Quote Thom Hartmann:Five billion dollars is being slashed from the program, leaving the poor to survive on even less. Families who are already struggling to make ends meet will see their food stamp benefits drop by an average of $36 dollars per household. That may not sound like a lot, but it's a huge difference to a family trying to feed themselves on an average of $278 dollars a month.

It is quite amazing that the very imbeciles that wrote this Sequester abomination are people who routinely will dine at one meal in excess of $278.00 at the tax payer's expense. Oh, excuse me, that should be $242.00. My goodness! We have taken the tip away. These inhuman monsters should be ashamed of themselves. I hope they choke on their Caviar.

Aliceinwonderland ~ I did some research on Gun laws you might be interested in. As it turns out California already has the most restrictive gun purchase legislation in the county. Someone I know recently told me he went through it and tells me that not only is registration and licensing required; but, you have to take and pass a written gun proficiency test, pass an extensive background check, and go through a 15 day waiting period.

I did some further research and according to these statistics on Wikipedia California has the most restrictive gun laws in the United States scoring 80 out of 100 on the Brady Campaign Score for gun laws. (100 being the most restrictive score.) Despite that effort California leads the nation in gun related murders per year at 1,257; followed not so closely by Texas at 805. Texas has a very poor gun restriction laws scoring at 6 out of 100 on the Brady Campaign Score for gun laws. California with a higher population than Texas at 37,253,956 and Texas at 25,145,561 and comes in with a lower gun ownership at 21.6% of the population. Texas gun ownership is at 35.9%. All other factors considered there is little difference in the number of deaths that occur from gun violence due to gun laws. Gun deaths per 100,000 people in Texas is 3.2 and in California is 3.4. Total murders by any cause per 100,000 people in Texas 5.0 and in California is 4.9. Not much difference at all considering that a higher percentage of people in Texas own guns with hardly any restrictive gun laws. The bottom line is that the gun death rate is higher in California despite the radical difference in gun laws.

Of course, that makes little sense. I'm sure that there must be more factors involved in these deaths then these simple statistics suggest. However, it does suggest that restrictive gun legislation does little to prevent gun violence. You would think that our leaders in Washington would be well aware of these facts.

In the big picture gun restriction laws has little to do with gun homicide rates when looking at other states. For instance, Illinois has a gun death rate of .8 and a Brady score of 2, North Carlina .6 with a score of 4, Vermont .3 with a score of 6, and Hawaii .5 with a score of 50.

Nevertheless, having learned that stricter gun legislation is in effect in my State somehow gives me a sense of relief. I agree that other states should at least adopt the reasonable policies already in effect here in California. If for no other reason, because it is the responsible thing to do. It sure can't do any harm as long as we limit those policies to reasonable restrictions. Perhaps the best way to do that is to let the states develop the law, like they did here in California. That would keep the Fed out of the loop. That would satisfy my apprehensions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence_in_the_United_States_by_state

Sorry to hear about Higgins' passing. These guys add so much joy and fun into our lives. Our 2 kitties are very much part of our family. We elected not to take an out of state trip a week ago because we weren't sure that they would be safe from predatory dogs while we were gone.

About the SNAP program: The GOP has said that there is corruption or people taking advantage of that system. If they really think that that is the case - why don't they propose some legislation to regulate it better? They really should not be able to have it both ways! I said the same thing to our US Representative. He probably did not even read my comments.

This is totally disgusting. We have billions in armaments and we are not willing to feed all of our people. Maybe is all of the politicians had to live for a month on anallocation of SNAP funds - that might change their tune. IMO this is a huge embarrassment to this country.

Thanks, Thom.

I coordinate a food pantry and county wide mobile pantries. We have already seen an increase in the number of families needing help because of the sequester and the government shut down. Now this is going to add more to an already stressed system.

May I say thank you for your work we volunteer as often as we can. I know it all we can do in this time. Once more thank you.

