Dems Raid Food Stamps to Pay Off Union Supporters

[Fairweather]

Here you go j_b. Behold the depths to which your public-sector union stooges, lying president, and shape-shifting House Speaker will plumb. From a source I know you'll appreciate:

 

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/kati-haycock/cutting-food-stamps-to-sa_b_674770.html

 

"Though many in the education community are celebrating last week's Senate vote for the so-called Edujobs bill, I can't find any joy in it. In fact, I am shaken and ashamed because, to pay for it, the Senate snatched $11.9 billion from the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

 

That's right: They cut food stamps. For the first time ever, this move would gouge the monthly benefits that low-income families receive. Beginning in 2014, America's poorest families will--if the House concurs during a special session this week--see $59 disappear from their food stamp benefits every single month.

 

The families and individuals who depend on food stamps are our nation's most vulnerable. They tend to be the young, the old, the black, and the brown. They now total more than 40 million Americans. And despite cold, inside-the-Beltway rationalizations that food prices have not risen as steeply as had been anticipated--and that this cut will "just" return benefits to pre-2009 levels--I challenge any who support it to feed their own children on $4.50 a day. That's the average per-person benefit now, before the Senate cut takes effect.

 

It is no wonder, then, that experts predict the passage of this bill will put more families back in lines at soup kitchens and food banks. That's why so many social justice and faith-based groups are expressing strong opposition to the proposed cuts.

 

Politicians know that there are less ruthless ways to pay for this than by slashing food stamps. Oil and gas and other corporate subsidies, for example, could withstand the blow far better than the poorest people in this nation. But families who rely on public support don't wield much political influence. After all, when you don't have enough money to buy your children dinner, it's hard to find room in your budget for a lobbyist or a fat campaign contribution.

 

Most shockingly of all, the education community--particularly those who assert that it's all but impossible to teach impoverished children who come to school hungry or overwhelmed by family stress--is cheering the passage of this bill with its hateful trade-off. We'd all do well to remember this proposal and those who supported it the next time teacher union bosses assert that they are fighting for what's best for our nation's poor kids."

[olyclimber]

I was raised on food stamps and I can tell you their nutritional value is negligible.

[denalidave]

I was raised on food stamps and I can tell you their nutritional value is negligible.

Shows in yer climbing.

 

That was in the olden days though, now they use plastic credit cards things (I think), which are chock full off all the essential caloric, vitamins & minerals you need to be the ultimate hardman dirtbag.

[JosephH]

That's because the moron's, formerly known as republicans, forced the democrats to "pay" for the stimulus up front which was moronic in every respect. It really isn't 'stimulus' if you simply shuffle it from one pocket to another.

 

It's really a matter of belief whether we should be doing debt-subsidized government spending to prevent this recession from turning into a depression. If the government doesn't spend and it all goes south as a result then all you mouthy bastards will be screaming for government spending then. Pretty ignorant all the way around.

[prole]

If the government doesn't spend and it all goes south as a result then all you mouthy bastards will be screaming for government spending then...

 

Well, not exactly screaming...

 

S. Carolina Takes Stimulus Money

By MICHAEL LUO

 

Early last year, while still a rising G.O.P. star, Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina led a chorus of Republican governors criticizing the federal stimulus package and vowing to reject at least some of the money being directed to their states.

 

The governors focused their ire, in particular, on provisions that pushed states to expand jobless benefits to some previously ineligible workers, like those seeking only part-time work or people new to the work force. They argued that the changes would lead to tax increases.

 

Two months ago, however, with the bright lights of political promise dimmed by a scandal involving an extramarital affair, Mr. Sanford quietly signed a bill passed by the Legislature that expanded eligibility for unemployment benefits. The move paved the way for the state to claim $97.5 million in stimulus money to bolster its financially ailing unemployment insurance trust fund.

 

The federal Department of Labor announced Tuesday that South Carolina had officially cleared its approval process and that the stimulus money was being released immediately.

 

The reversal by Mr. Sanford attracted virtually no notice, but it made South Carolina the 33rd state in the country to expand jobless benefits to qualify for its full share of stimulus money under the program, according to the National Employment Law Project, a liberal advocacy group.

 

Mr. Sanford joined several other governors who had initially expressed hesitation about the money but later relented, including Dave Heineman of Nebraska and Sonny Perdue of Georgia, both Republicans, and Phil Bredesen of Tennessee, a Democrat.

 

In South Carolina, the expansion of jobless benefits was part of a broader measure to overhaul the handling of the state’s unemployment insurance trust fund, which is nearly $1 billion in the red.

