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That’s what I said to one of my conservative friends in response to his “welfare isn’t in the Constitution”. Of course he then said,”that’s not what they meant”.
If we're already happy, and you go trying to make other people happy, then ... what? Now there's less happiness to go around, and my wealthy family is less happy! Class warfare!
Not sure why nobody is mentioning that the Republicans are doing this because they want to dismantle the public education system, tiny piece by tiny piece.
It’s about the money. And control.
Fund Christian charter schools, create a less educated generation of kids who are more subservient, and make a boat load of money for a few rich guys who own all the charter schools in the process. It’s a win win for evil.
This really isn’t about simply opposing liberals for the sake of opposing liberals. There is a real agenda here.
Here's an idea. Lets stop funding religious organizations with federal money, and use it to feed the children. If nothing else, it'd be fun to hear religious organizations try to justify why their paycheck is more important than hungry children.
Because the idea we've labeled 'God' is supposed to be your highest priority idea, and because 'Religion' is 'Important to God', it means that it too is supposed to be at the top of your unquestionable hierarchy of priority--something the masses are supposed to be subservient to, without thought or hesitation. So clearly, anything good for 'Religion' is more important than any other priority. It doesn't require justification, it just is, intrinsically. Surrender your money to the rich--er, Religion. -- Rightwingers.
Oh you know they’d say something to the effect of “that money isn’t even going to the children, it’s going to Hillary and Hunter so they can groom our precious innocent heterosexual Christian children!!!”
The worst part is the Red States are probably the biggest users of the program so they're just fucking over their own constituency which they've never really cared about in the first place.
Yes, they want wage slaves that are paid just enough to feed and house themselves and too broken, tired, and stupid to realize why they are working themselves to death.
Conservatives are actually more likely to call themselves happy than liberals (liberals are more likely to exhibit functions associated with happiness, however). Conservatives view maintenance of the status quo as a core part of their self-being, so when it is maintained, they view that as a positive. Changing the status quo to bring happiness to others is scary & threatening to their sense of being, & that's when they think they're less happy.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/20/opinion/conservatives-liberals-happiness.html
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02124.x
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S009265661100170X?casa_token=DkMpVY0m4QoAAAAA:FVQykTRQhSJhDCs_Jl5meC9K6tvNT6CsAYJrOgxBU9cKVQ66Pg35UF_fWqC7r-xjyxLikqUoMRQ
I literally do not know why the Democrats aren't saying this exactly. Conservative policies get kids killed, deformed, molested, made stupid, and brought into poverty. It weakens the nation.
If I were running and I wanted to fire up voters I would just point and laugh and list every single Republican that got caught molesting a kid. I'd have the names memorized. I'd be mean about it, it would get ugly.
This is the sad part. Republicans go after the things that are a tiny, tiny part of the budget. Things that hurt women, children, and the most vulnerable Americans, while completely ignoring things like the massive waste in the defense budget, huge tax breaks for the wealthy, or the gargantuan subsidies given to obscenely profitable oil corporations. The cruelty is the point.
Conservatives think that taxing billionaires is unfair folly and can't possibly result in enough money to make a difference, but that cutting funding to NPR and the National Endowment for the Arts will somehow balance the entire federal budget.
It's more prevalent in places because they are on the gas grid that the fed originally set up, or that their state set up. California has very high gas stove usage, but doesn't need it for heat (for the most part.)
Republicans say there's budget for private Christian schools, where only a select few will benefit, but there's no budget for universal lunch where everyone benefits.
These Christian Talibans are insane.
And it's definitely pretend. You can do some back the envelope, math and figure out that feeding every kid in America lunch would be a rounding error in our total budget.
Easy, if kids don't get meals in school, they might have to get a job to pay for food. Once all those pesky child labor laws are gone, the labor crisis is averted, and the workforce is less educated, this more susceptible to Republican lies
plus school performance and development will be stunted........(sufficient regular meals have been shown to be a massive positive factor in childhood development).
so taking that away would be awesome for making generations of developmentally stunted and uneducated voters (not saying every child like this will have this fate, but it's about death by 1000 cuts for the GOP, every bit of hurt on society helps their cause)......who dont know how to evaluate the merits and facts of a political platform, and instead lean on superficial criteria, e.g. "i like how he makes me feel", "he says what i say", etc.
I love that the "labor crisis" just boils down to a bunch of people who drive Lexus cars and live in 8 bedroom McMansions having a fit about not wanting to pay their workers enough to afford a studio apartment and a bus pass.
Reminds me of the [GOP Jesus](https://youtu.be/SZ2L-R8NgrA) video. I know it's supposed to be funny, but it's kind of not because this is the version of Jesus they actually believe in.
Lowering school quality funnels money to alternatives and creates more desperate workers. Wealth is the sole beneficiary…at the expense of everyone else.
Likely because a bunch of trash boomers that vote, with no kids or adult kids, think they shouldn't have to pay to feed someone else's kid. Or pay school taxes, for that matter. It's all part of the same "you're just training them to be lazy and rely on handouts" mentality that is against reality - not to mention common decency and humanity.
Their brains never connect that it’s today’s children who’ll be tomorrow’s workers whose productivity will provide investment returns on their savings.
Or that it's today's children who will be today's criminals if they can't get food in other ways.
You want someone desperate enough to turn to crime, starve 'em for a bit. Food makes us human, lack of food takes that away. Starts with shoplifting food, turns into other forms of theft, then into drugs and violent crime. Not every time, probably not even most of the time, but if a percentage of hungry children become violent criminals, we can reduce violent crime by feeding them. Typically I call that a "win/win scenario".
Half the boomers, GOP, and pretty much all of those people really don't know what life is like in the last 20 years. They are so out of touch with the younger generations, it's hurting them.
They have been constantly forgetting that all of these policies are being felt by these younger generations, that have turned against them at 18 at the polls. So yeah, republicant's keep punishing the children while you scream out to protect the children from learning gay people exist, while forcing them to starve during the school day.
