Welfare and how it makes everyone an idiot

I have to apologize to you all. I made the mistake of not immediately screen capping one of my favorite comments before it was removed. It went something like this:

"It's Ironic the government gives food stamps to people, but the national parks service tells us not to feed the animals because they won't be able to find food themselves and become dependent on handouts!"

Ironic!

Of course you'll have to add in way more incendiary adjectives toward the government and some terrible spelling on par with a person who stated to have the same mental capacity as a wild raccoon, but you get the gist.

Today we're going to talk about the fantastic myth of the Welfare Queen. You know, the one buying lobsters with your tax money while driving off in an Escalade, cackling while flashing their iPhones and recently painted nails. It's one of the more electrifying debates on the internet, mostly because it's the internet and many people in the debate need their genitals shocked.

It seems a lot of people need to look down on others to make themselves feel good. In one of the various facebook conversations that popped up surrounding government assistance, I saw someone who claimed to know these people were all gaming the system because she saw it when she was a grocery store checker for seven years.

Not to be insulting to people who do such a job, but a seven year grocery store checker might breed bitterness and a need for some kind of downhill for the shit to continue rolling. Might as well be all them poors out there with their big screens and their voting for libruls!

Using anecdotal evidence for your argument is also known as The Cherry Picking Fallacy, in which a person takes individual cases which confirm their already held beliefs. It would be just as wrong for me to say the panda bears aren't going extinct because I totally saw two of them boning at the zoo. Statistics about the Panda says they are on their way out the door, regardless of how I choose to spend my evenings.

John knows two people who do this and has all kinds of information on them, their past and their current situations. I would believe this but he also uses the term "Obama Phones" like it's a baseball bat of truth smashing in the teeth of fraud, waste and abuse. There is only one proper way to use that term:

"Did you hear this guy talking about Obama phones? What an idiot!"

I like that David McCrary assumes poor people are the only ones who would have the audacity to abuse a system malfunction. When I was a young pup in the military on active duty, a vending machine was incorrectly programmed to give out food without paying for it. It took about twenty minutes for the machine to be cleaned out by a bunch of Soldiers who had a free chow hall, lodging and a pay check every two weeks.

This is not a reason to be angry at the system, and if you need hard evidence of someone cheating when the cheating was good, I invite you to read up on Bernie Madoff. Or Enron. 

This doesn't make it right, but it doesn't demonize recipients either. Humanity can be kind of shitty at times. 

Let it be known right now that the poor are not allowed to have any luxuries or phones. One of my favorite arguments is that people shouldn't spend five bucks on a six pack of beer. Instead, save it and put it towards something you need, like pineapples or whatever the elders of the internet have decided the poor are allowed. 

Invariably this comment is usually given by someone who has never been poor. They may have been broke at one point, or they may have been forced to put off an electricity bill for a month, but never impoverished. I'm not going to begrudge a person a six pack of Natty when living in shitty conditions of poverty.

Micheal Kassidy reminds me of of the people who screamed for drug testing for welfare recipients, which, of course, failed miserably. Not only did it not catch very many drug users but it was a waste of state money in every state that tried it. 

He also reminds me of the guy on that one corner downtown. You know the guy. The one who screams about his underpants being controlled by Obama microwaves from space.

You know, conservatives are supposed to be opposed to big government, but they sure will throw MY TAX DOLLARS at things that don't make any damn sense and have been proven ineffective. They want the government out of their business until it's something they don't like, and then cry out for the government to do something. Don't regulate my guns, but please come make sure these nasty poors aren't using MY TAX DOLLARS on things I don't think they should have.

Gotta love a good bible thump. Denny Long is quoting Genesis 3:19. You remember Genesis from Sunday school, right? If you look up that chapter and verse, it's part of God's punishment for Adam and Eve for eating from the tree of knowledge. The sweat of our brow is because we're massive fuckups. We might as well also say no woman gets to have an epidural because Genesis 3:16 states women are supposed to have painful childbirths. 

Austin 3:16, however, is still in effect. And that's the bottom line.

STFU Hippy

Ooh, the guy who is so conservative he's actually a Libertarian and just doesn't know it! Assistance is stealing and it's wrong, as is anything you don't like the government doing. How about we refund Darren all his "stolen" money that was given to these nasty poors. And right after that I'll reposes and have my very own drone. I promise I'll clean up after it every day, and give it lots of fresh JP-8.

Here's another lesson: Don't judge based on what you see. You don't know where any of that came from and it's downright rude to ask or assume. I have a very nice household income, but I dress in jeans and a hoodie most of the time. Sometimes I remember to shave.

Point being, Mary Barnhart is a judgmental bitch and probably is playing her own game of Confirmation Bias XTREME! Everyone she knows sees all this happening and reports directly to her. I assume her Walmart checker friend is following them poors out to their cars, shaking their heads and quietly tutting to themselves as they watch these people get into BRAND NEW SUVs with their kids and their NEW CELL PHONES!

Mary, if you are standing close enough behind me in line to read my credit card, I'm going to elbow you in your stupid face. Back the fuck up, Nosey Nellie. I'm so glad no one posts online about being behind that one guy who bought a rack of Bud Light, personal lubrication and a Bag o' Salad because my other hobbies are also none of your business. 

I bet Mary is the kind of person who is aghast at celebrities in People Magazine, and has a strong opinion on Miley Cyrus because her own life is nothing but a drudge of unending boredom and repetition. Like Groundhog day, but without the chance to hang with Bill Murray.

It amazes me the things people will get riled up about and things that slide with some people. Apparently in the pecking order the poor can go fuck themselves, but we're perfectly fine with enough tax loopholes that many US companies pay little to no taxes every year.

There is probably some fraud happening in government assistance. There is fraud happening all over the government. That's the price of doing business with humans. Poor people are going to commit fraud, rich people are going to commit fraud, government employees and contractors are going to commit fraud.

If you want to get pissed, get pissed at the people who are rich and keep getting richer off fraud. People in the situation of receiving government assistance aren't living in beach side condos. It's a crappy world to be in with many factors as to why it exists, none of which any of us are probably smart enough to debate.

Shit, you think EBT for steak is bad? You have no idea how many movies I watched and websites I surfed while on duty in Iraq.