Tough sanctions: Obama Administration pays half of Ukraines gas bill due to Russia

Congress wasted no time in extending billions in low interest loans to Ukraine since the Russian annexation of Crimea. Of course no such help went to U.S. homeowners when they were getting foreclosed on left and right at the peak of the housing crisis (and it continues for many). Nor have the jobless or hungry kids gotten any sympathy as Congress recently cut unemployment insurance benefits and foods stamps.

Nothing for Americans, but our government is tripping over itself to help Ukrainians.

Now for the best part. You know how the Obama Administration has been talking tough with respect to economic sanctions on Russia? So we find out that the U.S. is paying half of Ukraine's gas bill that is in arrears to Russia.

Not only is this another slap in the face for Americans who have seen their own heating subsidies cut, but the U.S. is now subsidizing Russia by paying Ukraine's gas bills. That equates to profits to Russian gas companies. These are Obama's tough sanctions? What a joke. Does anybody in this Administration have a brain?

It's the Keystone Cops running the show.

Arthur Delaney and Emily Swanson — Food Stamp Cut Popular With Republican Voters [Poll Results]

By a 67 percent to 25 percent margin, most Republicans said they approved of the cuts. By a 67 percent to 28 percent margin, most Democrats said they disapproved. Independents were more likely to disapprove than approve, with 48 percent against the cuts and 40 percent in favor....

Overall, 51 percent of Americans don't like the food stamp cutback, while only 40 percent said they approve. A HuffPost/YouGov poll conducted in June found that 40 percent of Americans wanted the food stamps budget decreased, while a combined 48 percent said spending on food stamps should either be increased (24 percent) or kept the same (24 percent).

After the recent round of cuts, support for further cuts may be even lower -- aYouGov/Economist poll conducted this week found only a combined 33 percent of people want the food stamps budget cut or eliminated completely, while 56 percent want it increased or kept the same.

The Huffington Post

Food Stamp Cut Popular With Republican Voters

Arthur Delaney and Emily Swanson

James Patterson — Why the GOP Is Really Waging Its War on Food Stamps

Why the GOP Is Really Waging Its War on Food Stamps

The attack on SNAP is mere political symbolism–but that symbolism is lucrative.
During my service at the Republican National Committee in Washington in the 1990s, I learned just how important symbolism is, both to GOP leaders and their political base.

The House impeachment of President Clinton, for instance, was largely symbolic. Though the public disapproved and the Democrats in the Senate made the two-thirds requirement for Clinton’s removal from office highly unlikely, House Republicans impeached him anyway. House Republicans enacted the political drama purely as symbolic rage—and according to my conversations with GOP fundraisers during that time, that rage helped the RNC rake in millions.

Though I am no longer at the RNC, I smell the same tactic in House Republicans’ recent vote to cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, popularly known as food stamps: It is simply more symbolism and political soap opera for Fox News viewers and Limbaugh Leaguers—and, in turn, another opportunity for Republicans to reach potential donors....

Moral: There is high office and lots of money in targeting abusers of welfare and food stamps.

In These Times
Why the GOP Is Really Waging Its War on Food Stamps
James Patterson

Gutter politics.

George Chidi —Republican congressman tells constituent asking about food stamp cuts: ‘Let him not eat’ [2 Thessalonians 3:10]

A Facebook question from a Bismark, North Dakota resident to his congressman started off rockily yesterday, when the congressman dismissed a religious argument opposed to cuts in the federal food stamp program with a religious quote.

“2 Thessalonians 3:10 English Standard Version (ESV) 10 For even when we were with you, we would give you this command: If anyone is not willing to work, let him not eat,” Congressman Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.) posted in reply Friday afternoon to an inquiry from Kevin Tengesdal, a Bismark-based actor and activist....

The quote Cramer used in reply to Tengesdal is an admonition against Christians failing to plant seed and harvest food because anticipation of the imminent return of Christ might seemingly make that toil unnecessary. [Not to mention that a majority of New Testament scholars do not accept 2 Thessalonians as authentically Pauline.]

Ironically, Cramer’s North Dakota district received $10.4 billion in agricultural subsidies from the U.S. Department of Agriculture from 2005 to 2012 — the single largest recipient of farm subsidies in the nation.

The Raw Story
Republican congressman tells constituent asking about food stamp cuts: ‘Let him not eat’
George Chidi

Mary Clare Jalonick — House GOP Works For Votes On Food Stamp Measure

Republican House leaders are working to line up votes for nearly $4 billion in annual food stamp cuts, but some GOP moderates are questioning if that is too much.

The savings would be achieved by allowing states to put broad new work requirements in place for many food stamp recipients and to test applicants for drugs. The House is scheduled to vote on the bill Thursday.

The bill also would end government waivers that have allowed able-bodied adults who don't have dependents to receive food stamps indefinitely.

Conservatives have said the almost $80 billion-a-year program has become bloated. More than 47 million Americans, or 1 in 7, are now on food stamps, and the program's cost has more than doubled in the last five years as the economy has struggled.

But finding a compromise – and the votes – to scale back the feeding program has been difficult. Conservatives have insisted on larger cuts, while Democrats have been united in opposition and moderate Republicans from areas with high food stamp usage have been wary of efforts to slim the program.

