Post 4-SNAP and Sexual Assault in the Military

Hello all! I know everyone is probably thinking "Wow, I thought that Jeremy was only going to do his blog posts on Mondays?". Well that would be correct except it's hot outside and I'm bored. So I just thought that I would give you guys something to read while you are also hot and sitting inside with nothing to do!

So this week I think we should take a little look into the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) also known as food stamps. Now in Kentucky there are quite a few people who do not look kindly upon SNAP. Although this program is one of the most successful social welfare programs in the country, there are still debates in cities around the country and Washington D.C. about whether or not SNAP is a good use of our tax dollars. So our deep read this week is going to take a look at facts and stats about SNAP that many do not know, the reason why as a society we should invest in social welfare programs, and how conservative arguments against SNAP and other forms of social welfare are inaccurate and .
So let's start by making sure we are all on the same page with FACTS. First off, many people seem to think of SNAP as a program that disproportionately helps minority groups such as the Black and Latino communities. However, this is simply not true. As the Louisville Courier-Journal reports that food stamp aid is not only used by people of color. Also, 94% of households in Louisville that receive food stamps have either 2 working adults, 1 working adult, or a retired senior. So we can safely say that very very few are collecting hard earned tax dollars of others, since working households and retired seniors pay taxes that go towards SNAP. Second, there is a myth that welfare fraud is rampant. Also, not true. There is an estimated 2% of welfare cases that contain fraud in the U.S. Now stick with me because this may get confusing. The entire spending budget of the U.S. is $3.685 trillion. Now 11% of that is welfare spending, totaling just over $405 billion. Now of this $405 billion, 2% is "wasted" because of fraud, totaling $8.1 billion. So out of the $3.685 trillion U.S. spending budget, $8.1 billion is wasted on welfare fraud. This results in .22% of the U.S. budget. Not as high as you thought eh? That $8.1 billion sounds like a lot, but in the defense realm, it would only buy ONE M1A2 Abrams tank, and have a little money left over to maybe arm it with a couple soldiers and artillery.
So why am I writing about this right now you may ask. The answer lies in the actions that the Republican House of Representatives has taken with the recent farm bill, which allocates money for SNAP. However, this bill, which passed the House on mostly partisan lines (Repubs voting yay and Dems voting nay) completely cuts out the nutrition benefit. This is an absolute travesty. Our country routinely decides to give tax breaks and tax loopholes to the wealthiest individuals in hopes that they will create jobs (because hedge fund managers create so many jobs), meanwhile the working class and poor must bear the brunt of austerity (more on that another day). We have to go all the way back to President Franklin Roosevelt to see the major foundations of our American social contract. Under FDR (the creation of Social Security), LBJ (creation of Medicare), and Obama (Obamacare), we see a greatly expanding network of medical safety net. In this fashion, health care becomes less a commodity and more of a human right. I argue that health care, nutrition, and housing are human rights. Not only those with money should have such things. After all you can best judge a society by how it treats its poor.
As I stated earlier, the Conservative media machine has done a great job at creating myths around social welfare programs. Even though no one likes the idea of welfare fraud or waste of tax money, we have to realize that it is not the widespread problem that they would have you believe. In fact, the myth of the Welfare Queen, invented by the Reagan team while running for President, still exists today, even among liberals and Democrats. This myth was created for the sole reason of manufacturing racism and turning white middle class voters against low and middle income African Americans (even though the two groups share similar voting interests). And Reagan and his conservative allies have been able to capitalize on this (until Romney may have messed it up with his 47% remark).
So remember friends, think of SNAP and other programs like Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), Women, Infants, Children (WIC), and Section 8 housing as programs that ARE serving their purposes. When we see numbers of people on these programs go up during a recession, we should be encouraged to lower them by creating jobs and opportunity, but we should also feel proud that we live in a society where the middle and lower classes have a safety net to fall back on when those families fall on hard times. I for one would rather pay taxes for someone to eat, than for companies like Exxon to make record profits as gas prices go up AND receive tax breaks at the same time. While you complain about seeing a woman buy a candy bar with her EBT card, remember that companies such as Exxon are receiving huge tax breaks. For example, in 2009, Exxon made 45.2 billion and paid a whopping $0.00 in taxes. Gas was an inflation adjusted $3.37 a gallon, Clearly savings were not passed to the consumer.

Another topic of interest this week is the emotionally draining cases of sexual assault in the military. Although our soldiers do a lot for our country, the military is a HUMAN institution composed of thousands of every day people. It is estimated that around 26,000 service men and women have been sexually assaulted within the last year. This of course shouldn't be a problem if the service man or (more often) woman reports it to his or her senior officer. However, since the military is still a male dominated sphere, women are often hushed, shunned, or ignored by the chain of command. That is why New York senator (and former Hillary Clinton staffer) Kirsten Gillibrand has introduced a bill to remove the chain of command and introduce special counsels to deal with the rising epidemic. In a show of true bipartisanship, Texas and Kentucky senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul have stepped up to support Gillibrand's bill. Two of the most conservative senators backing a New York Democrat is very puzzling, but it shows that action must be taken on this issue and that there are still areas of life where political party doesn't hinder progress. So please, write your Senator/Representative on this issue to give extra support to the bill. And, until next time, give life (and Senator Gillibrand's bill!) a deeper read.