get 99+ weeks of unemployment to sit at home.
And I think most everyone agrees Rain that the truly poor people like the ones that you mention need help, but there are not 50 million of those type of poor people in the country. But 50 million people are on food stamps. That is why is we need reasonable welfare control laws. It used to be easier to get welfare than food stamps. I am not sure if that is still the case. It has been a long time since I was poor.
When a Republican gets in office like when Bush was and it was getting so bad, who will you have to blame? It's all his fault and you ignore the wealthy making away like crooks. Amazing how easy it is to dupe some people. Like the hotshot article on the UK Mail where a guy claims he eats lobster and steak on $200 a month food stamps, single, young man who likes to surf and not work. It's supposed to be an example of the ones cheating the system except who can really exist and eat so well on that with no work? I have the answer-- a drug dealer and that's about it. The guy looked like a caricature of Fast Times at Ridgmont High and probably that's what he was along with most of what so infuriates the right to want to end help for the poor. It's so easy to turn some from looking at the real cause of this. they must chuckle to themselves at how easy it is to manipulate and cause you and others like you to miss the real profit takers in our generation. Inflation has only profited them but sure not the ones at the bottom of the working food chain but maybe the righties think they also will be rich; so must protect them. *shaking my head*
As for the minimum wage, I'd say $10 an hour is minimum and ideally $12 to start but then keep up with cost of living. But righties don't want that as they are trying to also end for the old any decent cost of living. rather than up the level of income where you pay the tax, they would solve it by ending its value for future generations. Good luck with voting for those guys who care about you...
I just read an article by Greg Easterbrook of the Atlantic Monthly which allows us to see this situation from another perspective. It’s about how the owners of pro football teams benefit directly from the tax payers. Here are the two most egregious examples of political hypocrisy I gleaned from the piece: The Republican governor of Virginia, Bob McDonnell, who has a reputation for being a “budget slashing” conservative, gave 4 million dollars to the Washington Redskins for an upgrade to their workout facility. He did this when the state legislature was out of session in an attempt to avoid scrutiny. Dan Snyder, the Redskins owner, has a reported net worth of 1 billion dollars. I think he could easily afford to remodel the facility out of his own pocket. Bobby Jindal, another Republican governor known for his anti-spending conservatism, Gives 6 million dollars each year, extracted from public coffers, to Tom Benson, owner of the Saints, as an inducement to keep the team in New Orleans. I mention the fact that these two governors are Republican because of their insistence that our country just can’t afford to have social safety nets, yet they oversee a massive transfer of funds from the public treasure into private pockets. But, publicly elected officials of both parties, are willing to finance the building of new football stadiums , insure the lavish lifestyles of the owners, and grant tax exempt status to sports franchises, all at taxpayer expense. They justify their actions by claiming that the sport brings jobs and revenue to the area, but the benefits of having a sports team in your town are very small compared to the amount of money taxpayers have to relinquish. Professional football is only a small part of the picture. States and cities allow corporations to set up shop with tax exempt status, infrastructure paid for by the tax payers, and then provide low wage jobs and pollute the environment with impunity. I know of no conservative thinker who has ever criticized the payment of welfare to the rich. The problem is not the greedy poor. It is an utterly corrupt government. There is no political party that represents the interests of the American people. They have all sold themselves to the 1%.
Frustrating but true, Wally. I wonder if an honorable person got there would they soon become like the rest or get killed or impeached...
I like a bumper sticker I saw: Democrats think the glass is half full. Republicans think it's theirs.
Republicans believe in largess but only to themselves and their clients. They don't care if millions of their fellow Americans get nothing.
They are mean.
Hattie do you even know any republicans?
Going further on poverty in the US and the bogus info spent out by the right wing that infuriates so many voters, give this one a try: Conservative case for welfare reform suffers a massive blow regarding the cato institute study. So many want to believe what suits them about the poor. Hopefully they are willing to look at the other side. We used to believe in a safety net in this country. Some don't anymore. How big a population of the right would that be?
Some highlights from the Cato study: There are 126 different Federal programs to help the poor. And Idaho which offers one of the lowest benefit amounts has the highest number of people working while getting some welfare. It looks like the report proves the case that giving somebody $20 an hour to sit at home keeps them from working but giving them less motivates them to work.
And the study shows that under Obama both unemployment and welfare rolls are up.
you mean the discredited study, Ingineer? You are using it to make a point when it's only being believed by the Limbaugh faction.
The only place you find statistics to back up your position, ingineer, is far right (I just looked). Basically unless someone is handicapped, they can only be on welfare so long. The thing is when we went into the recession, it's logical that more people would need help. Is logic something the right wing uses these days?
And where you'd get the information that anyone who could work gets $3200 a month on welfare and can choose not to work? Cato Institute maybe? Check out who runs that-- who runs Cato
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