Consider America's response when Bill Clinton wiped out basic poverty relief, and began dismantling Social Security, starting with disabled workers. You didn't notice? Right. Since then, liberal media (with rare exception -- and I have tremendous respect for those exeptions!) has waved the Middle Class Only banner. Since Clinton, the overall life expectancy of America's poor has already fallen by 5-6 years. That might not sound like much, but on a population-wide scale, this would normally be regarded as a humanitarian crisis.

Kend, are you kidding? For your information, the Food Stamp program extracts ten cents per day out of an annual $50,000 income. That is less than one twentieth (or less than 5%) the amount extracted for war! I get so sick of you conservatives blaming poor people for the goddam deficit. You never bitch about the cost of weapons that kill and mutilate people, but heaven forbid if our resources are allocated to food, health care and education for those of average means (or less)! You guys are full of crap. - Aliceinwonderland

As long as there is something left to take, they will find a way to take it. All under the guise of conservatism. They are nasty self centered people with power. God help us.

Will this cost more than it saves? Stressed and desperate people are forced to commit crimes, hungry people will have poor nutrition, many more people will be jailed. That costs more money . As many jails are privately owned there will be a masive increase in proffits for those companies.

For those of you bemoaning the cost of food stamps and support, last week, Associated Press reported that Congress has authorized almost half-a-Billion dollars over two years to build Abrams tanks for the Army. But the Army has said it currently doesn’t need any tanks, and the money would be better used elsewhere. They are immediately going into storage. Food stamps keep people alive, and healthier, so they can work and take care of their families--and it puts money into the economy.

DAnne, then change those policies. Again five years later and there is no hope and no change when it comes to jobs. There is only so much money. I have asked here over and over what has Obama done to create jobs, nothing.

Quote Kend:DAnne, then change those policies. Again five years later and there is no hope and no change when it comes to jobs. There is only so much money. I have asked here over and over what has Obama done to create jobs, nothing.

Kend ~ The people on food stamps mostly either can't work or work such low paying jobs that they can't afford a roof and food. So many "living wage" jobs flew out of the country with Free Trade that only poverty wage jobs are left; and, people are working them. However, they don't pay enough to live. It is the reverse Robin Hood effect where multinational industries are the recipients of the booty collected by the Federal Government.

For your benefit, here are some of the facts concerning Food Stamps and the situation here in the United States as published by the Federal Government itself. Please feel free to use the link and educate yourself.

Quote United States Department of Agriculture USDA Website:Most SNAP benefits are going to people who could be working.

This is FICTION.

Most SNAP recipients were children or elderly. Nearly half (48 percent) were children and another 8 percent were age 60 or older. Working-age women represented 28 percent of the caseload, while working-age men represented 16 percent.

People on SNAP benefits are not employed.
This is FICTION.

Many SNAP recipients are currently employed but they still need some assistance so that they can put nutritious food on the table for their families. More than 29 percent of SNAP households had earnings in 2009, and 40 percent of all SNAP participants lived in a household with earnings. For these households, earnings were the primary source of income.

The majority of SNAP households do not receive cash welfare benefits.
This is FACT.

Less than 10 percent of all SNAP households received Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) benefits and another 5 percent received State General Assistance (GA) benefits. About 24 percent of SNAP households received Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits and over 22 percent received Social Security.

http://blogs.usda.gov/2011/06/24/fact-vs-fiction-usda%E2%80%99s-supplemental-nutrition-assistance-program/

You are very right. Obama has done nothing to change our trade policies. In fact, he might be acting--even as we speak--to make the situation much worse with TPP legislation. There is not much that can be done about that. The problem started with a Democrat and is being prolonged with a Democrat. Yet, between Clinton and Obama we had 8 solid years of Republican leadership that also did nothing to solve the problem. In fact, the Republicans provided tax incentives to encourage even more businesses to leave the country. With both political parties determined to sabotage the countries economy, how would you suggest we "change those policies?"

