291 billion a year in federal, state and local taxpayer dollars to support social welfare. http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/us_welfare_spending_40.html

How much a year for corporate welfare? Is social welfare really dwarfed by corporate welfare? Or are they both a big expense?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:


No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.


The choices you have depend on the hand you're dealt and how well you understand the game.

If you're dealt a mixed hand of crappy cards...

and you can barely read them...

and you don't really understand the rules or odds of the game...

and you're distracted by a lot of other things like being hungry, medical issues, having to help support your family, lacking role models, etc. ...

and you don't have the financial resources to bluff ...

then most of your choices are bad and the odds that you will end up worse off after that hand are very high, no matter what you choose.

Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan.


Have you at any significant point in your life not had enough food?



Yes. There were several periods in my life when I had to get by on not much, for example the equivalent of $7 a week for food, ate pretty sparsely and went hungry much of the time. This is why I get annoyed when people want to just brush it all off and continually make excuses, saying, "oh, you don't know how it is" and "oh, you don't understand" - yes I fucking do, I grew up dirt poor, with a single mom who was barely around, a whole host of problems - and no other family to help, I have been homeless myself and managed to turn it around - and in fact I did so with far less help and support than the typical FARMS family in DC has available to them.

You sound like an exceptional person. What you did was very hard and I'm sure there were a lot of times when you wanted to quit, etc.

When I deal with people who face challenges that I've faced, my initial emotion is along the lines of "I did it. Why can't you?" and if they have an easier path that I did for that challenge, then I'm even less sympathetic.

What I try to do, however, is to remember how hard the challenges were (because that fades with time) and how often I felt hopeless and like giving up - and I try to remember when someone gave me a hand (or when I would've wanted someone to).

When you've climbed the mountain, you can either look down on the people who are still struggling, and say, "I did without help. Why can't you?" and turn your back on them, or you can reach down and say, "I know how hard it is. Let me give you a hand." At the very least you can say, "I know how hard it is. I know what you're facing." and give some sympathy and encouragement.

And yes, I do think corporate welfare needs to stop also - but that's a separate issue. BOTH are problems, and bringing one up doesn't absolve or excuse the other, it's just a dodge and deflection - so don't even bother trying.

You're right. They are separate issues. And I say this without any evidence, so I freely admit that I could be wrong, but I think the scale of the difference is substantial. I think the cost to us as a society of supporting children of people on welfare (to the extent we do), is much, much smaller than the benefits being given to corporations. The lobbyists for the poor are not nearly as well paid or as well connected as those who lobby for the corporations, and the poor have the added benefit of having people look down on them for their situation and make assumptions about how they are lazy, unwilling to work, drug addicted, etc. - because if they weren't all of those things, naturally they wouldn't be poor!

I think a cattle rancher should have a lifetime cap of 1 million dollars worth of grazing, 20 years max, and as long as he has free grazing, then no more kids.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

The choices you have depend on the hand you're dealt and how well you understand the game.

If you're dealt a mixed hand of crappy cards...

and you can barely read them...

and you don't really understand the rules or odds of the game...

and you're distracted by a lot of other things like being hungry, medical issues, having to help support your family, lacking role models, etc. ...

and you don't have the financial resources to bluff ...

then most of your choices are bad and the odds that you will end up worse off after that hand are very high, no matter what you choose.

Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan.

Have you at any significant point in your life not had enough food?

Yes. There were several periods in my life when I had to get by on not much, for example the equivalent of $7 a week for food, ate pretty sparsely and went hungry much of the time. This is why I get annoyed when people want to just brush it all off and continually make excuses, saying, "oh, you don't know how it is" and "oh, you don't understand" - yes I fucking do, I grew up dirt poor, with a single mom who was barely around, a whole host of problems - and no other family to help, I have been homeless myself and managed to turn it around - and in fact I did so with far less help and support than the typical FARMS family in DC has available to them.

And yes, I do think corporate welfare needs to stop also - but that's a separate issue. BOTH are problems, and bringing one up doesn't absolve or excuse the other, it's just a dodge and deflection - so don't even bother trying.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan. There's a whole lot of people who just sit around playing the victim rather than taking charge of their lives. There are library branches all over the city, including Anacostia. We have some of the best museums in the nation right here in DC. There's a SHIT-TON of resources available already - yet people don't even bother taking advantage of all of the milk and honey they already have before whining for more. They don't have libraries and museums in Somalia, they don't have SNAP and all of the other subsidies and benefits there that we do.

