Food Stamp Nation

[Danno 1,228]

October 08, 2010

Food Stamp Nation

By Patrick J. Buchanan

"The lessons of history ... show conclusively that continued dependence upon relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fiber. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit."

These searing words about Depression-era welfare are from Franklin Roosevelt's 1935 State of the Union Address. FDR feared this self-reliant people might come to depend permanently upon government for the necessities of their daily lives. Like narcotics, such a dependency would destroy the fiber and spirit of the nation.

What brings his words to mind is news that 41.8 million Americans are on food stamps, and the White House estimates 43 million will soon be getting food stamps every month.

A seventh of the nation cannot even feed itself.

If you would chart America's decline, this program is a good place to begin. As a harbinger of the Great Society to come, in early 1964, a Food Stamp Act was signed into law by LBJ appropriating $75 million for 350,000 individuals in 40 counties and three U.S. cities.

Yet, no one was starving. There had been no starvation since Jamestown, with such exceptions as the Donner Party caught in the Sierra Nevada in the winter of 1846-47, who took to eating their dead.

The Food Stamp Act became law half a decade after J.K. Galbraith in his best-seller had declared 1950s America to be the world's great Affluent Society.

Yet, when Richard Nixon took office, 3 million Americans were receiving food stamps at a cost of $270 million. Then CBS ran a program featuring a premature baby near death, and told us it was an infant starving to death in rich America. The nation demanded action, and Nixon acted.

By the time he left office in 1974, the food stamp program was feeding 16 million Americans at an annual cost of $4 billion.

Fast forward to 2009. The cost to taxpayers of the U.S. food stamp program hit $56 billion. The number of recipients and cost of the program exploded again last year.

Among the reasons is family disintegration. Forty percent of all children in America are now born out of wedlock. Among Hispanics, it is 51 percent. Among African-Americans, it is 71 percent.

Food stamps are feeding children abandoned by their own fathers. Taxpayers are taking up the slack for America's deadbeat dads.

Have food stamps made America a healthier nation?

Consider New York City, where 1.7 million people, one in every five in the city, relies on food stamps for daily sustenance.

Obesity rates have soared. Forty percent of all the kids in city public schools from kindergarten through eighth grade are overweight or obese.

Among poor kids, whose families depend on food stamps, the percentages are far higher. Mothers of poor kids use food stamps to buy them sugar-heavy soda pop, candy and junk food.

Yet Mayor Michael Bloomberg's proposal to the Department of Agriculture that recipients not be allowed to use food stamps to buy sugar-rich soft drinks has run into resistance.

"The world might be better ... if people limited their purchases of sugared beverages," said George Hacker of the Center for Science in the Public Interest. "However, there are a great many ethical reasons to consider why one would not stigmatize people on food stamps."

The Department of Agriculture in 2004 denied a request by Minnesota that would have disallowed food stamp recipients from using them for junk food. To grant the request, said the department, would "perpetuate the myth" that food stamps users make poor shopping decisions.

But is that a myth or an inconvenient truth?

What a changed country we have become in our expectations of ourselves. A less affluent America survived a Depression and world war without anything like the 99 weeks of unemployment insurance, welfare payments, earned income tax credits, food stamps, rent supplements, day care, school lunches and Medicaid we have today.

Public or private charity were thought necessary, but were almost always to be temporary until a breadwinner could find work or a family could get back on its feet. The expectation was that almost everyone, with hard work and by keeping the nose to the grindstone, could make his or her own way in this free society. No more.

What we have accepted today is a vast permanent underclass of scores of millions who cannot cope and must be carried by the rest of society -- fed, clothed, housed, tutored, medicated at taxpayer's expense for their entire lives. We have a new division in America: those who pay a double fare, and those who forever ride free.

We Americans are not only not the people our parents were, we are not the people we were. FDR was right about what would happen to the country if we did not get off the narcotic of welfare.

America has regrettably already undergone that "spiritual and moral disintegration, fundamentally destructive to the national fiber."

[Heracles 417]

Do you seriously think Dems are to blame for this too?

• What political affiliation are a majority of CEO, COO, Boards and business owners?
  
• Who in an organization - well an American organization - decides head count or whether to establish operations abroad? To save a dime..
  
• Who is more interested in allowing the few to amass massive and often ridiculous amounts of wealth, while the American people - like yourself - fight for scraps?
  
• Which party prefers to build a third worldesque economy that relies on few that are wealthy to spend, than the middle class be paid a reasonable salary?
  
• Which party has fiscal policies that no other first world countries endorses?
  
• Which party endorsed and encouraged the lawless gambling of America's wealth and pursuit of greed [at any cost] that caused this financial crisis?
  

Now legitimately and honestly ask yourself, who is responsible for so many Americans being on food-stamps?

There is one answer to every single one of these questions.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Heracles

[spookyturtle 9,466]

Now legitimately and honestly ask yourself, who is responsible for so many Americans being on food-stamps?

