First things first: You can’t rage against “the man,” or complain about “the system,” or pretend to be a “free thinker,” or fashion yourself a rebel, if you are proponent of, or a participant in, the Welfare State. The government coerces people into sacrificing their liberty and independence as they grovel at the feet of the powers that be, begging for a spot at the public trough. This is is not the sort of thing which any self respecting revolutionary or libertarian can abide. Neither can any constitutionalist or freedom lover. You can Occupy Wherever and shout about the “elites,” but who the hell do you think runs the welfare system? And why do you think they run it? The government that lies and kills and maims and conspires to seize power and wealth, also wants nothing more than to hold the poor and disenfranchised close to it’s bosom in a loving embrace? Is that what we’re supposed to believe?
This is the thing that immediately jumped out at me when I saw the Fox News special profiling the California surfer food stamp recipient. While exploring the exploding food stamp rolls they highlighted the interesting case of this one particular west coast EBT enthusiast. He’s 29 years old, he doesn’t have a job, he surfs all day, drinks all night, hangs with his buddies, and eats on the taxpayer’s dime. Oh, and he’s not dining on generic peanut butter and pre-packaged lunch meat — he’s munching on lobster and sushi and shrimp. I’ve never purchased lobster. I’ve never even had brand name cereal. But then again, I have an incentive to be frugal. It’s my own money I’m spending. This guy is a parasite on the Magical Money Tree, why should he deny himself the finer things?
But I also couldn’t help but notice that this mangy surfer stereotype also apparently sings for a punk band. That brings me back to my initial point. Before I ask what’s happened to America, I’d like to know what the hell has happened to punk music if this leech is accepted on the scene? You can’t very well be an advocate for entitlements AND anarchy, can you? Burn the system! Wait, but don’t burn the part of the System that buys me food. Burn, like, most of the System but leave a sliver of it so that I can still get free stuff. Just a sliver of System, that’s all. Yeah! Anarchy! Look at the Misfits sticker on my backpack! Hardcore, bro!
Our politicians will clamor on about “reforms” to the entitlement system. Of course, “reform” is just code for “add more bureaucracy to a bureaucracy to solve the problems created by bureaucracies.” Actual reformation to the Welfare State should be a deformation of the Welfare State. A destruction. A demolition. You can not have liberty in a country where billions of dollars are stolen from those who earned it and given to those who did not. Entitlement programs pervert the electoral process. They subvert and corrupt our cultural values. They can not be defended because there is no way that you can ever make a sound moral argument as to why food should be taken from my children’s mouths and given to you. You have no right to take from me by force. Period. End of story. That’s it. Sorry.
I’m aware that detoxing America from the poison of dependence will take time. We can’t do it overnight. There needs to be a process. So allow me to suggest the first step: First, we must acknowledge that Surfer Dude in California is not an aberration. He’s not a side effect. He’s the entire point. Our government wishes to create monstrosities like him, and they have succeeded many times over. For every sympathy-inducing single mother on welfare and food stamps, there’s a young, able bodied, physically capable man with no dependents leeching off the taxpayers simply because he lacks integrity and character. And that’s my first step in reforming entitlements. Immediately remove every single, physically capable, healthy man with no dependents. Single healthy guys with no kids should not be taking even one damned cent from women and men with kids and bills and houses and responsibilities. Not one cent. These guys can go anywhere, they have nothing tying them down. They have nobody depending on them. They can do whatever needs to be done to survive, and they should be required to do just that. I did it. I lived in a roach infested apartment with no cable and no air conditioning. I worked three jobs at a time to pay the bills. Millions of men have gone through much worse. Why should anyone be exempt?
There’s a great value to teaching men — forcing them — to learn to be independent, to develop survival skills, to figure out how to provide rather than waiting to be provided for. We are manufacturing legions of infantile males who aren’t prepared to be husbands, fathers, men. Maybe that’s because society never gives these dudes any tough love. We never require them to strive and sweat and go a little hungry from time to time.
How well has that worked out, America?
The Matt Walsh Blog 
That’s one way to keep children from being dumped on grandparents front step.
Punk died years ago. Jello Biafra would be ashamed of this tool calling himself punk.