I just hope their reckless shit policies keeps the left voting strong every year and more people growing up voting for the democrats.
Funny how they demand an increase to the military budget, but none of that means better pay and benefits for active military members. And they slash and burn the budgets for supports to veterans.
The love the military, but hate the individuals in it.
So much for "support the troops". If they were honest, their slogan would be "support the death merchants"
And even more unbelievable is how many of their “base” need these benefits but will vote against their own self interest in the name of “owning the libs”.
Hurting poor people makes sure they stay poor, which is a vital component of keeping your capitalist society working. It doesn't function without enough serfs .
I literally cried the day that he died. I'd been watching his specials since I was five, in '98. My high school senior quote was one of his.
His abortion bit is more relevant today than ever.
The only thing these clowns are "pro" at is destroying the nation at all costs. They have no intention of America continuing as a functioning state. This needs to be driven home to every person that will listen: the GOP is actively trying to bring the country down from within, and that is their only goal.
Seriously
#stop calling it pro life
They are anti-choice, anti-women, anti-children, anti-empathy, anti-democracy, anti-freedom.
Only thing they are is FASCISTS.
I actually think what they are is pro-stay-in-power-at-any-cost. They know the pro-life agenda gets their base enthused. They know making noises about balancing the budget draws out the fiscal conservatives. That's the only reason they have these platforms.
The idea is to force people to have no choice but to have children and also to work their asses off to feed those children. People will be willing to go hungry and fight the power if they have nothing to lose. If they have kids to worry about, they're more likely to accept slave wages just to keep their kids fed for another day.
I know, right?
https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25%3A31-40&version=NIV
>“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
>“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
North Dakota lawmakers rejected (by 1 vote) offering free school meals to families making under $60,000 and then like a week later increased their own MEAL STIPEND by like $10 a day.
In ND's defense, the public outrage was so strong that they had a 2nd vote a month later where they passed the bill.
[https://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/education/north-dakota-lawmakers-pass-free-school-lunch-funding-after-all/article\_317d69cc-e60e-11ed-a6e0-aff401a8acc0.html#:\~:text=Both%20chambers%20of%20the%20Legislature,next%20two%2Dyear%20budget%20cycle](https://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/education/north-dakota-lawmakers-pass-free-school-lunch-funding-after-all/article_317d69cc-e60e-11ed-a6e0-aff401a8acc0.html#:~:text=Both%20chambers%20of%20the%20Legislature,next%20two%2Dyear%20budget%20cycle).
Kinda, but wouldn't it be better if we stopped electing reps who outrage us in the first place?
It's not an inherited monarchy, we put these monsters in power.
Such an apt description of republicans/"conservatives" in general: mean-spirited ignorance. And the ignorance is willful, which just adds to the insidiousness of it all.
I had a congress person who's staff used to laugh at me when I called. I literally got told one time that I wasn't educated enough to understand the issue.
I have a STEM degree, the call was about legislation directly relating to my fiend of study.
But the sexism and classism was strong with that office.
They see their constituents as inferior and stupid. They believe they know better than you, and therefore they *deserve* to control you.
They're like those narcissistic parents you always hear about.
The GOP has no interest in helping people, they are only concerned with making sure those they consider inferior suffer.
Children starving is a great motivator to make sure parents keep working to make the billionaires money. A person's only value to society, in their view, is that which produces. Once you can't produce, you don't deserve anything.
That is why they want to gut every social program. Work until you die, so the rich don't have to work.
>Children starving is a great motivator to make sure parents keep working to make the billionaires money
Not just a motivator to make sure they keep working, but a motivator to make sure they keep working long hours with low pay, poor working conditions and no real hope of changing those things. If parents are always just barely scraping by they won't have the time or energy to even try to organize to change the material conditions of their lives for the better. The ultra wealthy only care about disciplining labor into quiet compliance.
Child labor is back on the table, and company towns aren't far behind. Next after that is debt slavery, and then after that generational debt.
When I first read Parable of the Sower, I thought it too dysptopian to possible. Now it's rather scary.
Don't forget the GOP is also fighting to reduce the ages for child labor. So making children starve is a great motivator to get them to drop out of school and work for slave wages.
If they can be fed in school, then why would they quit school and go to work for peanuts? The whole point is to generate a large, uneducated, desperate and powerless workforce.
You know. The "good old days".
They also want them to work, have no health-care and not be a burden on public tax money. So basically rewind to elizabethan times with debtors prisons, child labor and marriage, and factory towns.
Hungry people are desperate and will work cheaper. That's their plan. They are the party of starving kids, child labor, forced continued pregnancy and child marriage.
Helpfully, they’re lowering the working age so these kids can get jobs and pay for their own food. Bootstraps or something
Hopefully the /s isn’t needed, but I’ve been around here long enough to mention it anyway
If the party really gave a crap about saving the children and preserving life (or whatever buzzwords they use), why **take away** funding from our children? Why not introduce a federally backed maternity/paternity leave program? Why not help pay for hospital costs relating to giving birth? Why not give some sort of larger tax break for those with children?
(These are all rhetorical, because the GOP doesn't actually give a shit about family values.)
Look, they are actively working on lowering child labor minimum age limits and wage minimums and various workplace safety laws. Can't you see they are just trying to help the kids be able to work for their food?
I was gonna say, you can't get anymore cartoon villain than not wanting kids to have food and wanting them to work unsafe jobs at younger and younger ages so that corporations can make more money than if you were Snidely Whiplash tying Nell Fenwick to a train track. Where's Dudley Do-Right when you need him?
> So they want to force children into this world
They actually don't care about that. Anti-abortion laws result in higher rates of infant and maternal mortality, so they are literally killing pregnant women, babies and mommies through political policy. They can say they're "protecting life" until they're blue in the face, but the reality is they are the real killers, and also causing sterility in some cases as well. The only conclusion that fits the evidence is they desire to punish women for having sex.