The Huffington Post
House GOP Works For Votes On Food Stamp Measure
Mary Clare Jalonick

Stuart Varney, Fox Business host: Feeding hungry seniors is ‘called buying votes

Fox Business host: Feeding hungry seniors is ‘called buying votes’ (via Raw Story )

Fox Business host Stuart Varney on Tuesday accused the AARP of signing hungry seniors up for food stamps as part of a “buy-the-vote campaign” to benefit President Barack Obama. On Saturday, the Tribune-Democrat reported that the Pennsylvania chapter…

---

Robert Oak — Over 15% of America was on Food Stamps in April 2013

Lately there have been claims from some in the press and Congress that SNAP, the food stamp program is ripe with fraud and abuse. This is simply false. The economic realities of the new America are the reason food stamp usage has risen so dramatically. Next time you go to the grocery, watch for the food stamp cards. You will be surprised just how many are using them and fraud has nothing to do with it. Most people are broke and the wages statistics back that fact up.

The Economic Populist
Over 15% of America was on Food Stamps in April 2013
Robert Oak

Republicans attack food stamps, but dole out billions to wealthy farmers

The Free Rider Problem

While this is funny, it also demonstrates the sociological phenomenon of opposition to "free riders." It's a biological phenomenon that extends way down the range of evolutionary development, and, of course, it is typified by parasites. Taken to the extreme, it is comical.

The Raw Story
Georgia Republican Party chair: Straight people will enter gay marriages to get ‘a free ride’
Arturo Garcia

Fox News contributor: ‘It gets a little comfortable to be in poverty’
Stephen C. Webster

Appearing Saturday on Fox News’s “Cavuto on Business,” contributor Charles Payne insisted that he knows firsthand how “it gets to be a little comfortable to be in poverty” in the United States.

“There’s this idea that between the food stamps and the welfare and the earned income tax credit and the child tax credit and the local programs, you know, it gets a little comfortable to be in poverty,” he said. “Listen, I’ve lived it first hand. I’ve seen when people don’t go to work because they get everything paid for them. The incentive is not there.”

Payne, one of the network’s more vocal critics of assisting the poor and under employed, expanded on his theory about the laziness of poor people during a broadcast last Thursday, explaining that he’s disappointed so many Americans — over 47 million, according to the latest official numbers— are on food stamps. “What we actually have ended up doing is created a wall, a giant barrier, where people don’t move out of poverty into the middle class because in that initial transition they actually lose money and lose benefits,” he said. 

Payne is essentially repeating a common meme among many conservatives who believe that helping poor people keeps them poor and only fosters dependence and the growth of state benefit payments. What many Fox News reports on this subject fail to note is that 90 percent of all welfare benefits go to either members of working households, the elderly or the disabled,according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP).

Rep. Alan Grayson — Walmart "the largest recipient of public aid in the country"

Representative-elect Alan Grayson (D-FL) said Monday that he will put mega-retailer Walmart squarely in his sights during the next Congress for the company’s liberal use of public assistance programs to supplement their workers’ wages.

Speaking to Current TV host Cenk Uygur on Monday’s episode of “The Young Turks,” Grayson called Walmart “the largest recipient of public aid in the country,” saying their low wages force workers to take food stamps, housing assistance and Medicaid just to get by....

“In state after state after state, Walmart employees represent the largest group of Medicaid recipients, the largest group of food stamp recipients....

The Raw Story

Grayson: Walmart is ‘the largest recipient of public aid in the country’

Stephen C. Webster

The living wage movement is picking up steam. Prof. Galbraith must be pleased that he played a part in getting it up and running.

Treasury bond sales: Welfare for the rich!

It's been well discussed here as well as in many other MMT blogs on the web, that the government doesn't need to sell bonds. It spends simply by crediting bank accounts and the sale of bonds isn't necessary for the government to have the funds to pay for goods and services.

On the contrary, bond sales have historically functioned merely as a tool used to manipulate the level of reserves in the banking system in order to set interest rates. But now that the Fed pays interest on reserves, the sale of bonds is even more unecessary. So why do we keep on doing it? I have no idea.

Who buys bonds?

Mostly affluent people. I don't know too many poor people or even middle class people who are wondering what Treasury securities they are going to buy with their extra savings. Only rich people have that worry. Warren Buffet owns over $40 billion in Treasury securities by his own admission. So our government is basically paying interest to rich people like Warren Buffet for no reason at all. It's welfare for the rich and the numbers are huge. Take a look...

Here's what the government pays out in interest and what it pays out on some other, important spending items.

Fiscal Year-to-Date

Interest payments $194 bln
Education $206 bln
Unemployment Ins $106 bln
Temporary Assistance to Needy Families (TANF) $17bln
Food Stamps $4.6 bln

So the government spends 40 times more money paying interest to rich people than it does for food stamps.

It spends twice as much paying welfare to rich people as it does to help the unemployed.

It gives more than 10 times more to rich people than it does to needy families.

It gives about as much to rich people as it spends, in total, on education.

Pardon me, but these are disgraceful statistics. It's one thing to say that we need to spend a lot on national security, because without that, even food becomes moot. (You can't eat if you're blown up.)

However, to spend this kind of money subsidizing the rich when so many people--kids, families, etc--are going hungry or simply desiring an education or needing a helping hand during an economic depression, that is totally immoral, I'm sorry. Welcome to our government, our leadership and our economic reality.