That being said, why can’t we push all of these parasites head first into bear traps?
Great idea!!! They do that with innocent babies, dont they??
Stockholm Syndrome. People have developed an emotional attachment to their masters. To the point where they even vehemothly defend their masters actions. The only cure is to remove the master from their lives and allow them to simply readjust to the actual reality surrounding them the entire time. The Master here being Welfare and Entitlements. No it cannot be done over night but like a baby being taken off the bottle, there will be a lot of crying and bellyaching but Government has a moral responsibility to do what is right for the people of this country, not necessarily do what the people want. Once people understand that welfare is not perpetual, but is limited and eventually abolished for the majority of people, they will realize just what it means to truly be more independent and proud of real accomplishment.
So when are we going to shrug off the banking masters who control the corporate masters who control the government masters? Abolish the Fed, mint Greenbacks under Treasury, and more than 80% of the economic problems we talk about will disappear within two years. Guaranteed.
http://www.amendmentgazette.com/2013/08/02/feudalism-then-and-now/
Maybe there aren’t any jobs that pay mans wages and they are all part-time $8-10/hr. crap jobs with no possible future.
a job is a job . i work 2 jobs just to pay my bills and keep food on my familys table. why cant all men do that? or and before you start saying he need the help. im 60 years old have only one leg and i could be on welfare ssi and getting food stamps but i want. imaman raise by a man to be a man. to take care of my family. i may have only one leg but i still have a pair of balls ty
God bless you, John. And it’s too bad the next generation hasn’t learned to have your attitude.
The reason all men cannot do that is because not all men can even get an interview. My husband is 61 and very WILLING to work and actively LOOKING to work. Since he got laid off from high tech in 2001, he has not been able to find a long lasting decent paying job…period. He worked for am ministry that had lay off after layoff. He worked for a really good job with high pay for a bit and then the company went under. Ever since then, he has been part time for Lowe’s. And he has been applying for YEARS! Almost all applications are taken online with no opportunity to even sell yourself.
It is very disheartening to be willing and able to work and looking for work and you cannot even get an interview! We are three on one part time salary. Yes, we get food stamps. It is the only way we can eat.
And I would like to add that he started at $10/hour and now makes close to $11/hour. That is not much, but he was willing to take it.
In addition, we live in the country because it was the only place we could afford to live. So, now he has a job, but it costs a LOT on gas to get to work. He is willing to get another part time job, but Lowe’s does not use any rhyme or reason for scheduling. He rarely knows more than a week to two ahead what days he will work or what shifts. They make it impossible to get another part time job. He would have to fin a part time job that will give him a set schedule and then move from Lowe’s to that and try to find a second part time job.
We did what we had to do and lived in a little used RV for 5 and 1/2 years. We now live in an unfinished house that was built by the grace of God and the help of some others who donated some time and materials. My husband looked for work the whole time he was on unemployment. He did not just sit back and relax.
I only share that because there are other factors that some people just don’t see. I am not for the surfer guy. I think it is appalling and when people lump all Food Stamp recipients in one lump, it makes people like my husband (and others we personally know) look bad.
I am surprised to hear that about Lowes. We’ve been in a remodel project for….well…literally years now. I have come to know the schedules of a lot of folks at the 2 local Lowes. They seem to have pretty regular schedules as part timers. I know one fella that works part time and is in the Coast Guard. I would have your husband check if this is a corporate thing or just that location. I would also think that if he talked to management and told them, I need a set schedule so I can get another job, that they would take that into scheduling consideration. Several of the folks there are in school…so I know their schedules are taken into consideration.
Jay, local stores schedule part timers. I have heard complaints about other Lowe’s stores in other parts of the country, so I think a LOT has to do with the local management. Our experience at the Lowe’s here (and there is only one close by) is that management is not all that considerate. Hubs has asked for them to schedule around a day off needed for an appointment and they say “yes”, but then typically schedule him anyway. When he ends up having to take it off, he loses the day rather than being able to work a different day.
The only ones who have schedules outside of Lowe’s for school or another part time job, end up losing most of their hours. They end up with only a handful of hours versus the 18-20 they were working.