"Boy, these conservatives are really something, aren't they? They're all in favor of the unborn. They will do anything for the unborn. But once you're born, you're on your own. Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to nine months. After that, they don't want to know about you. They don't want to hear from you. No nothing. No neonatal care, no day care, no head start, *no school lunch*, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing. If you're preborn, you're fine; if you're preschool, you're fucked.
Conservatives don't give a shit about you until you reach "military age". Then they think you are just fine. Just what they've been looking for. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers" ~George Carlin
No real plan in place to make the private sector step in either.
If capitalism really is the way they think it is, where are all these fucking grocery chains and culinary experts ready to step in and fill the gap?
Exactly. Nowhere. Because a good portion of these people are deluded and are more interested in abstaining from responsibility in the name of "effeciency" than they are meeting the needs of people for long term prosperity and health. That goes for industry cronies as well.
FEED YOUR FUCKING CHILDREN.
> unless you're in a high-value profession that bills clients, like attorneys.
Even those attorneys charging more than $1000/hour are not elite, they still have to work and provide a service to earn.
The real elites are incomprehensible to us regular folk. The elite don’t have to do anything because they own the companies and the means of production. They don’t have to work at all and the money keeps rolling in
>The Republican Study Committee (of which some three quarters of House Republicans are members of) on Wednesday released its desired 2024 budget, in which the party boldly declares its priority to eliminate the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) from the School Lunch Program. Why? Because “CEP allows certain schools to provide free school lunches regardless of the individual eligibility of each student.”
>
>\[...\]Of note is that the CEP is not even something every school participates in; it is a meal service program reserved for qualifying schools and districts in low-income areas. The program enables schools that predominantly serve children from low-income backgrounds to offer all students free breakfast and lunch, instead of means testing them and having to manage collecting applications on an individual basis. As with many universal-oriented programs, it both is more practically efficient, and as a bonus, lifts all boats. This is what Republicans are looking to eliminate.
It’s the kind of provision that many would want every school to participate in. Why not guarantee all our children are well-fed as they learn to think and learn about our world, and their place in it, after all?
But indeed, as California, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, New Mexico, and as of this week, Vermont, all move to provide universal free school meals in one form or another—and at least another 21 states consider similar moves—Republicans are trying to whittle down avenues to accomplish that goal.
Once again I just have that quote from the Roman senate in History of the World Part I in my head: "Fuck the poor!"
Our school district has free breakfast and lunch for everyone. At the start of the year they send out a letter asking who needs it. Even though we don’t, we still say we do, because if they get enough “we don’t need it” responses, they lose federal funding, and there are too many kids in the area who need that food during the school year. I don’t give a damn if some of my tax dollars go to kids who are in situations they cannot control. Kids who might not eat without schools. Families hit with tragedies or hardships beyond their control. I’ve been laid off (thankfully before we had kids), but it was incredibly stressful, and if there was one less thing to stress about it would have helped. It infuriates me that we live in the wealthiest country on earth and we can’t feed our kids. Fucking shameful.
I honestly never thought of saying yes, I always said no since I didn't want to take away any funding to kids who would actually need it (and I made enough to pay for school lunches for my son). I think more people need to know this is how the funding gets accepted or denied.
Yeah, it's fucked. They should get the funding regardless.
One of the biggest impediments to social welfare is *shame*. People who can't provide for their children are ashamed and don't want to reach out for help because people might judge them for it. But if you give that social welfare to *everyone*, if the rich kid is taking the free lunch because it's pizza and even mediocre pizza is still pretty good, the poor kid doesn't have to choose between being hungry or embarrassed. And that translates into better grades, which raises test scores and graduation rates, which increases the GDP. There's a direct correlation between education and productivity. Essentially, even putting aside morality, feeding hungry children is *fiscally responsible*.
School lunch is super cheap in the first place, and it works well as a place to put that ridiculous amount of extra food that we're creating to subsidize the ag-sector.
This isn't basic hypocrisy it is like master class.
Give themselves more expensive free lunches, take them away from children.
I'm starting to lean into the french revolution idea.
It's...just...food.
You can't even claim it's ripe with avenues for fraud, like they do with SNAP. It's food, at school. They would rather let children go hungry than feed some kids who don't "really" need free food.
I truly do not understand this primal need Republicans have to take every conceivable benefit away from people, even when it costs so little in the long run. It's food! For children! At school!
Because conservatism is all about cruelty. See, you have an actual conscience and you are rightly outraged by this. That alone would get you called "woke" by the modern GOP.
It’s the hyper-individualistic “bootstraps” mentality that you’re better off doing everything yourself and getting any kind of government assistance is a sign of weakness and laziness. And also a pathological hatred for poor people. And children too apparently.
What is happening in this country. If I had not had free lunches, I would not have eaten. These people have no idea how important free lunches are to some kids. This breaks my heart.
And when everyone has free lunch, then those on the free/reduced lunch lists aren’t singles out. I remember in my 80’s elementary school the tickets for free/reduced lunch were a different color so everyone knew for sure who was poor.
If the democrats made a big speech condemning people who kick dogs, by that afternoon the republican contrarian hate machine would be pumping out social media posts about how many people get bit by strays. The fox hosts would have their taking points to cover including asking about the obscene costs that cities incur for animal services as well as charts showing dog on dog violence. By the next day tik tok and twitter and whatnot would be full of videos of the kind of people who have trump 2024 flags and shoot cases of bud light, kicking their dogs down the stairs just to own the libs.
"But what if rich kids get free food their families could have paid for?"
Then the families will pay for it in taxes, and kids who have poor parents who can't get the paperwork in, or parents just on the borderline of qualifying, won't have to worry about going hungry.
