Daily Blend: Wednesday, November 21, 2012

John Fairfax

American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists declares that birth control should be available over the counter. Not that such a sensible and provably effective measure has any chance of becoming reality in the foreseeable future, of course.

Nevada City proposes ordinance to make it illegal for homeless people to sleep outside without a permit.
(via @radleybalko)

New report: Only three developed countries (Mexico, Chile and Turkey) have a higher child poverty rate than the United States, and other disillusioning statistics.
(via @BuzzFeedAndrew)

Best obituary ever: “At 9, he settled a dispute with a pistol. At 13, he lit out for the Amazon jungle. At 20, he attempted suicide-by-jaguar. Afterward he was apprenticed to a pirate. To please his mother, who did not take kindly to his being a pirate, he briefly managed a mink farm […]” ^[pictured]
(via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

O’Donnell slaps Fox for attacking chef’s food stamps challenge

Greg Gutfeld

The problem with Fox News isn’t only its crippling lack of editorial standards and journalistic integrity; it’s also that it acts like an irresistible magnet for some of the most insipid dunderheads anywhere. A good representative of this phenomenon is career twerp Greg Gutfeld, last seen claiming liberals want to use birth control to eliminate poor people, responding to criticism with atrocious gay jokes, and generally acting like an insufferable brat given far too many platforms to snivel on. And now, here is is, attacking celebrity chef Mario Batali over the latter’s decision to raise awareness of the plight of people living on food stamps by doing it himself.

MSNBC’s Lawrence O’Donnell has some choice words for him:

Transcript: (click the [+/-] to open/close →)

[−]

Original transcript via MSNBC; edited for grammar, style, completion, etc.

LAWRENCE O’DONNELL: Celebrity chef Mario Batali, whom I’ve never had the pleasure of meeting, is trying to rewrite this country’s understanding of the food stamp program from zero understanding to what it’s actually like to try to feed a family on food stamps.

MARIO BATALI: At the big food bank for New York fund-raiser about a week ago, I challenged everyone to try to walk a mile in a person’s shoes. And that was to see if you could live on food stamps. It really causes us to think about what hunger is, whether the states is responsible for feeding people. What kind of things are going on in politics and what really makes it a great kind of engine for our discussion at the house is we really have to think about what we're eating.

O’DONNEL: Tomorrow, Mario Batali, his wife and two teenage sons will finish the week of eating on the equivalent of a food stamp budget. That’s $31 per person for the week. $1.48 per meal each. On day four of Batali’s life on a food stamp budget, he told the Associated Press, “I’m [expletive deleted] starving.” He said he’s been having rice and beans for lunch every day and figuring out ever-cheaper ways to put food on the table. He said his teenage sons are, quote, “having more peanut butter and jelly than they’ve had in the last ten years”.

Batali has been leading a couple of hundred people who are trying to eat for a week on a food stamp budget. This is an act of discipline and sacrifice that few among us would dare undertake, except of course, those already living on food stamps. Kind of wonderful that a rich and famous celebrity chef, who never has to think about the plight of the hungry, would help raise our awareness. Well, Fox News doesn't see it that way.

GREG GUTFELD: This week, Chef Mario Batali is eating on the equivalent of a food stamp budget, about $1.50 per meal, as a way to protest potential cuts to the benefits program. He said, quote, “we hopefully aren’t pretending or being like a bunch of yuppies saying uh oh, yeah, this is how we do it.” That’s exactly how it sounds. Terry, does this make you want to slap him around?

O’DONNEL: “Slap him around”. Now, Greg thinks that’s funny. In fact, he thinks most of what he says is funny. And it’s meant to be funny. Comedy isn’t comedy if it isn’t funny. His panelists went on for a couple of minutes ridiculing Mario Batali without ever once considering the plight of people who actually live on food stamps.

JAMIE WEINSTEIN: If he wanted to help people that are actually poor is to do what he does well, which is start successful restaurants and hire people. That would actually help some people get out of poverty.

O’DONNEL: You have to be so disconnected from American popular culture not to know that Mario Batali has started many successful restaurants and hired hundreds and hundreds, maybe thousands, of people to staff those restaurants. He has 11 restaurants from New York to Los Angeles. He also runs Eataly, a large combination of markets and restaurants under a single roof here in New York. And he’s also created jobs in the television business by his own very successful TV show The Chew on ABC.

GUTFELD: Wouldn’t it be a better idea to donate some food from one of his posh restaurants? Or allow them to use food stamps at the posh restaurant?