There really is no reason they cannot give their employees regular hours and shifts. The employees practically beg for it, but to no avail.
Take that part-time job, it’s easier to find full-time employment when you are already employed. Those jobs are stepping stone jobs and we have all had to do it at one time or another. Hell take two part-time jobs and then you will be fully employed. Do you think you are above working a part-time job? When did it become more respectable to go on food-stamps than working part-time? Unless you have a disability stop your moaning……. where’s your dignity?
dig.ni.ty |ˈdignitē|
noun ( pl. -ties)
the state or quality of being worthy of honor or respect: a man of dignity and unbending principle | the dignity of labor.
• a composed or serious manner or style: he bowed with great dignity.
• a sense of pride in oneself; self-respect: it was beneath his dignity to shout.
Richard, $8 to $10 per hour is a JOB!!!Stick with it and maybe you will get a raise if you show up on time and do more than the minimum required. The future is to get an education or learn a trade that someone will pay you more than $8 to do.
My husband is in management in retail. The part time positions he offers pay more than $10 per hour. Unfortunately he can’t find people to fill them because, god forbid the potential worker might have to work an evening or Saturday – (Sunday’s not even required).
The young males that he does have working for him have no plan for their future. All they want is to work as few hours as possible to keep their parents off of their back (“I have a job”) and be home playing video games in their basement. They don’t have a vision for the future. They have no desire to become productive adults.
As the parent of teenage daughters, it makes me cringe to think of the pool of potential husbands for them.
We’ve created a pretty pathetic future for this country in so many ways.
May be after they interview you they don’t think you’re deserving of a man’s wage. No real man would make that post. He’d go create a business, take three part time job’s or join the military. My 18 year old son just started a lawn service, has 10 yards to cut weekly. He did so using my home equipment in three weeks and adds one or two yards a week. You can start a cleaning service with rags and a vacuum. Mobile car detailing with a truck and 55 gallon drum. Pull weeds with a five gallon bucket or trash bag. Face the music, you’re lazy and lack imagination, not a good combination for a man’s wage.
Brooks, Does your 18 yo son carry indemnity insurance, Has he incorporated for limited liability, does have a tax id number?
http://www.ptshamrock.com/IRSnew.htm
before you go puffing out your chest…..You should cover your ass…
Click to access Home%20Based%20Business%20and%20Government%20Regulation.pdf
and if he’s using your “Home Equipment” and property gets damaged or persons get injured……
http://imprelisattorneys.com/lawn-care-operator-used-imprelis-needs-lawye/
CYA
A job is a job. Maybe he needs to go get one of those $8 an hour “crap” jobs so HE can pay for his OWN lobster dinner. I don’t care about his future, that’s his problem, not mine, nor anyone else’s. How about he works and feeds himself right NOW.
This dude figured out how to drive a nice car and put gas in it….he needs to utilize those mad skillz to feed himself. Tax payers should never have to feed an able bodied young man capable, yet unwilling to work. Want dinner? Pick up a broom.
work one of those “crap jobs” until you can find a better job…what else? There are millions of people working “crap jobs” to support themselves’…their kid(s) and not be a mooch on someone else. Momma and Daddy raised you for years (I suppose)….that does not mean for the rest of your life. The working American’s did not sign up to support you either…WHY do THEY owe you?? The government somehow has allowed too many people to get on the “ticket” to easy way living…maybe not high life living, but certainly “don’t have to work” living…and guess what?? Nearly everyone of the “everybody else’s” who have made a decent living started somewhere working a “crap job”…shock you??? Be shocked! Our country is in a financial crisis. It is past time but still TIME to clean every able bodied person to work and earn $$ to pay their own way. The “program” was put in place to give a helping hand to those who had not the ability to work, either from physical incapabilities or mental disorders profound enough that it would have been inhumane to turn away. It was NOT meant for slackers, lazy butt “entitled” sissies to have a free ride on…NO possible future??? How old are you?? If you are not a senior citizen living the last years or days of a life of working every workday available to grow a family and support them..or themselves’…then you HAVE a future…with choices and decisions…so be a big person and CHOOSE to work that CRAP JOB and get PAID for the effort you put in until you are skilled enough to find better work that MIGHT be less CRAPPY for more $$??? WHAT A GREAT IDEA???!