Mexicans?

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

It isa not accepted, it is cultivated. we created a "poverty industry" which employs hundreds of thousands of government people in secure good paying jobs given to tpeople that otherwise have nothing to offer a for-profit business. They ADVERTISE for people to apply for food stamps and continually increase the amount of income needed to make to be disqualifed. People with a family of four (2 children) in Vermont can receive food stamps up to an income of more than $3600 per month PLUS free school lunches and breakfasts which I pay more than $100 per month for. $3600 per month is NOT impoverished. Because they do not have enough applicants, they are actively adverticing for more people to jump on the food stamp wagon, even touting the amount you can make and still qualify.

There is no intent, desire or incentive for the government to do anything to end poverty.

[Danno 1,228]

It isa not accepted, it is cultivated. we created a "poverty industry" which employs hundreds of thousands of government people in secure good paying jobs given to tpeople that otherwise have nothing to offer a for-profit business. They ADVERTISE for people to apply for food stamps and continually increase the amount of income needed to make to be disqualifed. People with a family of four (2 children) in Vermont can receive food stamps up to an income of more than $3600 per month PLUS free school lunches and breakfasts which I pay more than $100 per month for. $3600 per month is NOT impoverished. Because they do not have enough applicants, they are actively adverticing for more people to jump on the food stamp wagon, even touting the amount you can make and still qualify.

There is no intent, desire or incentive for the government to do anything to end poverty.

YOu perfectly highlight the other party which clings to the social program. like it is a narcotic..... the Government agencies and the tens of thousands of workers in them who have every incentive to not only maintain their incoming cash flow .....but to grow it even larger.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Danno

[Gary and Alla 3,694]

Do you seriously think Dems are to blame for this too?

• What political affiliation are a majority of CEO, COO, Boards and business owners?
  
• Who in an organization - well an American organization - decides head count or whether to establish operations abroad? To save a dime..
  
• Who is more interested in allowing the few to amass massive and often ridiculous amounts of wealth, while the American people - like yourself - fight for scraps?
  
• Which party prefers to build a third worldesque economy that relies on few that are wealthy to spend, than the middle class be paid a reasonable salary?
  
• Which party has fiscal policies that no other first world countries endorses?
  
• Which party endorsed and encouraged the lawless gambling of America's wealth and pursuit of greed [at any cost] that caused this financial crisis?
  

Now legitimately and honestly ask yourself, who is responsible for so many Americans being on food-stamps?

There is one answer to every single one of these questions.

Yesm I absolutely believe they are. Now I will answer your questions one by one (something you never do)

1. Democrat. Corporate donations to political campaigns were heavily in favor of Democrats

2. Tax accountant. He points out how the corporation can avoid millions or billions in tax costs, EPA regulations, employee benefits, payroll tax, ADA, FMLA, etc. by moving manufacturing elsewhere.

3. Intelligent people do not limit what one can earn. Minimum wage is bad enough...maximum wage is inexcusable

4. Democrats.

5. Democrats. Except it isn't "lawless" On July 12, 1999 President Bill Clinton, Democrat, signed into law the exact legislation that caused all this mess in an effort to allow people to own homes that had no business owning homes. It worked.

Democrats promote and cultivate the food stamp nation to keep democrat politicians employed.

[Heracles 417]

Mexicans?

VIVA! Actually illegal immigration is a problem too. A big problem..

What happens to salaries when there is unlimited access to under the table cheap workers?

What happens to Americans prosperity and the country as a whole?

What happens to the level of poverty for Americans?

[Danno 1,228]

Do you seriously think Dems are to blame for this too?

• What political affiliation are a majority of CEO, COO, Boards and business owners?
  
• Who in an organization - well an American organization - decides head count or whether to establish operations abroad? To save a dime..
  
• Who is more interested in allowing the few to amass massive and often ridiculous amounts of wealth, while the American people - like yourself - fight for scraps?
  
• Which party prefers to build a third worldesque economy that relies on few that are wealthy to spend, than the middle class be paid a reasonable salary?
  
• Which party has fiscal policies that no other first world countries endorses?
  
• Which party endorsed and encouraged the lawless gambling of America's wealth and pursuit of greed [at any cost] that caused this financial crisis?
  

Now legitimately and honestly ask yourself, who is responsible for so many Americans being on food-stamps?

There is one answer to every single one of these questions.

Who said Dems were the sole shareholder in this business?

[Heracles 417]

Yesm I absolutely believe they are. Now I will answer your questions one by one (something you never do)

1. Democrat. Corporate donations to political campaigns were heavily in favor of Democrats

2. Tax accountant. He points out how the corporation can avoid millions or billions in tax costs, EPA regulations, employee benefits, payroll tax, ADA, FMLA, etc. by moving manufacturing elsewhere.

