Nope. Already passed it. Correctamundo on all other points. The parasite class will always vote for "more of the same", while greedy, power-hungry, chickenshit Leftist politicos pander to it. And as the parasite class is ALREADY >50% of the vote....
You have no idea what the demographic and circumstances and situation of the average food stamp recipient is, nor do you want to understand. Are you as equally concerned about the far greater waste in the defense budget? In general, people have little idea about the numbers involved here and inflate the problem of fraud in foodstamps, and other social support services, far beyond their actual amounts. It has more to do with just the idea that some are not deserving of help and we are paying money to these leeches. As I said before, this is of course abhorrent. But it needs to kept in perspective. This recent rise in foodstamp outlays are due to the great recession, not because some of some grand move toward socialism, as some ignorant paranoid righties seem to think.
What is "far less"? If waste is 15%, is that far less? Probably. Acceptable? Hell no. What about 25%? There's no way in hell it's 1%. No way. Feel free to provide the "numbers you ran some time ago" so I can review. If you are correct, I will certainly bow to them.
And you do? What did people do before welfare? They chose to starve or more often they chose to get off their lazy asses and do whatever it took to eat. Well now that's the difference between me you and your ilk. I'm concerned and even outraged at ALL government wasteful spending regardless of which party is more responsible for it.
It starts with a WAG that 7% of the welfare services are wasted on the undeserving. Perhaps that number is too low. Perhaps not. But it sounds about right to me. Assuming social services is 12% of the budget, that means about 1% is wasted on the leeches. " About 12 percent of the federal budget in 2012, or $411 billion, supported programs that provide aid (other than health insurance or Social Security benefits) to individuals and families facing hardship. Spending on safety net programs declined in both nominal and real terms between 2011 and 2012 as the economy continued to improve. These programs include: the refundable portions of the Earned Income Tax Credit and Child Tax Credit, which assist low- and moderate-income working families through the tax code; programs that provide cash payments to eligible individuals or households, including Supplemental Security Income for the elderly or disabled poor and unemployment insurance; various forms of in-kind assistance for low-income families and individuals, including SNAP (food stamps), school meals, low-income housing assistance, child care assistance, and assistance in meeting home energy bills; and various other programs such as those that aid abused and neglected children." http://www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cfm?fa=view&id=1258 I can just see the shocked look on all the crazed righty's faces right now. The smell of burning brain cells wafting on the air. Blood pressure rising.... a reach for the remote to turn on Fox News.
I do not, which is why I did not declare what waste is. FC, on the other hand, did. Would you like a refresher course on how debate works again?
Let me politely provide some context regarding the actual facts. One of the primary reasons that the foodstamp outlays increased is because President Obama changed the eligibility criteria. "The 2009 stimulus bill scrapped limits on SNAP benefits to adults without children and raised the maximum benefit by 13.6 percent through 2014. According to the Congressional Budget Office, about 20 percent of the $198 billion growth in between 2009 and 2011 can be attributed to the new eligibility standards, and hence will not go away once the economy recovers. As Greg Beato of Reason magazine explains in a 2010 article, many states open them up to anyone receiving funds from the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, program. In practice, applicants with gross incomes well above 130 percent of the poverty line are now eligible." The CBO office has reported multiple times that approx. 8% to 10% of Medicaid, Welfare, and SNAP payouts are fradulent. Waste is wrong - whether it is in the defense department or in public benefits. All areas of government should be reviewed for fraud and waste. The only good news I have to report is that states are cracking down on food stamp fraud - in Cary N.C. , they recently arrested over 30% of the residents of the low-income housing complex for food stamp fraud. These people were selling food stamps (EBT cards) on craigslist. I will note that nearly all of those arrested also were charged with drug possession while living in free Section 8 housing. States are also cutting down on replacement EBT cards - meaning that you can not sell your card every month and then claim you lost it. Unlike some others in the P&R forum, I support public benefits as a short term solution to help people in tough situations. The benefits should not be a long term support measure. One of the primary reasons to support benefits (even for the most militant anti-government spending types) is to stop the lower class from rioting and tearing up the middle-class working neighborhoods - as well as the hope that some of those on benefits at some point return to being fully-employed productive tax-paying citizens. As a volunteer with our local foodbank, I recognize that some families suffer from food insecurity and need a helping hand to move forward. I support private and public efforts to provide assistance to people in order to get people back on their feet. I am not about to classify everyone who needs help as leeches - many move on and get away from benefits. However, there are some who are mired in a culture of free benefits for generations that have no inclination to improve their situation or stop taking from the taxpayers. At some point, there needs to be limits placed on the number of years of eligibility with an associated crack-down on fraud. The taxpayers will not have confidence in the integrity of the public assistance system if many people are abusing it.