Be sure to read John’s reply. Follow a leader instead of a bunch of leeches.
Wow … you are talking about letting people grow up, but this is America where everyone should have fun forever! (JK) You are right. Men are being allowed by our culture be boys forever. This cannot be. We need adults to behave like adults and children to behave like children, not monkey that escaped the zoo.
Completely agree. This made me think of one of the things my dad said to me when my now-husband and I got engaged: “I know I will never have to worry about you being provided for. M isn’t afraid to work. If he can’t get a teaching position, he doesn’t have a problem doing ANY job that will provide for his family.” And it’s true. We have long discussed the problems with the current welfare system in the US. There are people who need it, but welfare was intended to be a temporary assistance program, not a lifestyle. It REALLY frustrates me when I hear people say, “We should have another kid so we can get more money.” True story!
One of the saddest things I ever heard was a six year old who said “My mommy needs more money so I’m going to have a brother.”
Spot on, Matt.
Richard, $8 to $10 per hour is a JOB!!!Stick with it and maybe you will get a raise if you show up on time and do more than the minimum required. The future is to get an education or learn a trade that someone will pay you more than $8 to do.
But his idea is “why work when I can NOT WORK ( although capable) and someone else support me”…and as long as that happens?….well, we can do the math…. where was mom and dad when he was growing up?? Why did they not actually RAISE him to know what life is about? Poor parents. Bet they are still paying….
This mindset is so completely foreign to me that I just cannot fathom being so absolutely devoid of self-esteem that I would even consider accepting government assistance if I still had the slightest ability to fend for myself. I love to work. I’m 64 years old and I haven’t been unemployed since I was 11 heard old. I’ve worked two, and occasionally three, part time jobs at a time, until I turned 18 and landed a full time job as a lineman. It was hard, nasty work, but the job paid $63.00 per week and I was thankful for the opportunity to work five or six days a week at the same job. Then I got drafted into the Army at $86.00 per month + room and board, (if you can call C-Rations “board” and a pile of sandbags in Vietnam a “room”). I never worked harder in my life, but I did it because it was my job.
Since then, I’ve raised a family, earned three college degrees (without government assistance – I didn’t even use the GI Bill) and I still work 50 hours a week. I’m eligible for Social Security, but I haven’t applied for it. I have two potentially terminal diseases, and my retirement plan is to die at my desk.
So why in the hell am I paying thousands of dollars per year in taxes for some long-haired surfer dude less than half my age to lay around and do nothing but procreate more of his kind for his whole miserable life? Political Poverty Pimps who buy votes with my hard earned tax dollars from bums who don’t work. What a fine kettle of fish we live in today!
Dan, God bless you.
^^godDAMN!
Tell me, why has the government not taken those who are able to work but “can’t find a job …only because they are “crap jobs” and don’t pay enough…put them on the payroll working FOR the government, the citizens who PAY the TAXES they are supporting the lazy butts with anyway?? Should not be a drain on the budget…already paying it out…get something in return PLUS some training for them???
think you nail it on the head with the self-esteem comment. I don’t want to bash on “lazy young men” anymore. It’s a tired old joke. The truth is, if you get to know any of these guys that get into this situation, it’s pretty sad. The video games and the surfing are escapism. Most aren’t trying to “game the system” they really do believe they’re not capable. They are scared to death of failing. It’s very rarely a big ego that thinks he’s “entitled” to the welfare check, but usually a very small, fragile ego that has no idea what else he can do. Is the welfare system as it is helping this problem… heck no. But the truth is these guys do need help and support from society at large.(just not the kind in the form of a check and a brush-off). My grandpa worked his butt off his whole life to provide for his family. But my grandpa also had a strong father to guide him and a local entrepreneur who reached out and took him under his wing as an apprentice, showing him the ins and outs of a trade at a very young age. Find me a 20-30 year old on food stamps who got much of any of that.
