A reading list:
"Marx's theory of alienation"
"Das Kapital"
"The Communist Manifesto"
"Mein Kampf"
"The Little Red Book, Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-Tung"
"Rules for Radicals"
"The Little Blue Book: The Essential Guide to Thinking and Talking Democratic"
"Obama & Marxism"
Food stamp use rises 100% under ObamaTimes247 by: Times247, Tuesday, July 17, 2012
Nancy Pelosi says President
Obama should embrace
the "Food Stamp President" label as a badge of honor — and
he has. Food stamp use has risen 100 percent in three years. Welfare reform has been rolled back through work requirement waivers. The USDA holds "food stamp parties" to hook seniors, and
Obama's Ag secretary calls welfare "economic stimulus." Given the White House's stance on
dependency, it's no surprise
: Food stamp rolls are set to swell through 2014.
Read more: http://times247.com/pset/22welfare-draft1/page/0
Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah
Photo Credit:AP
Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) said he plans to introduce legislation addressing President
Obama's decision to waive work requirements in the Temporary Assistant for Needy Families law.
"Late last week,
the Obama administration quietly released 'guidance' to the states informing them that the administration had granted itself authority to wave work requirements in TANF," Hatch said on the Senate floor Monday. "In the 16 years since the creation of the Temporary Assistance of Needy Families, no administration has concluded that they have the authority to waive the TANF work requirements."
TANF includes the commonly called "welfare-to-work" program, which requires those receiving welfare payments to be employed or prove they're looking for work.
GOP questions legality of Obama welfare rules
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius Photo Credit:AP
Republicans are questioning the legality of a move by the
Obama administration to absolve some states from a federal requirement that welfare recipients engage in "work activities."
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services announced last week that it will consider requests from states that wish to waive the requirement, which was at the heart of the 1996 welfare-reform law negotiated between congressional Republicans and President Clinton.
Administration officials say the change will give states more flexibility in developing new reforms, but GOP lawmakers argue the move is an illegal "power grab" aimed at undoing progress made under the current law.
Reading qualifies as 'work' under welfare rules
The
Obama administration has waived the 2005 work requirements for welfare-to-work programs, allowing such activities as motivational reading, housework, weight loss and journaling to count as "work" for the purposes of the program.
Photo Credit:AP [The Temporary Assistance for Needy Families bill] incentivized states to create welfare-to-work programs, trying to transition Americans from government dependency to financial solvency.
But states quickly acted to poke holes in that legislation, calling the following activities "work" for purposes of the statute: bed rest, personal care activities, massage, exercise, journaling, motivational reading, smoking cessation, weight loss promotion, participation in parent-teacher meetings, or helping friends or family with household tasks and errands.
This was idiotic. So in 2005, Congress closed the loophole, over the objections of then-Senator Obama.
Now, Obama has walked back the 2005 legislation, using his Department of Health and Human Services to unilaterally waive those work requirements.
GOP: HHS work waivers gutting welfare reform
Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius speaks at Covenant Community Care Inc., June 20 in Detroit, Mich. Photo Credit:AP
Republicans are accusing the
Obama administration of unilaterally gutting welfare reform after the Department of Health and Human Services
quietly notified states that they may seek a waiver for the program's strict work requirements.
HHS made the announcement in a policy memo Thursday, news that slipped well
below the radar amid a raucous day on the presidential campaign trail. But a few prominent GOP lawmakers on Capitol Hill picked up on the change, and accused the administration of overhauling one of the most important bipartisan agreements of the past several decades.
USDA throws food stamp parties to hook seniors
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) has embraced entire promotional campaigns designed to encourage eligible Americans to participate in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or food stamps. Photo Credit: AP
While spending on the food stamp program has increased 100 percent under President Barack
Obama, the government continues to push more Americans to enroll in the welfare program. ...
A pamphlet currently posted at the USDA website
encourages local SNAP offices to throw parties as one way to get potentially eligible seniors to enroll in the program.
"Throw a Great Party. Host social events where people mix and mingle," the agency advises. "Make it fun by having activities, games, food, and entertainment, and provide information about SNAP. Putting SNAP information in a game format like BINGO, crossword puzzles, or even a 'true/false' quiz is fun and helps get your message across in a memorable way."
