Laura Ingraham: "What if we just cut off the unemployment? Hunger is a pretty powerful thing."
Bar Rescue guy: "They only feed a military dog at night, because a hungry dog is an obedient dog. Well, if we are not causing people to be hungry to work..." Bar Rescue Host and Laura Ingraham Discuss Cutting Unemployment Aid to Make Workers “Hungry” Like an “Obedient Dog”....
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2021/08/bar-rescue-host-and-laura-ingraham-discuss-cutting-unemployment-aid-to-make-workers-hungry-like-an-obedient-dog/
The above segment is amazing to watch. Ingraham brags about her mother being forced to work when she was 12. Pro child labor Laura. This right wing crew hungers for this:
So contrast this NYT piece where Biden aims to destroy capitalism by trying to increase food for hungry families.
Biden Administration Prompts Largest Permanent Increase in Food Stamps.....The
jump in benefits, the biggest in the program’s history, comes after a
revision of the initiative’s nutrition standards that supporters say
will reduce hunger and better reflect how Americans eat.... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/15/us/politics/biden-food-stamps.html
Let's see what Republicans are saying:
Critics say that the costs are unsustainable and that the aid erodes Americans’ willingness to work.
...as hints of the benefit increase spread last week, Republicans pushed back. Former Representative Mike Conaway, a Republican and chief author of the 2018 law, said it was written “assuming the precedent of cost-neutrality would be followed” and warned the administration against “unilateral overreach.” Before the plan was even released, two Republican legislators called for a watchdog to review it.
Opponents of a benefit increase say the program is meant to supply only part, not all, of a household’s diet, as suggested by its formal name: the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. They also say the aid would last longer if the needy spent it better, citing research showing nearly 10 percent goes to sweetened drinks.
“The data on the inadequacy of the Thrifty Food Plan is pretty weak,” said Angela Rachidi of the conservative American Enterprise Institute.
...others note that nothing guarantees the needy will buy healthy food. Ms. Rachidi of the American Enterprise Institute said “to the extent that SNAP contributes to poor diet,” an increase could even harm poor people’s health.
Anticipating the benefit increase last week, Republicans on Capitol Hill warned of a power grab. During the pandemic, Congress approved extraordinary, if temporary, SNAP increases, with average benefits doubling. Since those increases are now starting to expire, some Republicans see the updated plan as a backdoor effort to sustain a major welfare expansion.
The full NYT article below does a deep dive into the nitty gritty of SNAP.
The debate over benefit adequacy turns on colliding assumptions: SNAP bills itself as supplemental, but more than a third of households receive the maximum benefit. Caseworkers have found that those households have no cash for food, so for them, aid is not supplemental.
Just take the beans story for example:
Critics [of the old plan] say multiple features of the department’s model drove such unrealistic results. The model ignored preparation time — assuming that SNAP users would buy dried beans and soak them before cooking them, which takes hours but is cheaper than buying them in cans. (Few did.)....
The update:
They also factored in time: The plan assumes that SNAP families will get 99 percent of their beans from a can. Among the other convenience foods it includes are hard-boiled eggs, prepared salsa, baby carrots, boxed macaroni and cheese and bagged salad greens.“It was a scientific, analytical process,” said Stacy Dean, a senior Agriculture Department official who oversees the program. “It wasn’t about approving a benefit increase.”
Full article online and below:
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/15/us/politics/biden-food-stamps.html