BULL SHIT!!!!!!!! A good swift kick in the ass is the “support” these guys need.
as a lady w 4 kids who cant make ends met..(and yes i get ebt and yes im looking for work) i get the guy needs to eat…but i do agree..before my kids i ate bread the landlady brought from the store..day old bread..and noddles…we are not happy getting help..but dh is almost done w school.and he works full time. and no we dont buy 34 cuts of streak..I would love to be able to pack up and live on the beach….but how does work again w 4 kids…
I think if only the people who truly needed it were on it (like the sympathy inducing single mother), it’d be alright. But surfer dude and others like him need to vamoose.
I especially like this post. 8% of the population is on disability. Just as many on welfare and then there’s the unemployment rolls meaning that of every dollar I earn about 1/3 if it goes to another while I have struggled to raise my children and put them into college. I’ve worked in soup kitchens, worked for a year helping Katrina victims, and orphanages and see that most times the people that need the help the most don’t have advocates to get them the services they need, but there’s a huge amount of people that should be working.
I’m a single mom with two kids. I receive EBT benefits, SSA because their dad died, and my children are on Medicaid. It guts me that I’m thirty and I feel looped into this system of which is essentially impossible to rid myself and my children. And these guys have to eat too, yes, BUT I know there are many, many men out there that cannot find work because they are either held down through the inability to pass a background check and/or suffer from drug abuse/co-occurence disorder. It is quite the predicament in America. Our focus in this country is centered on the problem, not the solution. Whatever solutions we create, they simply add to the problem because those solutions are not created in a way to ACTUALLY help. Instead, those “solutions” require us to be more involved with a government that we don’t even feel we have the right to dismiss.
I have had to use the welfare system a few times in my life when 1) When I got pregnant (accidents DO happen even on birth control!) and wouldn’t abort like the father wanted me to. and 2) when my alcoholic husband binged (for a year so I moved my children out of state to keep them out of his reach). I got off welfare both times asap. It was there as a ‘temporary’ assistance, not a life style.
Fast forward a decade and I am currently on SSI after an accident that left me unable to hold down a job. I tried for a year after the accident but then my companies insurance MADE me apply for disability or they would stop covering me. I hate it. SSI is less than half what I was making working and it burns me that I can not control my own livelihood.
So yes, I do and can rage against the machine…from my wheelchair.
I absolutely do not agree with dissolving the welfare state. Changing the requirements to recieve welfare, perhaps. But as a mother of two who used to receive EBT benefits and whose children are still on FAMIS, I understand the difficulties life can throw at you when you least expect them. I’m in a better place now with a full-time job, but there was a time when I needed help. Had I been living in a non-welfare state I can’t tell you what might have happened to me and my children, and perhaps you wouldn’t care regardless. I just recently found your blog and had really high hopes after reading your post on breastfeeding and the follow-up post on parenting. If I understand the parenting post correctly there was an argument against judgement towards parenting decisions. But then you turn around and write a post dripping with judgemental scorn. You may say that it is the able-bodied-men leeching off the system, but by saying you want to rid America of any and all welfare, you are placing me and my children in a box with the 29 year old surfer dining on lobster, and that’s a little disheartening.
Katie….are you saying that without welfare, you would have been incapable of figuring out how to feed your children? This is an amazingly defeating statement.
I fully believe that women with children are much stronger than that.
The biggest shame of the welfare state is that it has convinced so many that they are incapable of surviving without the gov’t’s intervention.
No, it is the people like the surfer dude, like the one’s who CAN but will not even LOOK for a paying JOB because they are lazy and feel entitled to life without effort, the people who think “well, my time is worth more than $8-10 an hour…I can get money AND food and NOT have to spend energy earning it…why work?” THAT I what MOST people who work and pay the taxes that support THAT kind of people are upset about…not the TEMPORARY assistance for people in dire circumstances OR the permanently disabled citizens. THEN you have the illegals here that our GOVERNMENT feels are entitled to welfare on top of all else? Time to rewrite the assistance programs and set rules, regulations and make them viable….
Did you even read this article? He actually was understanding of people like YOU! It is about the single hypocritical punks on the system he was talking about who, as the title of the article states. He actually contradicts allowing people like this guy as being eligible with people like YOU.