[also see earlier email about voter fraud/government agencies funding voter registrations of poor/welfare recipients]
Soaring food stamp enrollment credited to USDA marketing push
More than 46 million Americans use food stamps now. Photo Credit: AP
Food stamp enrollment swelled to a new high in 2010, surpassing the 40 million mark for the first time in March 2010. That number climbed steadily to 45,183,931 (1 in 7 Americans) in June 2011. The average recipient receives $133 per month, totaling $5.5 billion in government spending each month.
This surge can be attributed to ramped up marketing efforts on the part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (the agency which administers SNAP benefits), including looser eligibility requirements and outreach to large populations. The Department of Agriculture and the White House say it is meant for the poorest of the poor, but there is a deeper story beneath those talking points. Government officials also want to use food stamps to influence products that food vendors sell and what private citizens can buy at the grocery store.
SNAP is ostensibly about feeding the poor.
But the Department of Agriculture's aggressive marketing, combined with ever-loosening eligibility requirements, is changing what that means.
Top secret: Feds won't say what food stamps buy
Photo Credit:The Washington Times
The federal government doles out $80 billion in food stamps each year!
Americans spend $80 billion each year financing food stamps for the poor, but the country has no idea where or how the money is spent.
Food stamps can be spent on goods ranging from candy to steak and are accepted at retailers from gas stations that primarily sell potato chips to fried-chicken restaurants. And as the amount spent on food stamps has more than doubled in recent years, the amount of food stamps laundered into cash has increased dramatically, government statistics show.
But the government won't say which stores are doing the most business in food stamps, and even it doesn't know what kinds of food those taxpayer dollars buy.
Coinciding with lobbying by convenience stores, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the program in conjunction with states, contends that disclosing how much each store authorized to accept benefits, known as the Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (SNAP), receives in taxpayer funds would amount to revealing trade secrets.
As a result, fraud is hard to track and the efficacy of the massive program is impossible to evaluate.
As the House debates the once-every-five-years farm bill, the majority of which goes to food stamps, there is a renewed and fervent call from a broad spectrum of camps that the information — some of the most high-dollar, frequently requested and closely held secrets of the government — be set free.
Soviet leader Josef Stalin reportedly ordered John Wayne's assassination in the 1950s because he represented a threat to collectivism. Here, Wayne portrays Ethan Edwards in the 1956 classic Western, "The Searchers."
Photo Credit:APEnemies of the United States also noticed America's exceptional national character and, in particular, John Wayne. Wayne's rugged individualism challenged the idea of collectivism. Although Soviet leader Joseph Stalin enjoyed watching American westerns, he recognized them as an ideological threat, and the Duke's vocal anti-communism made him a clear target.
According to multiple accounts, Stalin ordered John Wayne's assassination in the 1950s. Wayne reportedly survived two assassination attempts by Soviet agents, in Los Angeles and on a movie set in Mexico. For similar reasons, China's Communist leader Mao Tse Tung also put a price on the actor's head. It turns out that his fictional portrayals of a very real American idea were an important element of U.S. public diplomacy and useful to the success of America's foreign policy.
The political culture and societal values reflected in his movies are slipping. Increasingly, Americans look to government as a source of financial, physical, and emotional well-being. Americans' growing dependency on government is both a symptom and a cause of the move away from constitutional government and toward an ever-greater role for government in the daily lives of ordinary citizens.
Food stamp use rises 100% under Obama
Food stamp use has doubled under President Obama. Photo Credit:AP
The vast majority of federal spending in the Senate farm bill, which is estimated to cost over $100 billion annually, is going toward food stamps, representing a 100 percent increase since President
Barack Obama took office, according to Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions.
"This legislation will spend $82 billion on food stamps next year, and an estimated $770 billion over the next ten years. To put these figures in perspective, we will spend $40 billion federal dollars next year on roads and bridges," said Sessions, the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee.
Food stamp rolls set to swell through 2014
Restaurants now advertise that they accept food stamps. A new government report estimates that food stamp use will continue to increase until 2014.
Photo Credit:AP
We earlier reported that 45 million Americans are currently on food stamps, and a new report out of the Congressional Budget Office puts that number in perspective
: The number of food stamp users has jumped 70% since 2007, and shows no signs of stopping.