Do we as the rest of society have an obligation to help the poor, the sick, the hungry, those who've fallen on tough times? YES. Of course we do. But are we as the rest of society obligated to pay every bill and wipe every ass indefinitely? Absolutely NOT. And that's what the whole issue here is.

Are you equally enraged about perpetual corporate welfare or only money given to poor people?

+1

Anonymous wrote:Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan. There's a whole lot of people who just sit around playing the victim rather than taking charge of their lives. There are library branches all over the city, including Anacostia. We have some of the best museums in the nation right here in DC. There's a SHIT-TON of resources available already - yet people don't even bother taking advantage of all of the milk and honey they already have before whining for more. They don't have libraries and museums in Somalia, they don't have SNAP and all of the other subsidies and benefits there that we do.

Do we as the rest of society have an obligation to help the poor, the sick, the hungry, those who've fallen on tough times? YES. Of course we do. But are we as the rest of society obligated to pay every bill and wipe every ass indefinitely? Absolutely NOT. And that's what the whole issue here is.

Are you equally enraged about perpetual corporate welfare or only money given to poor people?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

The choices you have depend on the hand you're dealt and how well you understand the game.

If you're dealt a mixed hand of crappy cards...

and you can barely read them...

and you don't really understand the rules or odds of the game...

and you're distracted by a lot of other things like being hungry, medical issues, having to help support your family, lacking role models, etc. ...

and you don't have the financial resources to bluff ...

then most of your choices are bad and the odds that you will end up worse off after that hand are very high, no matter what you choose.

Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan.

Have you at any significant point in your life not had enough food?

Anonymous wrote:

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

The choices you have depend on the hand you're dealt and how well you understand the game.

If you're dealt a mixed hand of crappy cards...

and you can barely read them...

and you don't really understand the rules or odds of the game...

and you're distracted by a lot of other things like being hungry, medical issues, having to help support your family, lacking role models, etc. ...

and you don't have the financial resources to bluff ...

then most of your choices are bad and the odds that you will end up worse off after that hand are very high, no matter what you choose.

Lots of us are dealt mixed hands of crappy cards - parents that divorce, die young, who are alcoholics, drug dependent, manic depressive, can't manage money and go bankrupt, lose their jobs, have nervous breakdowns bla bla bla. Hunger? Issues at home? No role models? Cry me a river, you weren't born in Somalia or Afghanistan. There's a whole lot of people who just sit around playing the victim rather than taking charge of their lives. There are library branches all over the city, including Anacostia. We have some of the best museums in the nation right here in DC. There's a SHIT-TON of resources available already - yet people don't even bother taking advantage of all of the milk and honey they already have before whining for more. They don't have libraries and museums in Somalia, they don't have SNAP and all of the other subsidies and benefits there that we do.

Do we as the rest of society have an obligation to help the poor, the sick, the hungry, those who've fallen on tough times? YES. Of course we do. But are we as the rest of society obligated to pay every bill and wipe every ass indefinitely? Absolutely NOT. And that's what the whole issue here is.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

Sometimes you make good choices and life is still shitty.

Wait, so you're saying that kids from wealthy families who go to top notch private schools, starting in pre-K, don't get a short cut to success compared to the child of a single mom who often goes to school hungry? You can't possibly believe that shit your shoveling. Besides, plenty of CORPORATIONS get a hell of a lot more financial help from the government yet still pay below the poverty level or ship jobs oversees.

But go ahead and hate poor people. It requires less thinking.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:While I agree that the government should stay out of reproductive issues, I still feel that we are in our rights to not provide government assistance (tax dollars) to those that continue to have kids when they can't afford their own basic needs (food, shelter, etc.). If youalready have kids and are down on your luck, absolutely you should get some help, but the second you pop out another mouth for us to feed, then your support ends.

Yeah, yeah "why punish the innocent child". I totally get that, but if the parents are that stupid to make the right decisions, then lets throw them on birth control and we'll make the decisions for them.

Laws do exist to prevent the dumb from killing themselves, such as seatbelts, so why not restrictions to prevent a burden, however slight, on our tax dollars. Not to mention that the odds are high that the vicious cycle will continue.

I bring this up when I found out that a co-worker of mine's daughter, who is 17, is having another baby by another boyfriend. The coworker is 34. Imagine being a grandma at 33. The daughter is on welfare and at the same time was getting tattoso, piercings, nails, hair dyes and cell phones since she kept losing them. She lives in subsidized housing and has a roomate that she collects from, the roomate paying more than what the daughter is paying for rent.
The co-worker thinks it is great how smart her daughter is. Stupid breeds stupid.