I read rants like this though and think it says a lot about the poster. Maybe the part where he said that welfare is basically taking money from the sweat of people who work to give to others bothers you. But you apparently glossed over the entire point of the article to ironically judge the blogger with scorn.
I was on unemployment one time for 5 weeks and no matter it is covered by companies paying into an insurance fund…I hated it. I still cringe. I have chaired findraisers, donated to charities and personally given money to people down on their luck. What kills me is prior to welfare, where a lot of taxpayer dollars go to pay heavily layered administration fees…charities and churches did it for free. There was a documentary a good 60 or years ago about the poor in this country. It was shown in Europe and they thought it was satire. I’m all for helping single moms, but at the same time they shouldn’t act entitled…they should be grateful. I was when I got unemployment which wasn’t even funded by taxpayers.
This one is dedicated to the Occuturds!!
This is clearly written to provoke a defensive attitude. We can do better than this. Jumping on the bandwagon and attacking people taking advantage of food stamps is part of the problem. The solution, includes a few hours and a email to your congressman/woman. No accusatory slashes of mud, just a simple business plan that states how your way makes the government more money.
Anjelica – Surfer guy needs food stamps? @ 29? Are ya kidding me??? He, and tons of others (just like him) are not “taking advantage” of “food stamps” they are taking advantage of the people (the tax payers) who “pay for those food stamps”… You know the “middle class” working people…the people Ofraud “is for” wants to “make stronger”?? (sarc)… Want to know how to save the Government Money? The Government should Stop creating bureaucracies, then make us feed them with our tax dollars…Our Government is way too big. Take away the bird feeder and the birds will take care of themselves…Get Government out of the way and our Economy will flourish…Right now there is too much cronyism in ALL Government…all sides…all angles…They ALL ‘claim’ to be in the corner of the middle class, and want to ‘help’ the middle class…yet it is the middle class that stands to lose the most!!.
Another great read Matt. The older I get the more I find myself questioning the way that our government allows certain things to go on ‘blindly’ in the face of other issues that are attached with unnecessary ferocity. I feel a blog post coming on…. 😉
attacked- not attached
Public school is the first, biggest entitlement program there is. What right do you have to demand I pay for your kids education? Until conservatives come to this realization and quit leaching off the system themselves, they are saying no more than “I’ve got mine and you can go fry ice!” to those on food stamps.
I don’t think you thought this comment through very carefully.
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From Media Matters for America:
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) Food and Nutrition Service, the fraud and waste rate in SNAP is roughly 1 percent, contrary to recent Fox claims that the program is rife with fraud.
USDA reports:
“Half of all new SNAP participants received benefits for 10 months or less in the mid 2000s, up from 8 months in the early 2000s. Single parent families and elderly individuals tended to stay in the program longer than did working poor individuals, childless adults without disabilities, and noncitizens. Seventy-four percent of new participants left the program within two years. This is an increase from 71 percent in the early 1990s.”
There will always be freeloaders on the system but going after a worthy program like SNAP (with less than 1% abuse by idiots like Jason Greenslate), instead of a totally unworthy and unhelpful program like ethanol subsidies and other big agribusiness hand-outs, or the multi-billion dollar subsidies to the fossil fuel industry, is misguided. SNAP, even an abused SNAP, keeps people shopping, improves consumer confidence and boosts both retail sales and shareholder value. Corporate subsidies go only into the pockets of top executives who store the extra cash in off-shore accounts and never churn it back into the system, eroding demand, stealing from their own shareholders and depressing the overall economy.
You need to do better research, my man.
Umm yeah, because the USDA would never self-report bad news right?
USDA doesn’t have a dog in that race. It’s no skin off their nose if SNAP lives or dies. I understand your point though. If you can find a legit source that disputes those numbers, let’s see it.
“Keeps people spending”…”worthy”…”misguided”…what kind of nonsense economics did you study? You, brah, need to do better research. Stealing tax-payer dollars from one demographic and giving it to another demographic isn’t a “worthy” program kiddo.
Who’s getting rich off SNAP? HINT: it’s not the people getting snap contributions. You can start with that question, I’ll accept your apology after you spend some time on Google. You’ll love the answer, considering your view on top-executive compensation and corporate profiteering.