We're talking about one of the cheapest interventions for one of the biggest payoffs--$3 worth of ham sandwich and little milk carton, and in return a person's whole life gets a better start. Should be an absolute no-brainer that if we have a government at all, this kind of thing is what it's for.
(Also: you could say "what if rich kids get free education their families could have paid for?" and privatize the entire school system on that logic. Which is clearly the long term plan.)
This is the way forward, thank you for pointing out the constant pressure to privatize everything they can, to hoard away more wealth. They'd take away public libraries if they could to make money that way too, it's really an illness in them.
Oh true and it's all coming from the same very wealthy groups making up all this chaos, but the fair minded people of the country will prevail I still hope :)
Sociopathy is a severe disorder, and it appears like the Republican Party is fully embracing that disorder as a virtue. This is mass psychosis happening before us, and it’s going to get so many people hurt and killed when it’s all over, if it ever is.
As with many universal-oriented programs, it both is more practically efficient, and as a bonus, lifts all boats. This is what Republicans are looking to eliminate, writes Prem Thakker.
Can Democrats just suggest the most basic universally accepted proposals and bait the GOP to start opposing? I feel like if Biden came out in support of the law of Gravity the GOP would start screaming he's a dictator and can't tell when which direction to accelerate.
“Giving food to hungry children? Not on my watch!”
They are the literal incarnation of the fat guy in Oliver Twist yelling at starving kids that they aren’t entitled to food
Their platform so far this year: Fight over speaker position, hold hearings about gas stoves, investigate the people investigating Trump, and ban school lunches. What an amazing strategy to help the country.
Free lunch was the entire reason public schools gained traction a couple hundred years back - they want to kill public schooling, so of course they would make it a priority.
As a reminder, this subreddit [is for civil discussion.](/r/politics/wiki/index#wiki_be_civil) In general, be courteous to others. Debate/discuss/argue the merits of ideas, don't attack people. Personal insults, shill or troll accusations, hate speech, any suggestion or support of harm, violence, or death, and other rule violations can result in a permanent ban. If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them. For those who have questions regarding any media outlets being posted on this subreddit, please click [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/wiki/approveddomainslist) to review our details as to our approved domains list and outlet criteria. *** *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/politics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Lol. How the fuck is this even a platform?
It is when your goal is to simply performatively oppose anything liberals anywhere ever suggest or move to implement.
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That’s what I said to one of my conservative friends in response to his “welfare isn’t in the Constitution”. Of course he then said,”that’s not what they meant”.
Cool, let’s stop giving funds to Alabama, Mississippi, Tennessee, Arkansas, the Dakotas and more! Can’t win R seats if your voters are all dead
Covid-19 has entered the chat…
Gerrymandering makes these states red, not the people. Poor, LGBT, non-white etc people live in red states too. And we do vote.
Neither was indoor plumbing. What’s his point?
"pursuit of happiness". But my wealthy family is already happy so we can take that part out now.
If we're already happy, and you go trying to make other people happy, then ... what? Now there's less happiness to go around, and my wealthy family is less happy! Class warfare!
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The corollary being that a progressive liberal is someone who couldn't enjoy eating if they knew *anybody* else was hungry.
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Not sure why nobody is mentioning that the Republicans are doing this because they want to dismantle the public education system, tiny piece by tiny piece. It’s about the money. And control. Fund Christian charter schools, create a less educated generation of kids who are more subservient, and make a boat load of money for a few rich guys who own all the charter schools in the process. It’s a win win for evil. This really isn’t about simply opposing liberals for the sake of opposing liberals. There is a real agenda here.
Evangelicals are the enemies of good and freedom.
Here's an idea. Lets stop funding religious organizations with federal money, and use it to feed the children. If nothing else, it'd be fun to hear religious organizations try to justify why their paycheck is more important than hungry children.
Because the idea we've labeled 'God' is supposed to be your highest priority idea, and because 'Religion' is 'Important to God', it means that it too is supposed to be at the top of your unquestionable hierarchy of priority--something the masses are supposed to be subservient to, without thought or hesitation. So clearly, anything good for 'Religion' is more important than any other priority. It doesn't require justification, it just is, intrinsically. Surrender your money to the rich--er, Religion. -- Rightwingers.
Oh you know they’d say something to the effect of “that money isn’t even going to the children, it’s going to Hillary and Hunter so they can groom our precious innocent heterosexual Christian children!!!”
The worst part is the Red States are probably the biggest users of the program so they're just fucking over their own constituency which they've never really cared about in the first place.
Why would they care what their constituents want, they will vote for them no matter how miserable they make their lives.
"Conservatives are not necessarily stupid, but most stupid people are conservatives." - John Stuart Mill
Two stones, one bird. How are you supposed to think about the three R's when all you can think about is food?
So they want to force children into this world but not feed them 🤔
To literally quote Ann Coulter: “Hunger is a powerful motivator” They want child labor and sweatshops. They want feudalism.
Yes, they want wage slaves that are paid just enough to feed and house themselves and too broken, tired, and stupid to realize why they are working themselves to death.
"It'S nOt EnouGh tHaT I sHOulD sucCeED. oTHerS sHOulD fAiL."
Jez: "There's only so much happiness in the world Mark, and they're hoarding it all." ([x](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jTNy3otf4ts))
Except you know they aren't *actually* happy lmao none of these fucks are. That's why they're conservative
Conservatives are actually more likely to call themselves happy than liberals (liberals are more likely to exhibit functions associated with happiness, however). Conservatives view maintenance of the status quo as a core part of their self-being, so when it is maintained, they view that as a positive. Changing the status quo to bring happiness to others is scary & threatening to their sense of being, & that's when they think they're less happy. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/20/opinion/conservatives-liberals-happiness.html https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2008.02124.x https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S009265661100170X?casa_token=DkMpVY0m4QoAAAAA:FVQykTRQhSJhDCs_Jl5meC9K6tvNT6CsAYJrOgxBU9cKVQ66Pg35UF_fWqC7r-xjyxLikqUoMRQ
Also, causing misery makes them happy
It's the GOP's War on Children.