Both the females and males need to be sterilized so they don't keep making babies that others have to pay for.

-Mother of two (I happen to be pro choice, but can't stand it when people are milking the system. If you knew your kid would die of starvation because no one would help, maybe you wouldn't have a kid you couldn't afford. But when the government will pay you for staying at home to take care of these kids, it becomes a job to them.)

My maternity leave was unpaid and no one is giving me money to raise my kids. We work to pay our bills. Why do others get a free ride?

Because they are infants and small children who deserve to be fed and housed even if their parents act without thinking or simply make choices we disagree with.Because a hungry or homeless 3rd grader can't take full advantage of a free pubic education and is likely to be a less productive citizen as a result.

Why do the parents constantly get to act without thinking and make the stupidest choices over and over again? Why are there never any consequences or interventions? When in the hell is this cycle going to end?

You make poverty sound like a walk in the park.

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

Sometimes you make good choices and life is still shitty.

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

The choices you have depend on the hand you're dealt and how well you understand the game.

If you're dealt a mixed hand of crappy cards...

and you can barely read them...

and you don't really understand the rules or odds of the game...

and you're distracted by a lot of other things like being hungry, medical issues, having to help support your family, lacking role models, etc. ...

and you don't have the financial resources to bluff ...

then most of your choices are bad and the odds that you will end up worse off after that hand are very high, no matter what you choose.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Y'all can argue about what a good idea this shit is all you want but I am EAGERLY looking forward to the day when y'all try to implement this bullshit. I will definitely be taking a day off and sitting my ass in front of the television as soon as word breaks that welfare recipients must be sterilized - you thought them riots after the Rodney King verdict was bad? Sheeeeiiiiit...lol

Good lord. Will people stop talking about sterilization. No one is saying that!

That's the problem. The people who are all in favor of this idea haven't thought it through. You've latched onto an inaccurate talking point and you're proposing a "cure" for a mostly non-existent problem without thinking about how it would work or the consequences.

So, let's assume there is a rampant problem of "welfare moms" out there just having babies to improve their lifestyle because of all the money they're going to get from the government (there isn't but y'all seem to believe there is). You want to discourage this. Let's play out the options:

At the extreme, do you require a woman to go on birth control (with regular medical checkups to confirm compliance) or do you require reversible sterilization? Do you require the men to get reversible vasectomies? Presumably if you just sterilize the men on welfare, then the welfare moms would only be getting pregnant from fathers who could afford the child support. Do you have any idea whether the cost of all of those medical procedures outweighs the supposed cost of supporting all those extra children? Do you require forced abortions for cases where the birth control or sterilization procedure failed, or do you just require the woman to carry it to term and then give it up for adoption?

If you're not going to require sterilizations/birth control, do you make it illegal to have children while receiving welfare? If so, what is the punishment for the mothers who do so? What about the fathers? Should it be a criminal offense, or just a civil one, bearing in mind that the people who are subject to these rules don't have the money to pay fines, anyway.

So, if it's not illegal, but a condition of continuing to receive benefits is that you don't have any more children, how do you handle cases of rape/sexual abuse? What if people are legitimately using birth control and it fails (among other things because some nice, devoutly religious people insisted on abstinence only sex ed in schools so the people who need it most actually don't know how to use the birth control properly)? If they have a baby while on welfare, do you cut off all the funds supporting them and their existing children, or do you just say "No additional money" Do you deny the mothers pre-natal education and care, increasing the likelihood of expensive medical complications or a special needs baby that will cost more to support? Do you then deny the new baby early nutritional support, increasingly the likelihood that the child will be developmentally disabled? How about school? If a baby was born to "welfare parents" should the child be denied access to public school education, too? After all the parents are unlikely to be paying property taxes to support the public school system.

One PP asked when the cycle would end. The best way to keep the cycle going is to increase the poverty level, deny benefits to children and push them into even worse poverty. To break the cycle you have to make the investment in the next generation and provide the resources and education and support that will help people break the cycle of poverty.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:While I agree that the government should stay out of reproductive issues, I still feel that we are in our rights to not provide government assistance (tax dollars) to those that continue to have kids when they can't afford their own basic needs (food, shelter, etc.). If youalready have kids and are down on your luck, absolutely you should get some help, but the second you pop out another mouth for us to feed, then your support ends.