O’DONNEL: It’s illegal in most states to use food stamps in restaurants, and as to donating some food – Mario Batali has donated more food than any other chef in America and probably the world. He has devoted years of service to the food bank of New York City. He has been on the board of the food bank for nine years. A food bank that helps feed over 1.5 million people every year. Mario Batali and his wife have been relentless fund-raisers for the food bank. Batali is also a founding member of the Feeding America Entertainment Council. Previously America’s Second Harvest, as it was known. That organization provides nutritious fresh foods to Americans struggling through hunger with local and national food assistance programs. And then, of course, there is Mario Batali Foundation, whose mission is, quote, “to feed, protect, educate and empower children, and encourage them to dream big while providing them with the necessary tools to become an active force for change in today’s world.” One of the many things that Mario Batali Foundation does is teach children and their families to cook healthy on very tight budgets. Kind of makes you wonder what the Greg Gutfeld Foundation has done lately.

GUTFELD: Doesn’t this make you want to slap him around?

O’DONNEL: Mario Batali, directly and indirectly, has helped feed millions of people. And that’s before we get to the very big federal tax bill he pays every year. Some of which goes to paying for the federal food stamp program. And for all of that, these people think Mario Batali deserves to be slapped around. If one of them has ever fed a poor hungry person, they forgot to mention that in their round of ridicule of Mario Batali. You have to wonder what would make them react to Mario Batali this way?

GUTFELD: Does this make you want to slap him around?

O’DONNEL: Why do Mario Batali’s kindness, generosity and concern for the poor, all qualities that Jesus Christ exhibited in abundance – why do they make these people so uncomfortable? It might be time for them to reread what Christ did with the loafs and fishes. And when they are reminded that he gave all the bread and all the fish away to the poor, will Greg Gutfeld say this?

GUTFELD: Does this make you want to slap him around? […] Does this make you want to slap him around? […] Does this make you want to slap him around?

I’m not a big fan of O’Donnell, but he’s as good as anyone when it comes to setting Fox cronies straight. (Not that it’s a particularly difficult task, mind you.)

(via Media Matters for America)

Tags: Lawrence O'Donnell • Greg Gutfeld • Fox News • Mario Batali • food stamps • food stamps challenge

Fail Quote: Penn Jillette calls social welfare “immoral self-righteous bullying laziness”

Penn Jillette

I saw this quote being floated around by libertarian tweeps this morning, and while I was hoping it was quote-mined or otherwise fake, I was able to track it down to this CNN opinion piece, confirming its veracity – and the reason why, yet again, so many people hold libertarianism in contempt. From Penn Jillette (again, sadly), after explaining that he’s both an atheist and a libertarian because he “doesn’t know”:

It's amazing to me how many people think that voting to have the government give poor people money is compassion. Helping poor and suffering people is compassion. Voting for our government to use guns to give money to help poor and suffering people is immoral self-righteous bullying laziness.

People need to be fed, medicated, educated, clothed, and sheltered, and if we're compassionate we'll help them, but you get no moral credit for forcing other people to do what you think is right. There is great joy in helping people, but no joy in doing it at gunpoint.

So, voting to have your elected representatives take a pathetically tiny slice of the overall financial pie and use it to provide critical assistance to the poor, homeless and starving is actually a form of “immoral self-righteous bullying laziness”. Because we’re all totally able to end poverty right this minute if only we’d stop being selfish prigs and give our own money to the poor. I mean, sure, ending government intervention in the matter and relying on private citizens to provide the only aid to the downtrodden would only result in a catastrophically inefficient quagmire with thousands and millions of the very poor suffering and dying in even greater numbers, but hey, at least we’d experience “great joy” for our “moral credit” in refusing to “forc[e] other people” – who we elected to do just that – to “do what [we] think is right”.

Look, I’m all for encouraging people to take personal responsibility for their own actions and to do things themselves rather than rely on others, but this sort of libertarian “government is bad and shouldn’t be relied on for nothin’!” rhetoric is as ridiculous as any other fringe schtick. Living in society is a contract: You are protected and served by the collective, with your interests watched over by an overarching organization of, by and for the people; and in turn, you must donate some of your own resources (in time and money) in order to keep the wheels turning for everyone. Of course, there will always be faults and points of failure – that’s inherent to any system that relies on people, and the bigger the system (and the more people in it), the greater the problems. But acting like it’s morally condemnable for the more helpless classes of people to rely on said system to do essentially the very job it’s intended to do – keeping them alive and safe to the best of collective’s ability – is more than just irrational; it’s frankly bizarre (not to mention incredibly petty).

