MrRodgers
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ORIGINAL: AtUrCervix
quote:
ORIGINAL: Lucylastic
Rep. Adrian Smith (R-Neb.) refused to say whether “every American is entitled to eat” and the food stamps program is the best way to ensure that they have the food they need.
NPR’s Scott Simon interviewed Smith on Saturday about the farm bill and President Donald Trump’sproposed cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps. In the president’s budget, the White House is seeking $193 billion in cuts to SNAP over 10 years, an amount equal to more than one-quarter of the program’s cost over that period.
There is room for “very minor shifts” in SNAP that “make sure we do not harm the most vulnerable among us,” according to Smith.
“Especially for people in need we do not want to leave our most vulnerable without nutrition,” he said. “Looking at that, we always want to keep that in mind.”
But Simon pressed Smith on his views about the program’s underlying philosophy.
“Let me ask you this bluntly: Is every American entitled to eat?” he asked.
“Well, nutrition obviously we know is very important and I would hope that we can look to ―” Smith began.
“Well, not just important, it’s essential for life,” Simon interjected.
Smith conceded that nutrition is essential to life.
“So is every American entitled to eat and is food stamps something that ought to be that ultimate guarantor?” Simon persisted.
“I think we know that given the necessity of nutrition, there could be a number of ways that we could address that,” Smith answered.
As Smith later observed, a president’s budget is merely a set of suggestions that reflect the president’s fiscal priorities. It is up to Congress to allot the funds for federal programs. The president can then sign or veto budget legislation they craft.
Smith refused to rule out reductions in SNAP spending as part of that process, however.
“I want to look at our entire budget, look at all of the details,” he said.
Roughly 43 million low-income Americans receive SNAP benefits, which are vouchers to buy food. Enrollment has dropped significantly since 2014 due to improvement in the economy.
Mick Mulvaney, director of the White House Office of Management and Budget, by claiming there are people receiving benefits who do not need them given how long ago the recession was.
The administration has not been clear about its intentions for the means-tested aid program though. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue, whose department oversees SNAP, has defended SNAP’s performance and claimed that it will be up to Congress to decide how much it wants to reduce the program’s spending.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/gop-congressman-declines-whether-every-173031436.html
im wondering why people are so silent about this....
Probably for similar reasons that people were so vocal during Johnson's reign among others where free (everything) was handed out and it changed nothing and in many ways, made things worse.
It was Pres. Clinton who first said "ya'll gotta do something...if you can....no more free anything".
He cut assistance programs across the board by limiting the time span allowed wherein which people could remain on programs designed for a hand up, that had evolved in to programs that were a hand out.
Productivity (for a lot of other reasons) rose faster than at any recorded time in U.S. history and we quickly approached a rare opportunity to pay off the debt (in full) only to watch the next Pres restore many of those assistance programs and raised our debt (for a lot of other reasons) because we "had the money to do so".
But we don't anymore.
And if we simply wrote off the entire debt...all 20 trillion....we still....don't anymore.
You are mostly correct, with a few exceptions in my memory. Plus there is that peaky aspect called perspective.
According to my memory, there was little in the way of free everything under Johnson. He created what was to be commonly known as AFDC. He also created Medicare. Nixon reformed welfare (calling it AFDC) to mainly deny assistance to families with any able-bodied man living at home, which broke up the family.
Clinton didn't cut programs as much as he put on a time limit of 2 years. Yes, productivity increases exploded but by luck. What the 90's enjoyed was the explosion of both the PC and the Internet. 20+ million jobs and their taxes created an operating surplus and he also in fact reduced fed. mgovt. payroll by 200,000.
The following admin. cut taxes massively twice and started two wars going through $11 trillion. A $5 trillion projected surplus if they had done nothing plus $6 trillion in wars and Part D Medicare which was a deliberate windfall (at retail) to big pharma.
I am not aware of any assistance programs GWB increased. That may have occurred due to SNAP and assistance going up at the bust of the Dot.com boom.
The proper perspective is that no corporate food stamps (welfare) were cut and the MIC flourished, the combination of which put trillion$ in the pockets of the corp. and investor class and at a time just after their taxes were cut.
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Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite.
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RE: Is every American is entitled to eat? - 
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