 

The eligibility changes, which also cover workers forced to leave a job because of an illness in the family or because a spouse moved, take effect in 2011. --from NYT 8/10/10

Edited August 11, 2010 by prole

[denalidave]

OK, I will preface this by admitting I am a lowly simpleton, but it seems the economy is still in free fall, just a matter of time till we ground out. Regardless of all the shenanigans those in power do to line there own pockets (more) along the way. (IMHO)

[tvashtarkatena]

I think the economy 'ground out' a while ago, no? Free fall? By what measure? I was against the stimulus originally, but it seemed like it kinda worked to minimize the evils.

 

j-b and JayB, that's your cue to take over.

[Fairweather]

That's because the moron's, formerly known as republicans, forced the democrats to "pay" for the stimulus up front which was moronic in every respect. It really isn't 'stimulus' if you simply shuffle it from one pocket to another.

 

 

You're in denial. The Democrats voted for it, Obama signed it. Nobody "forced" them to do anything.

[JayB]

The can got kicked down the road another year, but since the output at national, state, county, and city levels is not sufficient to pay for the wage and benefit structure built into the public employee contracts - they won't get paid for.

 

Before the inevitable pay and benefit cuts happen, they'll try to inflict as much pain on the public as possible with service cuts, then the lowest ranking members of the union will get laid off. Then, after these tactics have failed, pay and benefits will be cut to a level that the economy can actually finance.

 

Just like the housing bubble imploding - the timing may be variable, but the outcome is certain. Should be some interesting theatrics on the way there...

 

 

 

 

 

[JosephH]

That's because the moron's, formerly known as republicans, forced the democrats to "pay" for the stimulus up front which was moronic in every respect. It really isn't 'stimulus' if you simply shuffle it from one pocket to another.

 

You're in denial. The Democrats voted for it, Obama signed it. Nobody "forced" them to do anything.

Are you retarded? The republicans who voted for the bill demanded the offsets as the price of their votes and the cash had to come from somewhere; no democrat wanted to cut those programs nor would they have if not for those crossover republicans.

 

Do I hear you and republicans screaming for similar offsets to pay for any extension of W's giveaway to the rich? I'm sure some wealthy folks will end up on foodstamps if those unpaid for tax cuts aren't extended.

[prole]

The can got kicked down the road another year, but since the output at national, state, county, and city levels is not sufficient to pay for the wage and benefit structure built into the public employee contracts - they won't get paid for.

 

Before the inevitable pay and benefit cuts happen, they'll try to inflict as much pain on the public as possible with service cuts, then the lowest ranking members of the union will get laid off. Then, after these tactics have failed, pay and benefits will be cut to a level that the economy can actually finance.

 

Just like the housing bubble imploding - the timing may be variable, but the outcome is certain. Should be some interesting theatrics on the way there...

 

"Yeeah, it's like, electro- I mean equilibrium, 'n shit..."

 

[video:youtube]

Edited August 12, 2010 by prole

[billcoe]

You're in denial. The Democrats voted for it, Obama signed it. Nobody "forced" them to do anything.

 

I hardly consider myself a democrat although I do vote for an occasional one. This was set up a long time in advance. Read this thoroughly and see what your argument is on it: http://crooksandliars.com/jon-perr/10-republican-lies-about-bush-tax-cuts Bottom line for me, concentrating the wealth in the hands of a few is a recipe for disaster. Furthermore, not only were those cuts not needed at the time as the economy was fine, those cuts did not stimulate, and worst of all we borrowed the money from the Chinese to make them. WT hell? Now we are (all of us, you too) in hock up to our necks.

 

Unfortunately, behind the curtain is the ongoing devastation which US manufacturing has seen in the last 10 years. That's been bipartisan, even Clinton was in on it, but at least when he was President he was balancing the budget and consumers were seeing an increase in their living standard as free trade brought prices down. As international wage competition continues to heat up, and mfg goes toward the lowest cost labor on the planet, money is shifting to the wealthy and it's a perfect storm shaping up here I'm afraid.

 

The entitlement and belligerence of our fellow citizens will be the wild card here, you can even see this on this board. Not a good thing. We need to get our act together as soon as possible, the longer this mess goes on, the worse it will be.

 

Tonights Bloomberg news:

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-08-11/u-s-is-bankrupt-and-we-don-t-even-know-commentary-by-laurence-kotlikoff.html

 

"U.S. Is Bankrupt and We Don't Even Know It: Laurence Kotlikoff

By Laurence Kotlikoff - Aug 10, 2010 6:00 PM PT

 

Aug. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Laurence Kotlikoff, an economics professor at Boston University, talks about the state of the U.S. economy. Kotlikoff speaks with Erik Schatzker on Bloomberg Television's InsideTrack." (Source: Bloomberg)

 

"Let’s get real. The U.S. is bankrupt. Neither spending more nor taxing less will help the country pay its bills.