The CBO expects it to rise for two more years.
In 2007, the program cost $30 billion; the figure has risen to $72 billion, the Wall Street Journal reports, with the bulk of that spending increase due to the increased rolls.
Read the original article at Newser
Welcome to the welfare state
Pelosi: 'Food stamp president' title a 'badge of honor'
Christie calls out welfare couch potatoes
"When the American people no longer believe that this is a place where only their willingness to work hard, and to act with honor and integrity and ingenuity determines their success in life, then we'll have a bunch of people sitting on a couch waiting for their next government check," Gov. Chris Christie said on Tuesday, April 10 at the Bush Institute Conference on Taxes and Economic Growth.
Photo Credit: Politico
New Jersey governor Chris Christie addressed the Bush Institute Conference on Taxes and Economic Growth in New York on Tuesday, and had some tough words for the couch potatoes littering our "paternalistic entitlement society." ...
"I've never seen a less optimistic time in my lifetime in this country, and people wonder why," Christie said. "I think it's really simple: It's because government's now telling them 'stop dreaming, stop striving, we'll take care of you.' We're turning into a paternalistic entitlement society."
Christie warned this would bankrupt us both financially and morally, "because when the American people no longer believe that this is a place where only their willingness to work hard, and to act with honor and integrity and ingenuity determines their success in life, then we'll have a bunch of people sitting on a couch waiting for their next government check."
'Octomom' goes on food stamps to feed her 14 kids
Fox News by: Fox ews, Friday, April 6, 2012
Nadya Suleman has 14 children after undergoing repeated in vitro fertilizations when she already had six kids. Photo Credit: AP
Nadya "Octomom" Suleman is on food stamps.
Suleman has
14 children after undergoing repeated in vitro fertilizations ...
after she already had six children.
"In my mind I was doing well with the six, and it's three books in itself to rationalize why I wanted one more after six," she [told "Today" show's Matt Lauer].
[RAINBOW] Jackson: 'It's an honor to be a food stamp president' [Pelosi style]
Jesse Jackson told the Rainbow PUSH Coalition that Obama should be "honored" when he's referred to as "The Food Stamp President." Photo Credit:AP
Rev. Jesse Jackson spoke about food stamps and said they help the White House in a speech to his Rainbow PUSH Coalition Saturday.
"Honestly, it's an honor to be a
food stamp president. Food stamps feed the hungry. Food stamps save the children. Food stamps help the farmer. Food stamps help the trunk driver. Food stamps help the White House. Food stamps help the store. Food stamps hire people and feed people. Food stamps save people from starvation and malnutrition. Whenever you attack feeding the hungry, you undermine the moral authority of our faith. Give President
Barack Obama a big hand. Show your love, show your appreciation."
More than 46 million Americans are currently on food stamps, and total spending on the program has more than doubled in four years to an all-time high of $75.3 billion.
Feds raid million-dollar home of welfare recipient
KING 5 News by: Chris Ingalls, Monday, December 5, 2011
She lives in a beautiful waterfront home on Seattle's Lake Washington [valued at $1.2 million]. Yet, she's on welfare assistance.
This week federal agents moved in to put a stop to it. ... Search warrant documents unsealed Friday in federal court reveal that she received more than $1,200 a month in public housing vouchers, plus monthly cash from the federal and state government for a disability, as well as food stamps.
Fri Dec 02 17:53:55 PST 2011
Feds: Seattle welfare recipient lives in million dollar home
Search warrant documents reveal the woman on welfare received more than $1,200 a month in public housing vouchers, plus monthly cash for a disability, as well as food stamps, all while living in a waterfront home on Lake Washington. view full article
Welcome to the welfare state: Obama's 'badge of honor'
Welfare for the wealthy
Forbes by: Sally Pipes, Monday, December 5, 2011
[T]he [Congressional Budget Office] found that households in the bottom 20 percent of the income distribution in 1979 received just over half of all government transfer payments.
By 2007, that share had dropped to 35 percent.
Today, 10 percent of [Medicare] beneficiaries have annual incomes above $60,000. And fully 6 percent have incomes exceeding $80,000.
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