Tuesday, July 03, 2012

Obama Administration's goal: Everyone on the dole.

Because if they're dependent on big government for their sustenance, they'll likely vote Democrat to keep it coming.

USDA combats ‘mountain pride,’ self-reliance to boost food stamp rolls

Can't have any of that pride or self-reliance in the Obama-nation now, can we? You will be assimilated, and if you refuse, maybe a room at Gitmo for you. (You know Gitmo, right? It's that place that Obama swore he'd close on his first day as President...the place that's still open today.)

One in seven Americans are on food stamps, but the government is pushing to enroll more — in many instances working to overcome Americans’ “pride,” self-reliance or failure to see a need.

“Our common goal is to increase participation in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program,” the United States Department of Agriculture explains...

“Hearing from the outreach worker that benefits could be used to purchase seeds and plants for their gardens turned out to be a very important strategy in counteracting what they described as ‘mountain pride’ and appealed to those who wished not to rely on others,” the document explains. “Eventually, many accepted assistance from the Low Income Energy Assistance Program, the Qualified Medicare Beneficiary program, and others, in some cases doubling a household’s net income. In 1 year, SNAP participation increased over 10 percent.”

Overcoming “beliefs” is a stated method from the USDA to bring more people to the program.
And those "beliefs"? Chiefly the belief that it's better to care for one's own family than turn to the government to do it.
The agency adds that there are many hurdles — including reticence to accept government aid — that SNAP advocates must overcome in order to make eligible people accept the government’s help.
But it's not just welfare. The USDA says so.
The USDA also claims increasing food stamp participation is an economic stimulus.

“Outreach and education are powerful tools in overcoming barriers to SNAP participation. Even a small increase in SNAP participation can have a substantial impact,” USDA continues. “If the national participation rate rose 5 percentage points, 1.9 million more low-income people would have an additional $1.3 billion in benefits per year to use to purchase healthy food and $2.5 billion total in new economic activity would be generated nationwide.”

Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions, the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, described USDA’s assertion that food stamps are beneficial to the economy as “ludicrous.”

Sessions, who has had his eye on food stamp reform for years, added that USDA’s focus on reducing cultural impediments to food stamp participation is particularly concerning.

“I think it’s a deep problem when SNAP officials think it is their duty to overcome ‘mountain pride’ or overcome the American sense of independence and individual responsibility,” Sessions told The Daily Caller in an interview. “They seem to think that is an anachronism and that modern Americans shouldn’t have pride and independence. I think it is highly troubling actually.”

While Sessions does not begrudge food for those truly in need, he argues that the goal should be giving Americans the tools they need to get off food stamps, not adopting strategies to get more people on them.
Our Founding Fathers would be rolling over in their graves if they could see us ceding our hard-won Freedom and Independence from a British despot and voluntarily signing up to be controlled by an allegedly domestically-born one.

Kudos to Senator Sessions for fighting the good fight, but I fear that he represents a fading minority of Americans who actually understand and cherish the concepts of Independence and Freedom.

The cities fell to the Dems and their welfare-state mentality long ago. The last hope for a free nation was and is rural America...and now they're in the cross-hairs. If the Dems get them to knuckle under--and succeed in giving citizenship and the vote to the illegals in our country--who'll be left to wave the banner of Liberty?

2 comments:

  1. Wow. Perhaps I am confused though, but how on earth does this statement make sense? “Hearing from the outreach worker that benefits could be used to purchase seeds and plants for their gardens turned out to be a very important strategy in counteracting what they described as ‘mountain pride’ and appealed to those who wished not to rely on others,” the document explains.

    All these people are going to be on welfare in government housing, yet somehow they will have a nice parcel of land that they can have a nice garden? I suppose we will soon be paying for welfare recipient's landscapers soon too then. Give me a break.

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  2. Anonymous8:21 PM

    Lielly alone among your comentors I've spent, over the last eight years, three of those years on food stamps/debit card. Am I proud of this? Nope. Was it critical? Well, yeah.

    Actually, I qualified for it while TEACHING PUBLIC SCHOOL as a substitute in my home state! They threw the money at me and my daughter. I had no problem using the food money whgile doing the same job as the Union folks for less than half what they made and with no benefits at all. Anyway.

    The system is abused; it is. It's one of those things. I was stunned at some of the things on the Food Stamp list: Ice? Ice cream? Coca-Cola? Fresh bakery items? Like the $300 custom wedding cake I watched one woman purchase with her card? Yeouch!Honestly, for some people they wre getting so much they couldn't spend it all. $700 a month food budget for one skinny woman and her three under-five kids? Really! The reason they allow people to accrue that money in an unnattachable account is otherwise you have no other choice but to 'sell' the benefit. The going rate around me is $.50 on the dollar. No lie.

    I don't know, man; I was desperately grateful for it at the time, but I watched a LOT of people treat it as an entitlement. Oh; nobody buys healthy food with those bennies: they buy crap.

    I did.

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