 

What it can and must do is radically simplify its tax, health-care, retirement and financial systems, each of which is a complete mess. But this is the good news. It means they can each be redesigned to achieve their legitimate purposes at much lower cost and, in the process, revitalize the economy.

 

Last month, the International Monetary Fund released its annual review of U.S. economic policy. Its summary contained these bland words about U.S. fiscal policy: “Directors welcomed the authorities’ commitment to fiscal stabilization, but noted that a larger than budgeted adjustment would be required to stabilize debt-to-GDP.”

 

But delve deeper, and you will find that the IMF has effectively pronounced the U.S. bankrupt. Section 6 of the July 2010 Selected Issues Paper says: “The U.S. fiscal gap associated with today’s federal fiscal policy is huge for plausible discount rates.” It adds that “closing the fiscal gap requires a permanent annual fiscal adjustment equal to about 14 percent of U.S. GDP.”

 

The fiscal gap is the value today (the present value) of the difference between projected spending (including servicing official debt) and projected revenue in all future years.

 

 

To put 14 percent of gross domestic product in perspective, current federal revenue totals 14.9 percent of GDP. So the IMF is saying that closing the U.S. fiscal gap, from the revenue side, requires, roughly speaking, an immediate and permanent doubling of our personal-income, corporate and federal taxes as well as the payroll levy set down in the Federal Insurance Contribution Act.

 

Such a tax hike would leave the U.S. running a surplus equal to 5 percent of GDP this year, rather than a 9 percent deficit. So the IMF is really saying the U.S. needs to run a huge surplus now and for many years to come to pay for the spending that is scheduled. It’s also saying the longer the country waits to make tough fiscal adjustments, the more painful they will be.

 

Is the IMF bonkers?

 

No. It has done its homework. So has the Congressional Budget Office whose Long-Term Budget Outlook, released in June, shows an even larger problem.

 

‘Unofficial’ Liabilities

 

Based on the CBO’s data, I calculate a fiscal gap of $202 trillion, which is more than 15 times the official debt. This gargantuan discrepancy between our “official” debt and our actual net indebtedness isn’t surprising. It reflects what economists call the labeling problem. Congress has been very careful over the years to label most of its liabilities “unofficial” to keep them off the books and far in the future.

 

For example, our Social Security FICA contributions are called taxes and our future Social Security benefits are called transfer payments. The government could equally well have labeled our contributions “loans” and called our future benefits “repayment of these loans less an old age tax,” with the old age tax making up for any difference between the benefits promised and principal plus interest on the contributions.

 

The fiscal gap isn’t affected by fiscal labeling. It’s the only theoretically correct measure of our long-run fiscal condition because it considers all spending, no matter how labeled, and incorporates long-term and short-term policy.

 

$4 Trillion Bill

 

How can the fiscal gap be so enormous?

 

Simple. We have 78 million baby boomers who, when fully retired, will collect benefits from Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid that, on average, exceed per-capita GDP. The annual costs of these entitlements will total about $4 trillion in today’s dollars. Yes, our economy will be bigger in 20 years, but not big enough to handle this size load year after year.

 

This is what happens when you run a massive Ponzi scheme for six decades straight, taking ever larger resources from the young and giving them to the old while promising the young their eventual turn at passing the generational buck.

 

Herb Stein, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under U.S. President Richard Nixon, coined an oft-repeated phrase: “Something that can’t go on, will stop.” True enough. Uncle Sam’s Ponzi scheme will stop. But it will stop too late.

 

And it will stop in a very nasty manner. The first possibility is massive benefit cuts visited on the baby boomers in retirement. The second is astronomical tax increases that leave the young with little incentive to work and save. And the third is the government simply printing vast quantities of money to cover its bills.

 

Most likely we will see a combination of all three responses with dramatic increases in poverty, tax, interest rates and consumer prices. This is an awful, downhill road to follow, but it’s the one we are on. And bond traders will kick us miles down our road once they wake up and realize the U.S. is in worse fiscal shape than Greece.

 

Some doctrinaire Keynesian economists would say any stimulus over the next few years won’t affect our ability to deal with deficits in the long run.

 

This is wrong as a simple matter of arithmetic. The fiscal gap is the government’s credit-card bill and each year’s 14 percent of GDP is the interest on that bill. If it doesn’t pay this year’s interest, it will be added to the balance.

 

Demand-siders say forgoing this year’s 14 percent fiscal tightening, and spending even more, will pay for itself, in present value, by expanding the economy and tax revenue.