Now I know you think we can just snap our fingers and fix the situation. Either you are very terribly misinformed or you are being a smart a$$. In either case rest assured that We the People are aware of the problem and are desperately doing everything we can to fix it--and that ain't enough. With both of our political parties as corrupt as they are fixing this situation is no easy trick. Till the wheels in that process start to move pardon us for demanding that our fellow citizens receive the aid that we would like to receive if we were in their shoes. It's called "The Golden Rule". It was a teaching by someone by the name of Jesus Christ. You should get to know him. He had a lot of good ideas.

DAnne. Over 20 million children on food stamps. Wow that is scary. Those poor kids. I had my three grandchildren over last night well mom and dad went for diner and a movie. I can't help thinking how lucky they are compared to those 20 million kids on food stamps.

You are so right about politcations. Did you know Nancy Pelosi, working for the government all her life is worth 35 million dollars. Where is the media on things like that. How did see make it?

It can't be done over night. But it can be done. We are lucky in Canada our government put forward the "Canadian Action Plan" back about 5 years ago which gives us incentives to spend money, for example I used two of them. I re sided and insulted my house, I received $3,500 tax break and my business hired a new apprentice which we received a tax break for. Both I would have waited until the economy picked up but went ahead with it now because of the breaks. There is hundreds of others for huge corporations to individual people. Your government choose a different route. They gave grants to select companies that most of which went under. That wouldn't be where Pelosi made it would it.

DAnne that is why I have said over and over to have a health care system run by the Fed is insane. Even though we have only 33 million people our health care is run province (state) by province. We have a national health act the is the guide line for all provinces to follow but is is just the basic care. Each area has different needs. ie New York and Montana. What this also creates is a comparison as to what is working and what is not. Canada has been decentralizing as we have found doing anything at a national level ineffceint and the US is centralizing everything.

I have theory, want do you think. States like New York and California are in big trouble. They have given such generous state health care benifits over the years and are way under funded to keep them up. Not to mention the massive state debt they have built up. They desperatly need to go to a national single payer system to get those liabilities off the books. If not the whole socialism system collapses. I can't think of any other reason why the Fed would get involved in such a massive mess.

Interesting that in 1812 if Canada had not won the war against the US I would be an American. History is awsome. Canada defeating the powerful United States. Today only in hockey,.

You're right Kend, we should be more like Canada. Canada's welfare benefits are even more generous than ours. You are of the European style welfare statism which is much more vigorous and robust than ours and is tinged with willfull socialism making Canada more a welfare state and more a workers' state than the U.S..

One of the great sense makings in Canada's system is its definition of poverty. In the U.S. the policy makers subscribe to a definition of poverty as "absolute poverty". That is, poverty is defined in terms that would be poverty anywhere in any period of history and purely in a very limited application - and thus, limited understanding - of the term. In the U.S. you are poor if your income makes you unable to procure basic necessities. You are not poor until you can't afford toothpaste.

In Europe poverty is defined as "relative poverty", i.e., you are poor if you are "relatively" poor, poor in relation to others in society. That is a very useful definition because people who are relatively poor - or, poor for their society but not as absolutely poor as the starving in Botswana - experience "social exclusion". They are not able to fully participate in society and - I would emphatically add - they are isolated, marginalized and unjustly denied the power to meaningfully participate in the decision making of society resulting in a less demnocratic, more oligarchic situation (I am a firm believer that socialism is an essential componant of any genuine democracy). Thus the "theatre allowance" to Germany's unemployed, and so forth.

Food stamps are about 2% of the U.S. budget. They and other welfare programs are an effecting of justice not an injudiciously wasteful charity. They are a just compensation for the undercompensation of American workers. Most welfare recipients are, in fact employed or children of employed people and a just compensation for business cycles that cause periods of widesprerad unemployment.

In this way - as an astute fellow poster on this site noted - they are a subsidy to unscrupulous business enabling undercompensation (e.g., Walmart in California giving seminars to its employees on how to get on food stamps) and business always hired PR campaigns and political campaigns against welfare because welfare benefits compete with wages and pressure them to pay a living wage.

If you want to reduce the debt cut the militeary budget. Stop the hither unfunded wars (Afghanistan) stop the wasteful spending on a military larger than all others combined whose opnly purpose is to enrich Pentegon cronies.