The government is, essentially, an extension of all of us, formed by people we select to work for us. What sense does it make to then turn around and condemn this very group we create and task with the responsibility of watching over us for doing just that – and even moreso, to accuse those who demand just that from it of being “lazy”, “immoral” “bullies”? Or do libertarians really believe that we’d all be better off without any real governing entity and left to our own devices? As caricaturized as that sounds, it’s increasingly similar to the inevitable logical outcome of so many of these ridiculous deregulation and “free market” arguments. (No, the people will not always choose the right thing. In fact, they mostly seem not to. Seriously, what planet do these naive bozos come from?)

It’s becoming remarkably difficult to defend libertarians when the irrational attacks aimed at them are proving increasingly on the mark.

(via @maysae)

Tags: Penn Jillette • libertarianism • libertarians • social security • welfare • government

Sacramento homeless to starve because of Church’s bigotry

Everything you need to know about the Catholic Church in one simple lede:

The Catholic Diocese of Sacramento no longer will fund programs at Francis House, a nonprofit agency that serves homeless people, because of its new director's views supporting abortion rights and gay marriage.

For it is better that the destitute starve than to fund to a charitable group whose leader happens to espouse beliefs contrary to the Church’s dogma.

What more encouragement do the Church’s liberal “Catholic In Name Only” supporters need to get them to abandon that Bronze Age relic of intolerance?

(via Joe. My. God.)

Tags: Catholic Church • Catholic Diocese of Sacramento • Sacramento, CA • Francis House • homelessness • Faith Whitmore

Welfare recipients “are slaves to the government and should be reminded of that fact”

Brion McClanahan

Be sure to keep this horrible little proposal by The Daily Caller’s Brion McClanahan in mind the next time you’re told that far-Rightists don’t hate poor folks. That is, unless arguing that poor people should be subjected to their own Jim Crow laws for the sake of humiliating them out of seeking welfare is actually seen as the compassionate approach nowadays:

Dharma-style food stamp reform would have four basic components. First, the federal government would create a government “brand” of essential food items such as milk, cheese, meat, cereal, vegetables, bread, peanut butter, beans, juice, soup, baby formula, diapers, etc., and would package the items with simple black-and-white labels and basic descriptions. The word “Government” would be stamped across the top in bold letters so everyone would know it was a welfare item. These items could be manufactured by major companies through government contracts, thus not creating a net loss to private industry. Because competition is not an issue, taste and quality, with the exception of the baby formula and baby food, would not be a top priority. Snacks, soda, cigarettes and beer would not be available through the program.

Second, the government would lease existing store fronts and set up “government stores.” There are typically several grocery store locations that have gone out of business in any given area; these would make ideal settings for the new government stores. The number of store locations would be chosen based on the size of the area and its number of food stamp recipients. The stores would be placed on public transportation routes for convenience.

Third, and most importantly, all food stamp recipients would be required to spend their government dollars at these stores. Private grocery stores and chains, such as Wal-Mart and McDonald’s, would no longer be allowed to accept EBT cards, and the money loaded on the cards could not be withdrawn and used for any other purpose. Each card would have a set dollar amount sizable enough to purchase essential items from the government store. For example, a family of four could expect to receive enough government-brand beans, rice, bread, milk, cheese, meat, cereal and vegetables to last a month with careful planning. In other words, they must be ready to stretch a food budget. Families with babies would get a month supply of formula, baby food and diapers.

Fourth, anyone who accepts government aid would have to submit to a monthly tobacco and drug test. Food stamp recipients are, after all, wards of the state. They are slaves to the government and should be reminded of that fact. If a recipient is found to have tobacco or drugs in his system, he would be dropped from the program. People on government aid would also lose the privilege of voting. That way they couldn’t vote for greater benefits or easier terms (most of them don’t vote, but now they couldn’t).

Fox News: Liberals want to eliminate the poor with birth control!

I know I’ve said this a few times previously, but I just cannot for the life of me figure out how anyone, anywhere, can take these Fox News clowns seriously:

My transcript: (click the [+/-] to expand/collapse →)

[−]

GREG GUTFELD: But the thing is, Bob [Beckel] is hitting on something where the Left is making this about availability to the poor. It’s more about getting rid of the poor.

[awkward beat]

BOB BECKEL: It’s what?

GUTFELD: It’s more about getting rid of the poor.