 

My reaction? Get real, or go hang out with equally deluded supply-siders. Our country is broke and can no longer afford no- pain, all-gain “solutions.”

 

(Laurence J. Kotlikoff is a professor of economics at Boston University and author of “Jimmy Stewart Is Dead: Ending the World’s Ongoing Financial Plague with Limited Purpose Banking.” The opinions expressed are his own.)"

 

 

 

 

[Fairweather]

That's because the moron's, formerly known as republicans, forced the democrats to "pay" for the stimulus up front which was moronic in every respect. It really isn't 'stimulus' if you simply shuffle it from one pocket to another.

 

You're in denial. The Democrats voted for it, Obama signed it. Nobody "forced" them to do anything.

Are you retarded? The republicans who voted for the bill demanded the offsets as the price of their votes and the cash had to come from somewhere; no democrat wanted to cut those programs nor would they have if not for those crossover republicans.

 

Do I hear you and republicans screaming for similar offsets to pay for any extension of W's giveaway to the rich? I'm sure some wealthy folks will end up on foodstamps if those unpaid for tax cuts aren't extended.

 

Are you a moron? Democrats had all the House votes they needed on this bill--and with Olympia Snow helping them in the Senate earlier, they even had a filibuster-proof majority over there. Trying to blame Republicans for enabling the public union sector handout that the Democrats just foisted on the American taxpayer is more than a bit disingenuous. Then for your messiah to stand in front of the cameras and claim it was all "paid for" with the closure of corporate tax loopholes, well, I think you need to pull your head out of your ideology.

[JosephH]

Snow is one of the republicans who demanded the offsets, check it yourself - they are wholly of republican origin. And how would you pay for extending tax cuts for the wealthy?

[Fairweather]

You mean the wealthy who are already footing a grossly disproportionate share of the total tax take? You mean the wealthy whose business ventures (and yes, lifestyles) provide jobs for millions of Americans? Your class-envy bullshit leads to nowhere but social upheaval. How 'bout the bottom 46% of wage-earners start contributing something to the federal tax pie? Or at least shut up about what a supposedly shitty--albeit free--deal they're getting.

[prole]

[wdietsch]

I was raised on food stamps and I can tell you their nutritional value is negligible.

[JosephH]

Yes, exactly, those very same people...

[AlpineK]

You mean the wealthy who are already footing a grossly disproportionate share of the total tax take? You mean the wealthy whose business ventures (and yes, lifestyles) provide jobs for millions of Americans?

 

[video:youtube]

 

[rob]

You mean the wealthy who are already footing a grossly disproportionate share of the total tax take? You mean the wealthy whose business ventures (and yes, lifestyles) provide jobs for millions of Americans? Your class-envy bullshit leads to nowhere but social upheaval. How 'bout the bottom 46% of wage-earners start contributing something to the federal tax pie? Or at least shut up about what a supposedly shitty--albeit free--deal they're getting.

 

I agree. We shouldn't tax the extreme wealthy at all. Poor bastards. They really suffer.

[Fairweather]

Yes, Feck, the wealthy (and middle class) who shelled out the $4 million you didn't have...

[Fairweather]

 

I agree. We shouldn't tax the extreme wealthy at all. Poor bastards. They really suffer.

 

 

...and, after all Rob, it's really just about making them suffer, right? Libtard logic = dead end.

 

[prole]

Well, it only make sense given that they're the one who are benefiting the most from the kind of society we live in.

[JosephH]

Of course! Let's get money from people who don't have any. Dude, the treasury will score BIG!!! Now why didn't we think of that sooner?

[eldiente]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/money/tax/article1996735.ece

 

"Mr Buffett said that he was taxed at 17.7 per cent on the $46 million he made last year, without trying to avoid paying higher taxes, while his secretary, who earned $60,000, was taxed at 30 per cent"

 

Fairweather can you please help explain why Buffet pays 17 percent and his middle income secretary pays 30 percent? What's this about the rich paying more than the middle class? Forget taxing the rich, how about they just pay the same as I do? (I'm around 27 percent at last check) Fairweather, I would guess you're not rich, doesn't it bother you just a tiny little bit that the most wealthy among us pay the least in taxes?

 

Note that for people in that 1% bracket of the world (Buffet, Jobs, Gates etc etc) they usually don't pay any tax at all. Jobs for instance reports an income of $1 per year, the rest is all done through stock options which thanks to Bush are no longer taxed.(Thankfully for Jobs, Apple stock is going up) No capital gains tax is rad if you are paid in stock options, but how many folks on this board are paid in stock though? Not me.

 

-Nate