Sorry about the long windedness but you know how it is. Once you start you can't stop.

Much more crowded countries than even the United States have exemplary national health care systems so you can quit that trick too Kend.

And correct me if I'm wrong but wasn't the War of 1812 an attack upon us by the Brittish, whose colony Canada still was, in attempt to regain control of the United States? I n that sense who won and who lost?

I couldn't agree more with Aliceinwonderland. This country has been ripped apart and I suspect by design of the "Divide and Conquer" concept of 1% thinkers. While everyone is up in arms over this, that, and the other... pointing fault fingers, and admittedly it's hard not to because we all have our opinions and beliefs. But in doing so, things are happening, that is not readily disclosed and in many cases only after the fact, when it's too late.

Americans regardless of political, or religious affiliations, gender, age,and income (levels that aren't millionaires or billionaires) need to come back to basics on what unites us all and we can ALL agree on.

None of us are happy with our government officials and even less their methods regardless of who, what, where.

We have all lost respect for the men/women who hold those governing seats to a point of distrust that is self evident in the final results of what they do, do.

Given their power to rule over the people of this country in a fashion of childish public rants, loose loop-hole blocking measuresand tactics, finger pointing, and refusal to work with one another. We can all agree no employer in this country or any other would tolerate retaining such a dysfunctional employee. If we were employers ourselves, would we hire this team for our business? Well technically we do employ them because we are the reason they are where they are. "I voted for the other guy" doesn't get you off the hook ether because what they say and what they do doesn't appear to have anything to do with each other anymore... once they get into office, the office agendas seem to take on another life of it's own.

And finally, we can all agree...We share the same sense of feeling that the fate of the common man today, the plight of our children and those who come after, the land we live and depend on stands in dire jeopardy times. The energy force that sorrounds us in present time, is not eminating a postive force but a sense that more and more is being taken away and only the super rich and aristrocrats have rights as ours grows weaker every day.

Where once we all had differences of opinion and we always will... but what's absent today that wasn't before....Was we also had possabilities/aspirations and a means to move toward them. We had hope and dreams that weren't unrealistic or unatainable. Today, what we all sense and what succesfully divides us is the sense we're all sitting on the Titanic and the only hope available is to survive by whatever means.

Agreeing we all have a sense of these things and our differences are not as much what seperates us as our fear and anger as to what's to come. We should feel compassion for one another because we're not the problem. Our Government and it's handling and mishandling, misappropriating and ties are the problem. The money is there to accomplish all these things that can make it a healthier more prosperous America but not enough to fill the fat pockets of the 1% nor the war mongers that profit from it.

And Campaign finance reform is logically #1. Followed by a united front to demand a change in our trade agreements and removing tax breaks from the wealthiest. If people are back working, and EVERYONE is paying their fair share of taxes ...there won't be any need for "entitlements" to be an issue of discussion to address.

When it comes to our own people. the government was formed to protect those in this country and see to it's welfare. That is it's first obligation to which our leaders I think we're united in agreement...Get a Fail.

Aliceinwonderland ~ Funny story! Sounds like "TrappedInATownFullOfIdiots" is actually "TrappedInAHouseFullOfMirrors." Poor guy. Everywhere he turns there is some idiot staring back at him. He probably doesn't have any windows either. Probably why he is such an expert in natural gas--it isn't just baloney that he is full of.

By the way, thanks for the support on Campaign Finance Reform. It seems like a lot of us already are on that boat. Lets keep that ship a' floating.

Kend ~ It looks like we finally agree about something--Single-Payer Health care for all. Thanks for thinking the problem through. I agree, that is going to have to be the final answer. Thanks for the input.

Here's the bigger picture regarding the US Default kabuki theatre (just part of the usual neoliberal ploys to give state wealth to big business and finance at the expense of the people):

http://www.globalresearch.ca/economic-coup-detat-debt-and-deficit-as-sho...

