An Angry Letter about Food Stamps

Dear House Republicans,

I am writing this letter to let you know that I am unhappy with you. We both know this a normal thing, I generally disagree with a lot of things you do, but this time you have gone too far. Your recent decision to cut $40 billion from the food stamp budget shows just how ignorant you are about the needs of anyone who is not in the upper middle class.

When I was growing up my mother would not have been able to afford any food at all if we had not had food stamps. She didn't have a job, and no, she wasn't interested in finding one (a decision which I don't agree with, trust me). The only way she could afford food was to use food stamps. Without food stamps me and my three brothers would have starved, which honestly, since we already got such little money we almost nearly did, wouldn't have taken much. I know from experience how invaluable resources like food stamps are to people who don't have any money to buy food with.

And what irritates me the most is imagining the 16 million children who live in households that are below the poverty line that are going to go hungry if the Senate passes this bill. How are we, the supposed richest nation able to justify allowing that? Furthermore, 210,000 students will lose free lunch, which parents who can't afford school lunch rely on to make sure their students can get three meals a day. For me, lunch was the only guaranteed meal for many years.

And why is this cut happening? "Too many people are abusing the system" says House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. But why not push for a reform? Why not work to create a system that can't be abused versus taking away an invaluable system altogether? And then they rush in and cry "it's the hard working middle class that has to pay for your abuse!" but here's the thing. 2.1 MILLION people, a number which consists mainly of low income seniors will end up not being able to buy food. Seniors who probably contributed to the working class for most of their lives.

And furthermore, cutting money from SNAP (food stamps) doesn't even make freaking sense because the program basically pays for itself, jerk faces. The Center on Budget Priorities has been quoted as saying "Economists consider SNAP one of the most effective forms of economic stimulus....in a weak economy every dollar increase in SNAP benefits generates about $1.70 economic activity." AND!!! Get this. Only 1 out of every 100 dollars is actually trafficked (abused) so the argument that the program needs cuts because of abuse is a giant lie.

House Republicans, why you gotta play a low class like that? And the fact that you think that everyone on food stamps is sitting on their couches expecting a middle class citizen to fund their food expenses is complete crap, considering for every three unemployed adults there is one job opening. Want to help out the economy? Work on creating more jobs, not punishing those who can't find one.

If you don't want SNAP around anymore, why not raise minimum wage? Oh wait. You had the chance to do that back in March, but unanimously voted it down, even suggesting the idea of eliminating minimum wage altogether! This is what happens when there is such a large disconnect in socio-economic classes between the people and those who are chosen to represent them. House Republicans, you need to learn what it is like to live in a low class neighborhood from paycheck to paycheck PRAYING you can afford more than a package of top ramen after bills are paid.

Here's some other facts: The new bill would limit the amount of time one could receive food stamps to three months. So good luck, you can work a minimum wage job for three months and feed your family but then you have to miraculously become qualified enough to work a better job. And again, this bill will hurt children, more than anyone.

Yes our economy is unstable. Yes, we have budget problems, but my 11 year old sister, my 9 year old brother, my 7 year old self, we didn't cause those problems and we don't deserve to be punished for them. And when children are not getting proper nutrition, they aren't able to grow mentally or physically like they should. If the bill is passed, the four million kept above the poverty line because of assistance from food stamps, and the millions kept from falling deeper into poverty would be screwed.

Here's the thing, I don't know how to fix our economy, and I don't know how to balance things out so that we don't have to punish CHILDREN for our country's budget problems. But what I do know is that starving the roughly 14 million people that would be cut from food stamps in order to provide a solution is wrong. And you should all be ashamed of yourselves for even thinking that this would be okay.

Alexis

Why Obama and Romney Need to Go Back to Elementary School.

Note: This may be true of all politicians. It may not be. This also based off of the Second Presidential Debate (and some other random events) as I have yet to muster up enough courage to go watch the third one.

During the Second Presidential debate I, like many interested people and undecided voters tuned into to see what Governor Romney and President Obama had to see about important issues such as women's rights, especially where healthcare is concerned, the current state of our countries economy, unemployment rates, and apparently the AK-47 topic that was thrown in just for kicks.