Oh, and the USDA does seem to have a dog in that race. Here’s the guidelines on what can be purchased with SNAP, as distributed by the USDA – http://www.fns.usda.gov/snap/retailers/pdfs/Retailer_Training_Guide.pdf
They also fund their “education” portal – http://snap.nal.usda.gov/
And they also provide grants (this one at $4m) to get Farmer’s markets to participate in SNAP – http://www.fns.usda.gov/pressrelease/2012/014912
You may want to examine your own research practices before criticizing others, my man.
Thank you, Joshua!
Yes, the USDA definitely *does* have a dog in this fight.
Ethanol subsidies are stealing from one demo to give to another. Fossil fuel subsidies and tax breaks are stealing from one demo and giving to another. Federally funded drug research grants are stealing from one demo and giving to another. Debt-backed currency creation, like quantitative easing, is stealing from one demo and giving to another. You seem to think it’s OK for factory farmers to steal from everyone else but it’s not OK for poor people to get assistance to buy the food those farmers produce at taxpayer expense, especially small family farmers.
Food stamps get used in local economies, whether the retailer is a franchise of a big national chain or an independent mom-and-pop. Strong local economies make a strong national economy, not the other way around. And what the hell is wrong with spending food stamps at farmers markets? You think people receiving food stamps should only be allowed to eat chemically-laden processed foods? Or perhaps eat only at McDonalds or something? What a load of corporate bullshit.
My research has been ongoing for most of my life. You obviously just parrot whatever pro-corporate talking points you hear and formulate a response to fit the propaganda. You do a piss-poor job of it, though, because the links you provided support my argument WAY more than yours.
Accept my apology? Who the fuck are you, Mr. Anonymous? At least I have the guts to use my real name. You’re just another anonymous flamethrower with nothing in the tank… “brah.”
Years ago I was a 22 year old mother of two who had children WAY too young for my own plans to work out. I worked all day, every day, to make sure that *I* was the one providing their food and shelter, not Daddy Government. Now that I’m in a much better situation I use it as a way to show them why it’s so important to be responsible and do whatever it takes to care for yourself and your family. I hope they pick up on it and don’t become another one of those statistics.
Ayn Rand was on Social Security and Medicare when she died. All of the red states that voted for Romney in the last election take in more federal dollars than they dish out, which presumes that a large percentage of those who rail against entitlements find a way to use them anyway. Walmart used to hang food stamp information for its employees in its break rooms. Walmart and several other corporations wrote a letter in favor of the public option prior to the passage of Obama Care.
Things are often more complicated than the simple minded presumes.
The first job of politicians should be to keep the Federal Govt from stealing my money. Once the government has taken it, I want my elected officials to do all they can to get it back for me and my community. This is the answer conservatives should give when asked why they applied for federal money like TARP.
I’m in favor of letting red states fend for themselves without any federal involvement whatsoever. That means closing down all the military bases in those states and all the government-funded research facilities, and you get to maintain your own bridges, tunnels, dams, water and wastewater systems, etc. No more money for interstate highways or subsidies for cargo rail systems that bring your farm produce and manufactured goods to market. You can setup a pay-as-you-go system and privatize everything in every red state. Knock yourselves out. I can’t wait to see what that looks like.
Ayn Rand was on Social Security and Medicare when she died, which pretty much sums up what I think of people who rail against abusing the system.
Food stamps are equally corporate and farmer welfare, which blowhards like Mr. Walsh never seem to recognize. Ever hear of Walmart turning away a food stamp customer? They used to hang signs in its break room for employees to take advantage of the program before they got called out for it.
If Daddy Government was so bad, why is it that all of the states that voted for Romney in the last election took in more federal dollars than they paid in?
Seems rather hypocritical.
The problem is that when it is exceptionally easy to utilize gov’t programs, people ARE going to use them. I have a hard time believing, in a country where obesity is a big problem, that we have all these starving people running around needing to be fed. Many people on food stamps also own iphones and big screen tvs. There is something seriously wrong with that. We SHOULD be feeding the truly NEEDY….but if you have a big screen tv….how needy are you?