There is zero difference between the majority of Democrats and Republicans. There are or were a few good people from both parties but they're a dying breed -- Dennis Kucinich screwed by his own party :(

Just a reminder for all you JFK conspiracy fans...yet another docudrama about the assassination of JFK will premier tonight on REELZ (299 on Dish). I don't know much about this except for the little I have read. Something like the Australian police investigator turned author after investigating for 4 years and after getting hold of all the released Warren Commission evidence that was supposed to be locked up for 75 years believes that there was a conspiracy...that Oswald did do the first shot and may have missed...and then another shot came from a secret service agent from one of the tailing cars. It went off accidentally? Hitting the President? I don't know if this is what the movie is trying to say but it sounds hokey as hell. Maybe that's what it is meant to do...

Anyway, I'll be watching to see what the movie is really about. It comes on tonight, Sunday Nov 3, at 7:00PM PST.

DAnne, I believe in single payer for basic health but there has to be a mix of private and public. Canada is the only country in the world that has only public And it isn't working very well. I should say since a supreme court decession in the 1990's we do have private clinics for non life threatening surgeries like knees and shoulders. As we have waiting lists for up to a year for those in some parts of Canada.

I think what Americans are missing with ACA is although everyone is covered I am very confident your level of care will drop. It has everywhere else in the world.

Quote Kend:DAnne, I believe in single payer for basic health but there has to be a mix of private and public. Canada is the only country in the world that has only public And it isn't working very well. I should say since a supreme court decession in the 1990's we do have private clinics for non life threatening surgeries like knees and shoulders. As we have waiting lists for up to a year for those in some parts of Canada.

I think what Americans are missing with ACA is although everyone is covered I am very confident your level of care will drop. It has everywhere else in the world.

Kend ~ I fail to see what you mean by "level of care will drop." The way I see it, any care is a far higher level of care than no care. Unless, of course, you mean for the fortunate people who already are blessed with care? If that is the case, shame on you.

You don't have to worry about private insurance. There will always be a fair market for them to exist--just like they exist in Mexico and many other countries--in check. They can compete with private clinics and hospitals who also exist in Mexico as well. Prices at those institutions are affordable. Imagine that! The only thing that will be lacking is the monopoly over all health care private insurance used to enjoy in this country; and, the lack of competition that enables them to charge anything they want for coverage. The situation overall will dramatically improve for everyone. I have no doubt we will ever question that.

We can all thank the private insurance industry for one thing--the existence of Medicare. If it wasn't for the obtuse and shortsighted greed of the unchecked insurance industry there never would have been the profit hungry desire to boot all the most costly customers off the insurance claim payrolls. Thanks to the insurance industries blind greed and shortsightedness we already have in place a functional and proven single-payer health care system in this country; that, when push comes to shove will easily take over for the ACA. Thank you, health insurance industry. The only thing you've ever done right. The party's over.

That's right Kend. The United States took half of Mexico - which was also sparsely populated and still relatively is in many parts - in 1846. We were manifesting our destiny.

This is why many Mexicans feel entitled to come to live in places like California which some of them call "occupied Mexico".

I often wish you Canadians had at some point over run and conquered us and civilized our savage asses.

I think this may be another example of your illogic, Kend. Usually you're feigning stupidity, this time I think it might be the drinks you had last night hanging over. It does not necessarily follow at all that level of care has to go down if cost doesn't go up. The cost of health care in the U.S., hitherto, has been largely administrative. ACA mandates that 80% of the money insurance companies take in go to actual care provision and not to the administering of insurance or the CEO's salary like it did before. Even better would be excluding private insurance all together and giving it all to the government. That would bring the administrative cost to 3% and 97% would go to care.

I don't accept that the level of care would go down. I hear very different reports from other Canadians about their healthcare system and I lived in West Germany and heard no complaints about their system, however, I hear very MANY complaints about our healthcare system from visitors from Canada, Germany and elsewhere.

Our level of care is good only for the rich. It's often already pretty dismal for everyone else.

"War is hell!" Kend declares. Yeah and theft is theft. In this case, land theft. Isn't "colonialism" the polite way of saying it? - Alice I.W.