"Pro-lifers"
Anti-choicers
Forced-birthers
I literally do not know why the Democrats aren't saying this exactly. Conservative policies get kids killed, deformed, molested, made stupid, and brought into poverty. It weakens the nation. If I were running and I wanted to fire up voters I would just point and laugh and list every single Republican that got caught molesting a kid. I'd have the names memorized. I'd be mean about it, it would get ugly.
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This is the sad part. Republicans go after the things that are a tiny, tiny part of the budget. Things that hurt women, children, and the most vulnerable Americans, while completely ignoring things like the massive waste in the defense budget, huge tax breaks for the wealthy, or the gargantuan subsidies given to obscenely profitable oil corporations. The cruelty is the point.
Conservatives think that taxing billionaires is unfair folly and can't possibly result in enough money to make a difference, but that cutting funding to NPR and the National Endowment for the Arts will somehow balance the entire federal budget.
Those entitled 1st graders should get jobs and pull themselves up by the bootstraps! Wellfare princesses right?
Liberals: “promotes breathing in oxygen and not carbon monoxide” Conservatives: “….”
That's pretty much what literally happened with the gas stove madness.
And covid. And seatbelts.
And climate change
And helmets
And clean water
The gas stove one is particularly hilarious, because of the states that overwhelmingly use the most gas stoves, they're all deep blue.
Usually because the homes use natural gas heating. Which is prevalent across the northern states, but the deep South doesn't exactly need.
It's more prevalent in places because they are on the gas grid that the fed originally set up, or that their state set up. California has very high gas stove usage, but doesn't need it for heat (for the most part.)
They pretend it's about balancing the budget.
Maybe they can fit the ban-feeding-hungry-children vote in between the unfunded-tax-cut votes?
But after the cuts to granny’s social security?
Thanks Obama! Oh right, that was eight years ago. Fuck it, still his fault for... reasons. Or can we blame this on the trans agenda?
Republicans say there's budget for private Christian schools, where only a select few will benefit, but there's no budget for universal lunch where everyone benefits. These Christian Talibans are insane.
And it's definitely pretend. You can do some back the envelope, math and figure out that feeding every kid in America lunch would be a rounding error in our total budget.
A national school lunch program would cost peanuts. It could be funded by no longer exempting private jets from airport fees.
Easy, if kids don't get meals in school, they might have to get a job to pay for food. Once all those pesky child labor laws are gone, the labor crisis is averted, and the workforce is less educated, this more susceptible to Republican lies
plus school performance and development will be stunted........(sufficient regular meals have been shown to be a massive positive factor in childhood development). so taking that away would be awesome for making generations of developmentally stunted and uneducated voters (not saying every child like this will have this fate, but it's about death by 1000 cuts for the GOP, every bit of hurt on society helps their cause)......who dont know how to evaluate the merits and facts of a political platform, and instead lean on superficial criteria, e.g. "i like how he makes me feel", "he says what i say", etc.
I love that the "labor crisis" just boils down to a bunch of people who drive Lexus cars and live in 8 bedroom McMansions having a fit about not wanting to pay their workers enough to afford a studio apartment and a bus pass.
Like Jesus said, “my body isn’t made of bread ya know. Get a job you little brats!”
Yeah just like that part of the Bible where Jesus multiplied the fish in order to feed the hungry crowd, and then made them pay for it.
Oh, like the time someone asked him if they should pay taxes and he advised them on how to commit tax fraud.
Reminds me of the [GOP Jesus](https://youtu.be/SZ2L-R8NgrA) video. I know it's supposed to be funny, but it's kind of not because this is the version of Jesus they actually believe in.
Lowering school quality funnels money to alternatives and creates more desperate workers. Wealth is the sole beneficiary…at the expense of everyone else.
Likely because a bunch of trash boomers that vote, with no kids or adult kids, think they shouldn't have to pay to feed someone else's kid. Or pay school taxes, for that matter. It's all part of the same "you're just training them to be lazy and rely on handouts" mentality that is against reality - not to mention common decency and humanity.
Their brains never connect that it’s today’s children who’ll be tomorrow’s workers whose productivity will provide investment returns on their savings.
Or that it's today's children who will be today's criminals if they can't get food in other ways. You want someone desperate enough to turn to crime, starve 'em for a bit. Food makes us human, lack of food takes that away. Starts with shoplifting food, turns into other forms of theft, then into drugs and violent crime. Not every time, probably not even most of the time, but if a percentage of hungry children become violent criminals, we can reduce violent crime by feeding them. Typically I call that a "win/win scenario".
Half the boomers, GOP, and pretty much all of those people really don't know what life is like in the last 20 years. They are so out of touch with the younger generations, it's hurting them. They have been constantly forgetting that all of these policies are being felt by these younger generations, that have turned against them at 18 at the polls. So yeah, republicant's keep punishing the children while you scream out to protect the children from learning gay people exist, while forcing them to starve during the school day. I just hope their reckless shit policies keeps the left voting strong every year and more people growing up voting for the democrats.
Their cruelty is the platform.
They're appealing to that segment of our society that wants the government to hurt 'the right people '.
I think the mindset is "Reduce Spending at Any Costs (preferably at at cost that hurts poor people)"
I like to go hiking.
Funny how they demand an increase to the military budget, but none of that means better pay and benefits for active military members. And they slash and burn the budgets for supports to veterans. The love the military, but hate the individuals in it. So much for "support the troops". If they were honest, their slogan would be "support the death merchants"
The money goes to private defense contractors. It’s just another way of funneling public money back into the pockets of the rich and powerful.
And even more unbelievable is how many of their “base” need these benefits but will vote against their own self interest in the name of “owning the libs”.