BECKEL: [incredulous] Did you really just say that?

ANDREA TANTAROS: Well actually, it’s not a bad point.

[crosstalk]

KIMBERLY GUILFOYLE: Population control?

GUTFELD: The difference between the Left and the Right: The Right want the poor to get rich; the Left want the poor not to exist.

BECKEL: And the Right’s doing everything they can to make sure the poor don’t get rich, so –

TANTAROS: [indignant] That’s – really? Name one thing.

BECKEL: One thing? I’ll tell you one thing: They cut back on welfare programs, training programs …

Right, because the side trying to grant impoverished folks easier access to reproductive care actually want to wipe them all out, and the side doing their damnedest to destroy all the crucial programs the poor rely on to survive really just want these “parasites” and “animals” to become rich.

You really come to pity Bob Beckel for being stuck on that panel of jabbering cretins, don’t you? I can only hope it was a requirement in his contract and not his own choice. No-one’s that masochistic.

(via ThinkProgress)

Tags: Fox News • The Five • Bob Beckel • Greg Gutfeld • Andrea Tantaros • Kimberly Guilfoyle • birth control • contraception • Leftists • liberals

Homeless in a houseful land

From Daily Kos (for what it’s worth):

Ah, the marvels of red tape.

(via Uzza)

Tags: homelessness • USA • United States

Daily Blend: Wednesday, January 11, 2011

Rick Santorum

• (Last October) Rick Santorum ^[pictured] thinks it’s “wonderful” ^{[warning: auto-start video]} that Iranian nuclear scientists are being murdered.
  (via @ggreenwald)

• Two Houston, TX 10-year-old boys charged with molesting 8-year-old boy on school bus. Why do I get the feeling there’s something deeper and far worse going on behind the scenes?
  (via The Agitator)

• I was about to mention nearly all of these stories individually before deciding to just link to Balko’s post instead.

• Scorned health inspector shuts down respected NYC diner after owner records him with his cellphone.
  (via The Agitator)

• On whether prison inmates should be allowed to masturbate and enjoy porn. Seems like giving confined convicts the right to release some sexual tension in private might be a smart thing, there.
  (via The Agitator)

• Exploring the vertical slums of Caracas, Venezuela.
  (via The Agitator)

• List of the best New York Times corrections ever.
  (via The Agitator)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Tags: Rick Santorum • Iran • sexual assault • rape • George's • Bill Koulmentas • Kenneth Reid • jail • masturbation • Caracas, VE • Venezuela • David's Tower • slums • The New York Times

Fail Quote Tweet: Bryan Fischer declares end to war on poverty

Here’s über-bigot Bryan Fischer of the American Family Association, taking some time off from hate-mongering about gays and Muslims to advocate for the end of welfare because the poor apparently don’t exist anymore:

My transcript: (click the [+/-] to expand/collapse →)

[−]

Time to declare victory in war on poverty, shut down welfare. 80% of "poor" have AC, 75% own cars, 2/3 have cable. ow.ly/7vdDv

OMG! Most poor people don’t want to melt in the summer! They drive around in old clunkers! They even watch cable television! Obviously, Fischer’s right – those moochers are getting way too much in government handouts. Anything more than a miserable existence of unending toil and scrounging is clearly living in the lap of luxury. No more food stamps for them!

(via Joe. My. God.)

Tags: Bryan Fischer • welfare

Daily Blend: Friday, October 28, 2011

James O’Keefe

Do our beliefs shape our values, or do our values bring about our beliefs?

• Fundy Christians beat adopted daughter to death following teachings of fundy child-rearing book, then claim girl committed suicide. More info here.

• Lawsuit: New York woman allegedly struck by stray bullet, arrested and detained by distrustful and abusive NYPD for five days before being released without ever being charged.
  (via @radleybalko)

• Professional jizzstain James O’Keefe’s ^[pictured] latest scoop (amended): Lefty journalism professor tries refuses to discredit the Tea Party by passing along sensational footage to [the New York Times].
  (via @Frauenfelder)

• Jen McCreight explains the obvious: An evidence-based worldview is not the same (read: the polar opposite of) dogmatism.

• Am I the only one who finds amusement at Vox Day’s ongoing and bizarre attempts to debunk evolution using economic theory? (And his claim that evolutionary science should be able to predict what new species will evolve next – as if speciation were just some fancy equation scientists could plug into a computer – is just crank gold.)