What we as an audience got was an hour and a half long festival of indecisive Romney, sassy Obama, and two men who forgot some rules that most people learn in second grade. Rules like, "if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all," and "don't interrupt". I'm quite sure that the second grade teachers of these adult men were sitting in a living room somewhere writing lesson plans and shaking their heads. Because that's what I, and most of the social networking world were doing, sans lesson plans.

After watching the debate I went and did some research about social skills that are taught in elementary school. And what I found was not only a list of things that we are taught in second grade in regards on how to behave around other people, but it was also a comprehensive list of skills that Obama and Romney should probably work on.

• Item #1 - Listen to Others

     A prime example of  "others" would be Candy Crowley, since she was Tuesday nights debate moderator.  When she states several times that it is time to move on and actually answer the question that was asked, you should probably listen, boys.

• Item #2 - Follow the Rules. 

      So....I've written a list of rules broken during the debate.
           NO QUESTIONS TO THE OPPONENT: Rule 5e - The most frequent offender in regards to this was Romney, who broke rule 5e eight times when he turned and directly asked President Obama about the amount of permits he had cut in relation to fuel extraction. 
             
          PERSONAL SPACE VIOLATIONS: Rule 9c(iv) - Before the debate starts the campaigns set up a pre-designated space in which both opponents are allowed to move around in during the debate. They are not allowed to leave these areas and the areas can't overlap. If this rule was ever even so much as looked at, it was hard for me to tell, since a couple of times the opposing forces were chest to chest. Debate? More like a fist fight waiting to happen. 

         REFERENCING A QUESTIONER Rule 5c- Both candidates are guilty of this as well, but then again, Candy Crowley probably should have stopped them, since part of section 5 is rules about when the moderator can interrupt, and one of those times is when a candidate goes back and references any individual sitting in the room except for their family members. 

          TIME LIMIT VIOLATIONS Rule 7a(5f) - The way that the time is allotted (in a document signed by the campaign lawyers) goes as follows: Candidate A is asked a question and is given 2 minutes to respond. Candidate B then has two minutes to answer the question then 2 additional minutes to rebutt what Candidate A said in response to the question. Candidate A is then given 2 minutes for a rebuttal to Candidate B. Time and time again Obama and Romney ran over their time limits and one time Obama blatantly told Candy Crowley to wait. No offense Mr. President, but you need to shut your mouth and take a seat, its not your turn anymore. 

• Item #3 - Take Turns When You Talk

    Someone went through and counted the number of interruptions in Tuesday's 90 minute debate. They reached 122. I imagine most of those came from Obama, but Romney definitely played a part in that as well. It's not nice to interrupt, boys. You'll get your four minutes of unshared camera time soon enough. Calm down.

• Item #4 - Get Along with Others

      No, we don't like everyone, and I'm not even going to pretend this is EVER a rule followed during election season. Obama obviously dislikes Romney and vice-versa. If you couldn't tell that, check out Obama's tumblr, which holds the most popular post on the entire site, and listen to his one-liners. Romney reciprocates this dislike, obviously. I mean, have you ever seen Presidential candidates who liked each other?

• Item #5 - Be Responsible for Your Actions

   Dear Governor Romney, we know about you and the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay act, we know about you and your flip flopping viewpoints so that you can get endorsements. We all know. You're in the public eye, and you should probably just realize that we're going to see everything you do. You can't pretend it didn't happen, because it did. Maybe you would have more support if you owned up to your mistakes and got rid of your binder full of women, because that's creepy.

   Dear President Obama, we know about the whole Libya attack thing and how you insisted for days that it was a spontaneous attack. We also know that you promised us some things that you haven't delivered on. When Romney calls you out on it, don't get so defensive. No, you didn't do everything, but you did a lot of things, be proud of those. But come on, man. Take some responsibility.

Before we pick a President we should stick him in the middle of a second grade classroom and make him relearn all of these lessons. I mean seriously, I can't take my President seriously if he can't follow the classroom rules. He would have so been stuck in the detention corner during recess if he was still in school.

And lastly, who wants to help me find this book
and send it to both campaigns?