People on welfare used to have regular visits by case workers to make sure they were not abusing the system. We’ve now deemed that as a privacy issue. Well, if I am paying for your dinner, and dinner for your kids because you cannot, I don’t think you should be eating it sitting in front of a big screen tv with cable, video games and a boyfriend eating, too just hanging around long enough to create another mouth to feed.
Oh, but we aren’t allowed to make these moral or judgmental observations anymore.
The ol, “beggars can’t be choosey” adage applies here.
We have allowed beggars to be choosey, as a result we have a lot more beggars.
bingo.
As the U.S. economy recovers from the worst recession since the Great Depression, the explosive growth of food stamps remains a lingering legacy. And now the program comes with an irony, as the Republicans seeking to cut it also represent vast numbers of recipients.
Among the 254 counties where food stamp recipients doubled between 2007 and 2011, Republican Mitt Romney won 213 of them in last year’s presidential election, according to U.S. Department of Agriculture data compiled by Bloomberg. Kentucky’s Owsley County, which backed Romney with 81 percent of its vote, has the largest proportion of food stamp recipients among those that he carried.
Funny that you mention the Misfits, Matt, even Mr. Glenn Danzig himself (the singer and real genius behind the Misfits) blasted Obama recently in an interview…here is a link to share with the lemmings who don’t believe me
Perfect! A friend was asking today how to ‘splain this phenomen. Good job! You might like this youtube if you haven’t seen it: Mike Rowe from Dirty Jobs talking about 3M jobs available that nobody wants. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ls1YhhMHdNY
OK. I’ve ditched Social Security with a witnessed statement of claims of fraud within the system. I’ve operated for a decade now, as a citizen of Kentucky, rather than as a dead fiction under the rules for foreigners.
Do I get a pass to rage now~?
Who’s with me…~?
Starve the Beast~!
Absolutely!
Just give us a list of what you are raging about and any helpful hints to relieve you of your rage.
I’m writing this comment from the perspective of someone who has had to accept the offer of help from the government, and who does not like to.
Yes there are people who abuse the system. Unfortunately it is those that abuse the system that show up in the news and whose stories get around the most. But the huge majority are just trying to survive.
I do agree that the system is very flawed. It needs reworking. We get by, my husband works year round (but his job is part-time during the winter) and I work during the summer (only on my husbands days off so I can watch our son when he works). We are doing our best but since both our jobs depend mostly on the summer boom we find that we struggle to get through the winters.
We finally found an apartment that was within our price range after almost 6 months of living with my in-laws. Our previous place which we had been renting from my parents was discovered to have a very bad mold issue and we just couldn’t bring our newborn son back there. So we accepted our families help. During this time the only thing we accepted from the state was health insurance because there is simple no way we can afford it.
When we did move into our apartment we had a stretched budget. Because we wanted to make sure our son had the proper foods we did apply for EBT and used the program for 5 months. Once we felt more stable my husband and I decided to end our use of the program, even though we still easily qualify for it. We don’t want to be dependent on the state.
On the health insurance issue however, we have looked into health insurance and there is no way we can afford it. Yet we have to worry about our son losing his insurance if we make just a dollar over the states income limits. These limits are set too low. They cut you off at a point where it is still impossible for you to afford medical insurance. It becomes a vicious cycle for most families.
We have paid our taxes to the state for years. Every paycheck has gotten chunks of money taken out of them to fund these programs. So when people complain about the taxpayers supporting welfare recipients I would like to remind them that most welfare recipients are taxpayers as well.
Please don’t judge the majority on the actions of a few.
the worst part about this is, that my husband and i both work full time jobs and barely survive paycheck to paycheck, are frequently behind on our rent, or the light bill, or have to decide, “hey, i guess we can’t buy MEAT this week…” and yet we allegedly make “too much” to get additional assistance from the state. we had to rearrange our schedules with my husband working fewer hours so that we wouldn’t have to send the kids to the daycare that we couldn’t afford… so now we’re making even *less* and still don’t qualify. my husband often jokes that we’d be better off if he lost his job entirely, because we’d have more money if he collected unemployment and public assistance. a sad joke, but true.
As long as the impoverished are well-fed, the system won’t change. They are the masses, and they are getting more massive by number and waist size.