Yeah, yeah "why punish the innocent child". I totally get that, but if the parents are that stupid to make the right decisions, then lets throw them on birth control and we'll make the decisions for them.

Laws do exist to prevent the dumb from killing themselves, such as seatbelts, so why not restrictions to prevent a burden, however slight, on our tax dollars. Not to mention that the odds are high that the vicious cycle will continue.

I bring this up when I found out that a co-worker of mine's daughter, who is 17, is having another baby by another boyfriend. The coworker is 34. Imagine being a grandma at 33. The daughter is on welfare and at the same time was getting tattoso, piercings, nails, hair dyes and cell phones since she kept losing them. She lives in subsidized housing and has a roomate that she collects from, the roomate paying more than what the daughter is paying for rent.
The co-worker thinks it is great how smart her daughter is. Stupid breeds stupid.

Both the females and males need to be sterilized so they don't keep making babies that others have to pay for.

-Mother of two (I happen to be pro choice, but can't stand it when people are milking the system. If you knew your kid would die of starvation because no one would help, maybe you wouldn't have a kid you couldn't afford. But when the government will pay you for staying at home to take care of these kids, it becomes a job to them.)

My maternity leave was unpaid and no one is giving me money to raise my kids. We work to pay our bills. Why do others get a free ride?

Because they are infants and small children who deserve to be fed and housed even if their parents act without thinking or simply make choices we disagree with.Because a hungry or homeless 3rd grader can't take full advantage of a free pubic education and is likely to be a less productive citizen as a result.

Why do the parents constantly get to act without thinking and make the stupidest choices over and over again? Why are there never any consequences or interventions? When in the hell is this cycle going to end?

You make poverty sound like a walk in the park.

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.

Some choices go to shit even though they seemed reasonable at the time.
Do you want a society that looks like it came out of a Dickens novel? Because that's the reality of a society without a public safety net.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:While I agree that the government should stay out of reproductive issues, I still feel that we are in our rights to not provide government assistance (tax dollars) to those that continue to have kids when they can't afford their own basic needs (food, shelter, etc.). If youalready have kids and are down on your luck, absolutely you should get some help, but the second you pop out another mouth for us to feed, then your support ends.

Yeah, yeah "why punish the innocent child". I totally get that, but if the parents are that stupid to make the right decisions, then lets throw them on birth control and we'll make the decisions for them.

Laws do exist to prevent the dumb from killing themselves, such as seatbelts, so why not restrictions to prevent a burden, however slight, on our tax dollars. Not to mention that the odds are high that the vicious cycle will continue.

I bring this up when I found out that a co-worker of mine's daughter, who is 17, is having another baby by another boyfriend. The coworker is 34. Imagine being a grandma at 33. The daughter is on welfare and at the same time was getting tattoso, piercings, nails, hair dyes and cell phones since she kept losing them. She lives in subsidized housing and has a roomate that she collects from, the roomate paying more than what the daughter is paying for rent.
The co-worker thinks it is great how smart her daughter is. Stupid breeds stupid.

Both the females and males need to be sterilized so they don't keep making babies that others have to pay for.

-Mother of two (I happen to be pro choice, but can't stand it when people are milking the system. If you knew your kid would die of starvation because no one would help, maybe you wouldn't have a kid you couldn't afford. But when the government will pay you for staying at home to take care of these kids, it becomes a job to them.)

My maternity leave was unpaid and no one is giving me money to raise my kids. We work to pay our bills. Why do others get a free ride?

Because they are infants and small children who deserve to be fed and housed even if their parents act without thinking or simply make choices we disagree with.Because a hungry or homeless 3rd grader can't take full advantage of a free pubic education and is likely to be a less productive citizen as a result.

Why do the parents constantly get to act without thinking and make the stupidest choices over and over again? Why are there never any consequences or interventions? When in the hell is this cycle going to end?

You make poverty sound like a walk in the park.

No, you have that backwards. Life is a series of choices. Make shitty choices and your life will be shitty. Make good choices and your life will be better. Some people don't even understand that fundamental reality. Some people don't see the point of becoming educated enough to make good choices. Some people actually go out of their way to and prefer to make shitty choices, foolishly thinking there's a shortcut to or exit strategy to a better life (like gambling or crime or getting pregnant). There are no shortcuts, no walks in the park, you have to do the work and make the right choices.