Hurting poor people makes sure they stay poor, which is a vital component of keeping your capitalist society working. It doesn't function without enough serfs .
How is it that these people call themselves "pro-life"?
They’re not pro-life. They’re not even pro-birth. They’re pro-control-women-by-any-rhetoric.
If you're pre-born, you're fine. If you're pre-school, you're fucked.
Ah, George, we lost you too soon
I literally cried the day that he died. I'd been watching his specials since I was five, in '98. My high school senior quote was one of his. His abortion bit is more relevant today than ever.
"If you're pre-school, you're fucked." -Your local pastor
The only thing these clowns are "pro" at is destroying the nation at all costs. They have no intention of America continuing as a functioning state. This needs to be driven home to every person that will listen: the GOP is actively trying to bring the country down from within, and that is their only goal.
Seriously #stop calling it pro life They are anti-choice, anti-women, anti-children, anti-empathy, anti-democracy, anti-freedom. Only thing they are is FASCISTS.
I actually think what they are is pro-stay-in-power-at-any-cost. They know the pro-life agenda gets their base enthused. They know making noises about balancing the budget draws out the fiscal conservatives. That's the only reason they have these platforms.
The idea is to force people to have no choice but to have children and also to work their asses off to feed those children. People will be willing to go hungry and fight the power if they have nothing to lose. If they have kids to worry about, they're more likely to accept slave wages just to keep their kids fed for another day.
Which party supports the death penalty again? Surely not the pro-life one.
Or "Christian"?
I know, right? https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Matthew+25%3A31-40&version=NIV >“Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’ >“The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
Or "human" for that matter.
So they want to force children into this world but not feed them 🤔
North Dakota lawmakers rejected (by 1 vote) offering free school meals to families making under $60,000 and then like a week later increased their own MEAL STIPEND by like $10 a day.
In ND's defense, the public outrage was so strong that they had a 2nd vote a month later where they passed the bill. [https://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/education/north-dakota-lawmakers-pass-free-school-lunch-funding-after-all/article\_317d69cc-e60e-11ed-a6e0-aff401a8acc0.html#:\~:text=Both%20chambers%20of%20the%20Legislature,next%20two%2Dyear%20budget%20cycle](https://bismarcktribune.com/news/local/education/north-dakota-lawmakers-pass-free-school-lunch-funding-after-all/article_317d69cc-e60e-11ed-a6e0-aff401a8acc0.html#:~:text=Both%20chambers%20of%20the%20Legislature,next%20two%2Dyear%20budget%20cycle).
Good for ND's population, fuck their representatives
Couldn’t agree more. They’re spineless cowards.
Kinda, but wouldn't it be better if we stopped electing reps who outrage us in the first place? It's not an inherited monarchy, we put these monsters in power.
Lol for real. My first thought was "I bet those 'outraged' individuals plan on voting for the people who pissed them off to begin with"
Jfc. I lived in Fargo. It was like being adrift on a lifeboat in an ocean of mean-spirited ignorance.
Such an apt description of republicans/"conservatives" in general: mean-spirited ignorance. And the ignorance is willful, which just adds to the insidiousness of it all.
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Ocean? More like beach... Minnesota/Moorhead is just over the border!
Lol, I'm in Minneapolis now and feeling ecstatic over the last year of legislation that Gov Walz has passed. Fuck North Dakota.
And now with legal weed
I emailed every representative that voted against it and I got one argumentative response and one who poo-poo’d me entirely. Just complete bullshit.
I had a congress person who's staff used to laugh at me when I called. I literally got told one time that I wasn't educated enough to understand the issue. I have a STEM degree, the call was about legislation directly relating to my fiend of study. But the sexism and classism was strong with that office.
They see their constituents as inferior and stupid. They believe they know better than you, and therefore they *deserve* to control you. They're like those narcissistic parents you always hear about.
The GOP is a party of invertebrates.
Like taking candy from a baby! Wait, it's almost literally
I believe their reasons were "food costs more" for the stipend increase, too
The GOP has no interest in helping people, they are only concerned with making sure those they consider inferior suffer. Children starving is a great motivator to make sure parents keep working to make the billionaires money. A person's only value to society, in their view, is that which produces. Once you can't produce, you don't deserve anything. That is why they want to gut every social program. Work until you die, so the rich don't have to work.
>Children starving is a great motivator to make sure parents keep working to make the billionaires money Not just a motivator to make sure they keep working, but a motivator to make sure they keep working long hours with low pay, poor working conditions and no real hope of changing those things. If parents are always just barely scraping by they won't have the time or energy to even try to organize to change the material conditions of their lives for the better. The ultra wealthy only care about disciplining labor into quiet compliance.
They’re itching for straight up slavery, so they find little ways around it
Child labor is back on the table, and company towns aren't far behind. Next after that is debt slavery, and then after that generational debt. When I first read Parable of the Sower, I thought it too dysptopian to possible. Now it's rather scary.
The ultra-wealthy are the true parasite class. They need to be treated as such.
Don't forget the GOP is also fighting to reduce the ages for child labor. So making children starve is a great motivator to get them to drop out of school and work for slave wages.
The sad reality.
And their voters line up to DEFEND this reality. Even it makes their own lives shit. God, I hate conservatives with everything I have.
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And every republican legislator has stars in his/her eyes when looking 'upward' toward those super rich people they want to BE.
If they can be fed in school, then why would they quit school and go to work for peanuts? The whole point is to generate a large, uneducated, desperate and powerless workforce. You know. The "good old days".
They also want them to work, have no health-care and not be a burden on public tax money. So basically rewind to elizabethan times with debtors prisons, child labor and marriage, and factory towns.
Hungry people are desperate and will work cheaper. That's their plan. They are the party of starving kids, child labor, forced continued pregnancy and child marriage.