• Can you make it through a month on minimum wage? Find out. (A bit simplistic and limited, but interesting nonetheless.)
  (via @PersonalFailure)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Edit (10/29/11 4:10 PM ET) – Fixed some minor grammatical errors.

Tags: Hanna Williams • Larry Williams • Carri Williams • Christians • fundies • Takesha Griffin • NYPD • James O'Keefe • Jay Rosen • Clay Shirky • The New York Times • Tea Party • Jennifer McCreight • dogmatism • evidence • Vox Day • Theory of Evolution • speciation • SPENT • working poor • poverty

Herman Cain blames the poor for being jobless and, well, poor

Herman Cain

From Republican presidential contender Herman Cain, talking about why he doesn’t understand the Wall Street protests and becoming the embodiment of the Right’s increasingly explicit blame-the-poor mentality:

I don’t have facts to back this up [now there’s a promising start], but I happen to believe that these demonstrations are planned and orchestrated to distract from the failed policies of the Obama administration. Don’t blame Wall Street, don’t blame the big banks, if you don’t have a job and you’re not rich, blame yourself! […] It is not a person’s fault because they succeeded, it is a person’s fault if they failed.

Now, to be fair, he is right, in a way. After all, if you don’t have millions, then it’s your fault for not being born in a rich family, or for not being full of shit enough to con your way into wealth (televangelism come to mind), or for not robbing a bank, or for not sinking into panhandling in your free time for the next 30 years. Hey, if you don’t wanna do what it takes to get loads of cash real fast, then you just don’t deserve those riches, buster.

Of course, as technically correct as this brand of thinking may be, it’s also completely devoid of any compassion, sense, or humanity. It’s also utterly moronic. Which, coming from Herman Cain, is only fitting.

Tags: Herman Cain • poor people • Occupy Wall Street

Daily Blend: Thursday, April 25, 2011

Dr. Michael Mann

• “Climategate” scientist Michael Mann ^[pictured] cleared of any wrongdoing – yet again (again).

• In a twist no-one saw coming, the majoritarily Republican-led government defense of DoMA is based on bullshit from rotten sources.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Heritage Foundation’s Robert Rector claims that poverty is a Leftist scam based on ^{[citation needed]}.

• NASA discovers stars you could set foot on. (Barring the vacuum. Whatevs.)

• Bill Donohue is upset over NYC Mayor Bloomberg’s decision to keep professional god-botherers out of the families-only 9/11 ceremony.

• How sexists find love: Deconstructing the workings of “Game” (pick-up artistry).
  (via @PersonalFailure)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Tags: Michael Mann • Climategate • John Boehner • Defense of Marriage Act • DoMA • Edie Windsor • Lisa Diamond • Paul Clement • Robert Rector • Heritage Foundation • child poverty • brown dwarfs • NASA • stars • Bill Donohue • Michael Bloomberg • 9-11 • clergy • Game • pick-up artists • misogyny • dating

Stewart exposes Rightists’ hateful hypocrisy towards the poor

Jon Stewart

Last night, the consistently (and possibly even increasingly) brilliant Jon Stewart of The Daily Show spent a segment exposing the naked contempt exuded by the Right towards the poor and disenfranchised, first by pointing out their hypocrisy in condemning revenue increases whilst cheerleading for slashing entitlement funding, and following that up by simply showing as many examples of hate-filled anti-poor rhetoric as can be fitted into a television segment without going into overtime. The two parts, below.

Part 1 (4:48):

The Daily Show - World of Class Warfare - Warren Buffett vs. Wealthy Conservatives Get More: Daily Show Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,The Daily Show on Facebook

Non-US readers: Go here to learn how to enable Comedy Central videos

Part 2 (6:32):

Fail church sign of the day

A Christian church poses an edumacated question:

I got a better one. If your God loves everyone, why is he such a dick?

Or: If your church is that clueless, why should people attend?

(via Joe. My. God.)

Tags: Christian Fellowship Church

Poor if you do, unemployed if you don’t

To have money, you gotta make money. To make money, you gotta have money. To have money, you gotta have a job. To have a job, you gotta have money. Isn’t that just a fun little catch-22?

Those stupid, inconsiderate poor people! They should all just get a job.

Oh, riiight …

(via Political Irony)

Tags: Ted Rall • comics

Daily Blend: Saturday, May 28, 2011

“Sexting”

• Texas bill reducing “sexting” [pictured] charges from felony to misdemeanor goes to Gov. Perry for signing.

• Self-parody: Detroit crime lab ordered closed due to “sloppy investigations”, subsequently left open to the elements, with evidence still inside.