3. Intelligent people do not limit what one can earn. Minimum wage is bad enough...maximum wage is inexcusable

4. Democrats.

5. Democrats. Except it isn't "lawless" On July 12, 1999 President Bill Clinton, Democrat, signed into law the exact legislation that caused all this mess in an effort to allow people to own homes that had no business owning homes. It worked.

Democrats promote and cultivate the food stamp nation to keep democrat politicians employed.

Now you are just being ridiculous and talking out of the buttocks. That Democrats make up a majority of boards, CEO etc.. That Clinton is to blame for the derivatives or falsifying of information to promote risky loans as legitimate loans. What planet are you living on...

How intelligent is it for few people to amass a majority of the wealth, while the rest remain poor? How does this assist the country in any way?

You live in a liberal state and enjoy the perks but then hate them. How about you go live in a low taxing state, with negligible benefits or infrastructure first. Then come talk about Liberteapartian fiscal ideals all you like.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

Now you are just being ridiculous and talking out of the buttocks. That Democrats make up a majority of boards, CEO etc.. That Clinton is to blame for the derivatives or falsifying of information to promote risky loans as legitimate loans. What planet are you living on...

How intelligent is it for few people to amass a majority of the wealth, while the rest remain poor? How does this assist the country in any way?

You live in a liberal state and enjoy the perks but then hate them. How about you go live in a low taxing state, with negligible benefits or infrastructure first. Then come talk about Liberteapartian fiscal ideals all you like.

Actually he is...... look up Brooksley Born and how the administration destroyed her.

[Heracles 417]

Who said Dems were the sole shareholder in this business?

I think you missed the point. The fiscal policies towards investing in the country and taxes is exactly why so many Americans are on food stamps - dirt poor. Naturally, this is coupled with the 20 million illegal aliens working here of course.

The biggest socialist drive of them all is the Military, yet Repubs have no problem with it or the money wasted on it. It's communist actually, since you have to do what they say in it either. The military has the lowest ROI of any dollar spent, even less than giving people cash. Had you guys at the very least talked about reducing the expenditure to a reasonable $200 billion, from the annual ~$1.6 trillion a year, then I'd listen to lectures on fiscal responsibility.

This reminds me of the campaign against the Dem running for senator in NC. Since people can now hide under faux organizations like Americans for Apple pie, they can say and donate anything towards a cause. For example, there is one group who has commercials running against government spending and other rubbish, yet the founder receives over $1 million dollars in farm subsidies.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Heracles

[Heracles 417]

Actually he is...... look up Brooksley Born and how the administration destroyed her.

I did and saw this amongst other things, "the Bush administration's continued rejection of Born's (and thus the CFTC's) urgent warnings for the necessity of regulation to stave off just such a collapse". Looks like she did everything she could to sound the warning bells but the Repubs and co, pulled a Soviet style leadership and refused to listen.

Now what restrictions were placed during the last eight Repub years in office? Which party has been saying for years that the market can self-regulate? Dems? BS!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932010

The whole crisis reeks of greed, as well as unabated and unregulated Liberteapartian style capitalism. Another recession and another decade lost by American greed.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Heracles

[peejay 327]

Politicians derive their power and influence over people by making them dependent on them and/or creating conditions that require the people to go through them to get what they need.

[Obama 2012 1,714]

I did and saw this amongst other things, "the Bush administration's continued rejection of Born's (and thus the CFTC's) urgent warnings for the necessity of regulation to stave off just such a collapse". Looks like she did everything she could to sound the warning bells but the Repubs and co, pulled a Soviet style leadership and refused to listen.

Now what restrictions were placed during the last eight Repub years in office? Which party has been saying for years that the market can self-regulate? Dems? BS!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932010

The whole crisis reeks of greed, as well as unabated and unregulated Liberteapartian style capitalism. Another recession and another decade lost by American greed.

the CFTC was useless by the end of the Clinton Admin.

Don't trust wikipedia for your intel lol.

http://www.netflix.com/WiMovie/Frontline-The-Warning/70127213?strackid=269eb05a07b27208_0_srl&strkid=608052286_0_0&trkid=438381 <--- if you have Netflix - watch and learn.

or you can watch it here: http://video.pbs.org/video/1302794657/ - as well.

Edited October 9, 2010 by Paul and Vanessa

[lostinblue 1,989]

2 Thessalonians 3:10 For even when we were with you, this we commanded you, that if any would not work, neither should he eat. America is the best place in the world to be poor. Every child has a color tv in their rooms .$100 jeans,$300.sneakers. This along with a cell phone in every backpack. If the parents have a child or 6 why should they sacrifice. Let the taxpayers foot the bill. After all it would be a crime and great shame if you had to drive your child to school in a 10 year old car . God forbid if he had to ride the school bus that runs by his house almost empty twice a day. We have run out of money people but Washington spends like it is 1999