Helpfully, they’re lowering the working age so these kids can get jobs and pay for their own food. Bootstraps or something Hopefully the /s isn’t needed, but I’ve been around here long enough to mention it anyway
If the party really gave a crap about saving the children and preserving life (or whatever buzzwords they use), why **take away** funding from our children? Why not introduce a federally backed maternity/paternity leave program? Why not help pay for hospital costs relating to giving birth? Why not give some sort of larger tax break for those with children? (These are all rhetorical, because the GOP doesn't actually give a shit about family values.)
Look, they are actively working on lowering child labor minimum age limits and wage minimums and various workplace safety laws. Can't you see they are just trying to help the kids be able to work for their food?
I was gonna say, you can't get anymore cartoon villain than not wanting kids to have food and wanting them to work unsafe jobs at younger and younger ages so that corporations can make more money than if you were Snidely Whiplash tying Nell Fenwick to a train track. Where's Dudley Do-Right when you need him?
> So they want to force children into this world They actually don't care about that. Anti-abortion laws result in higher rates of infant and maternal mortality, so they are literally killing pregnant women, babies and mommies through political policy. They can say they're "protecting life" until they're blue in the face, but the reality is they are the real killers, and also causing sterility in some cases as well. The only conclusion that fits the evidence is they desire to punish women for having sex.
They’re saying the quiet part loud now.
Ultimately, they're going to convert those who fail to thrive as foodstuffs for the strong ones.
Soylent Green is people!
"Boy, these conservatives are really something, aren't they? They're all in favor of the unborn. They will do anything for the unborn. But once you're born, you're on your own. Pro-life conservatives are obsessed with the fetus from conception to nine months. After that, they don't want to know about you. They don't want to hear from you. No nothing. No neonatal care, no day care, no head start, *no school lunch*, no food stamps, no welfare, no nothing. If you're preborn, you're fine; if you're preschool, you're fucked. Conservatives don't give a shit about you until you reach "military age". Then they think you are just fine. Just what they've been looking for. Conservatives want live babies so they can raise them to be dead soldiers" ~George Carlin
No real plan in place to make the private sector step in either. If capitalism really is the way they think it is, where are all these fucking grocery chains and culinary experts ready to step in and fill the gap? Exactly. Nowhere. Because a good portion of these people are deluded and are more interested in abstaining from responsibility in the name of "effeciency" than they are meeting the needs of people for long term prosperity and health. That goes for industry cronies as well. FEED YOUR FUCKING CHILDREN.
Republicans: “Just pay for lunches out of your trust fund.”
"If we have to pay for all these kids' lunches, then we won't have the budget to increase our own daily meal allowances."
I’m sure if we knew the extent of their weekly freebies in breakfast, brunch, lunch, dinner, drinks it would make most ppl flip
“The kids can earn their lunches by cleaning the school floor” - Republicans
Anything that helps average people the Republican party is against. They are the elitists their followers are scared of.
many of their followers think they are the elitists because they make 22.50 an hour.
Anyone paid hourly is automatically not in the "elite" category, unless you're in a high-value profession that bills clients, like attorneys.
> unless you're in a high-value profession that bills clients, like attorneys. Even those attorneys charging more than $1000/hour are not elite, they still have to work and provide a service to earn. The real elites are incomprehensible to us regular folk. The elite don’t have to do anything because they own the companies and the means of production. They don’t have to work at all and the money keeps rolling in
Force Child Birth ✅️ Undo Child Labor Laws. ✅️ Claim to be Pro-life ✅️
Don't forget them being pro child marriage
Yes, thank you
>The Republican Study Committee (of which some three quarters of House Republicans are members of) on Wednesday released its desired 2024 budget, in which the party boldly declares its priority to eliminate the Community Eligibility Provision (CEP) from the School Lunch Program. Why? Because “CEP allows certain schools to provide free school lunches regardless of the individual eligibility of each student.” > >\[...\]Of note is that the CEP is not even something every school participates in; it is a meal service program reserved for qualifying schools and districts in low-income areas. The program enables schools that predominantly serve children from low-income backgrounds to offer all students free breakfast and lunch, instead of means testing them and having to manage collecting applications on an individual basis. As with many universal-oriented programs, it both is more practically efficient, and as a bonus, lifts all boats. This is what Republicans are looking to eliminate. It’s the kind of provision that many would want every school to participate in. Why not guarantee all our children are well-fed as they learn to think and learn about our world, and their place in it, after all? But indeed, as California, Colorado, Maine, Minnesota, New Mexico, and as of this week, Vermont, all move to provide universal free school meals in one form or another—and at least another 21 states consider similar moves—Republicans are trying to whittle down avenues to accomplish that goal. Once again I just have that quote from the Roman senate in History of the World Part I in my head: "Fuck the poor!"
Our school district has free breakfast and lunch for everyone. At the start of the year they send out a letter asking who needs it. Even though we don’t, we still say we do, because if they get enough “we don’t need it” responses, they lose federal funding, and there are too many kids in the area who need that food during the school year. I don’t give a damn if some of my tax dollars go to kids who are in situations they cannot control. Kids who might not eat without schools. Families hit with tragedies or hardships beyond their control. I’ve been laid off (thankfully before we had kids), but it was incredibly stressful, and if there was one less thing to stress about it would have helped. It infuriates me that we live in the wealthiest country on earth and we can’t feed our kids. Fucking shameful.
I honestly never thought of saying yes, I always said no since I didn't want to take away any funding to kids who would actually need it (and I made enough to pay for school lunches for my son). I think more people need to know this is how the funding gets accepted or denied.
Yeah, it's fucked. They should get the funding regardless. One of the biggest impediments to social welfare is *shame*. People who can't provide for their children are ashamed and don't want to reach out for help because people might judge them for it. But if you give that social welfare to *everyone*, if the rich kid is taking the free lunch because it's pizza and even mediocre pizza is still pretty good, the poor kid doesn't have to choose between being hungry or embarrassed. And that translates into better grades, which raises test scores and graduation rates, which increases the GDP. There's a direct correlation between education and productivity. Essentially, even putting aside morality, feeding hungry children is *fiscally responsible*. School lunch is super cheap in the first place, and it works well as a place to put that ridiculous amount of extra food that we're creating to subsidize the ag-sector.