• The bottomless stupidity of WND: Obama’s birth certificate is fake because tiny random markings in signature look like a smiley face. Journalism!
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Five things that make poor people’s lives that much more difficult.

• China takes a decidedly bizarre approach to prison “hard labor”.
  (via @ebertchicago)

• Facebookers who actually believe Onion articles. What a sad spectacle.
  (via @jennifurret)

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Supplemental tags: Weird • Prisons • The Onion • Satire/Parody

Michigan senator wants foster kids to shop at thrift stores only

Sen. Bruce Caswell (R-MI)

Republicans love kids and poor people so dang much, they wanna make sure that they’ll never be exposed to the ills of expensive new clothes. Michigan Senator Bruce Caswell (R) wants to make it so that government money intended for the purchase of clothes for foster and underprivileged children can only be used at second-hand thrift stores:

He says they should get "gift cards" to be used only at Salvation Army, Goodwill or other thrift stores.

"I never had anything new," Caswell says. "I got all the hand-me-downs. And my dad, he did a lot of shopping at the Salvation Army, and his comment was -- and quite frankly it's true -- once you're out of the store and you walk down the street, nobody knows where you bought your clothes."

He never had any new clothes as a kid … so now, he wants to make sure that no other poor kids get any, either. There’s a word to describe this kind of attitude, and it isn’t ‘compassionate’.

Humanitarian workers aren’t happy, either:

"Honestly, I was flabbergasted," Jacobs says. "I really couldn't believe this. Because I think, gosh, is this where we've gone in this state? I think that there’s the whole issue of dignity. You’re saying to somebody, you don’t deserve to go in and buy a new pair of gym shoes. You know, for a lot of foster kids, they already have so much stacked against them.”

But, hey, at least they’ll be free from the threat of impoverishing themselves further from blowing their sparse food money on chic new threads!

Oh, and of course:

Caswell says the gift card idea wouldn’t save the state any money.

Naturally. Very little of what modern Republicans do is ever about the budget (or jobs) – it’s pure, heartless ideology and nothing else.

(via @ebertchicago)

Daily Blend: Monday, March 28, 2011

David and Charles Koch

• Glenn Greenwald on the Koch brothers’ ridiculous persecution complex.
  (via @todayspolitics)

• Colorado Senate takes a new, particularly sleazy approach for cracking down on prostitution.
  (via The Agitator)

• This dishonest segment from Fox News’s John Stossel proves nothing more than how Americans can be charitable.

• Proof that excessive nationalism shrinks manhood(s)?

If you have any story suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments or send them in.

Minnesota GOP wants to outlaw poor people carrying cash [updated]

GFY. Signed, GOP [source]

And the Republican war on poverty – specifically, poor people – continues:

St. Paul, MN – Minnesota Republicans are pushing legislation that would make it a crime for people on public assistance to have more $20 in cash in their pockets any given month. This represents a change from their initial proposal, which banned them from having any money at all.

[…]

House File 171 would make it so that families on MFIP - and disabled single adults on General Assistance and Minnesota Supplemental Aid - could not have their cash grants in cash or put into a checking account. Rather, they could only use a state-issued debit card at special terminals in certain businesses that are set up to accept the card.

The bill also calls for unconstitutional residency requirements, not allowing the debit card to be used across state lines and other provisions that the Welfare Rights Committee and others consider unacceptable.

Hanlon’s Razor advises that one should never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity. Now, I’m quite happy to think of the modern GOP as possessing all the IQ of a bucket of bog-water, but there comes a point where mere dumbassery is no longer a suitable excuse. While I’m quite sure they’re idiotic to boot, there’s no way a collective could actually argue that poor people should be prosecuted for carrying around enough cash to pay for half a bachelor’s grocery list without also being motivated by some sort of animus. Which, of course, is exactly what we’ve come to expect from the GOP when it comes to virtually any minority group.

They aren’t merely the Party of No. They’ve become the Party of Fuck You.

(via Pharyngula)

---

UPDATE: (03/19/11 2:25 PM) – It seems that many have been misinterpreting the actual text of the bill. Rather than forbid folks on MFIP or GAMSA welfare from carrying more than $20 in their pockets at any given time, it would rather merely limit transactions from ATMs or vendors to $20, without actually regulating how much more or less they may have on them. While this does seem marginally better, it’s still quite the idiotic and repugnant proposal – nobody’s funds should be regulated at all, much less those who are in such need of them. (Thanks to Uzza for the correction(s).)