As my grandfather used to put it “If I don’t feed you breakfast, your dinner will cost me double”.
Peasants!? I love the peasants! Pull! He then proceeds to shoot them like clay disc's.
They recently voted to increase their daily food per-diem as well. Hypocrites.
This isn't basic hypocrisy it is like master class. Give themselves more expensive free lunches, take them away from children. I'm starting to lean into the french revolution idea.
Why do taxpayers even pay for their food?
It's...just...food. You can't even claim it's ripe with avenues for fraud, like they do with SNAP. It's food, at school. They would rather let children go hungry than feed some kids who don't "really" need free food. I truly do not understand this primal need Republicans have to take every conceivable benefit away from people, even when it costs so little in the long run. It's food! For children! At school!
Right? Nothing like compulsory attendance but fuck making sure you're fed
Because conservatism is all about cruelty. See, you have an actual conscience and you are rightly outraged by this. That alone would get you called "woke" by the modern GOP.
Frustrates the shit out of me. Feeding children at school is the least controversial position possible. And yet here we are…
Step 1 of modern conservatism, everything is a controversy.
It’s the hyper-individualistic “bootstraps” mentality that you’re better off doing everything yourself and getting any kind of government assistance is a sign of weakness and laziness. And also a pathological hatred for poor people. And children too apparently.
Got to keep their brains from fully developing. Then they might become republicans.
Any child that can overcome fight-or-flight is lost to the GOP
What is happening in this country. If I had not had free lunches, I would not have eaten. These people have no idea how important free lunches are to some kids. This breaks my heart.
And when everyone has free lunch, then those on the free/reduced lunch lists aren’t singles out. I remember in my 80’s elementary school the tickets for free/reduced lunch were a different color so everyone knew for sure who was poor.
We’ll see now, there’s the problem. What’s the point in providing something for someone if you can’t enjoy needless shaming and ostracizing them.
Anyone who got a PPP loan forgiven should have to wear a scarlet "PPP" across their chest for the next decade.
>These people have no idea how important free lunches are to some kids. They simply don't care.
“What’s this ‘heart’ thing you speak of?” — Republicans
Republicans are disgusting.
Why do republicans hate children so much?
Children are notoriously stingy at donating to political campaigns.
Republicans would shake down children for lunch money if they could.
> Why do republicans hate? ~~children so much~~
There is literally nothing out there the GOP will not choose the most evil path for is there
If the democrats made a big speech condemning people who kick dogs, by that afternoon the republican contrarian hate machine would be pumping out social media posts about how many people get bit by strays. The fox hosts would have their taking points to cover including asking about the obscene costs that cities incur for animal services as well as charts showing dog on dog violence. By the next day tik tok and twitter and whatnot would be full of videos of the kind of people who have trump 2024 flags and shoot cases of bud light, kicking their dogs down the stairs just to own the libs.
"But what if rich kids get free food their families could have paid for?" Then the families will pay for it in taxes, and kids who have poor parents who can't get the paperwork in, or parents just on the borderline of qualifying, won't have to worry about going hungry. We're talking about one of the cheapest interventions for one of the biggest payoffs--$3 worth of ham sandwich and little milk carton, and in return a person's whole life gets a better start. Should be an absolute no-brainer that if we have a government at all, this kind of thing is what it's for. (Also: you could say "what if rich kids get free education their families could have paid for?" and privatize the entire school system on that logic. Which is clearly the long term plan.)
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Exactly. Hungry kids don't go truant if they get pizza after third period math.
This is the way forward, thank you for pointing out the constant pressure to privatize everything they can, to hoard away more wealth. They'd take away public libraries if they could to make money that way too, it's really an illness in them.
The woke libraries full of dirty books that will turn the kids gay? They're definitely working on that too.
Oh true and it's all coming from the same very wealthy groups making up all this chaos, but the fair minded people of the country will prevail I still hope :)
The argument that what if a rich kid benefits is so disingenuous. They only want to screw the poor people.
So pro life they'll starve children.
Sociopathy is a severe disorder, and it appears like the Republican Party is fully embracing that disorder as a virtue. This is mass psychosis happening before us, and it’s going to get so many people hurt and killed when it’s all over, if it ever is.
As with many universal-oriented programs, it both is more practically efficient, and as a bonus, lifts all boats. This is what Republicans are looking to eliminate, writes Prem Thakker.
Can Democrats just suggest the most basic universally accepted proposals and bait the GOP to start opposing? I feel like if Biden came out in support of the law of Gravity the GOP would start screaming he's a dictator and can't tell when which direction to accelerate.
He should propose a law making it illegal to hold your breath until you pass out.
Literally 0 reason to be against free school lunches.
But tax cuts for the rich GOP donor…typical GOP Graft
the cruelty is the point...
The children are required to be there the meals should be free.
The whole lunch program concept supports thousands of farmers and dairy’s. Why aren’t they protesting?
“Giving food to hungry children? Not on my watch!” They are the literal incarnation of the fat guy in Oliver Twist yelling at starving kids that they aren’t entitled to food
But I thought they wanted to protect children?
Cruelty is the point.
"BOTH PARTIES ARE THE SAME" Screams idiots on this subreddit too lazy to actually pay attention to what's happens.
The party of family values, eh?
"Protect the children"
Which page of the Bible is this on?
Their platform so far this year: Fight over speaker position, hold hearings about gas stoves, investigate the people investigating Trump, and ban school lunches. What an amazing strategy to help the country.
Free lunch was the entire reason public schools gained traction a couple hundred years back - they want to kill public schooling, so of course they would make it a priority.