Why aren't we helping them?

I thought Last Week Tonight with John Oliver wasn't actual news?

I've never actually sat down and watched the show, but from the clips I have seen it seems like he reports real news stories, just in a very comedic and embellished manner for entertainment value.
 
It certainly isn't news, unless you consider 'the US government owes everyone a living and its so heartless not to be providing' to be news. Government (working people's taxes) in the US is feeding what? 1/4 to 1/3rd of the people with food stamps? Sending millions over seas as assistance...providing welfare, unemployment and now medical care but! We're not providing enough for overseas people who help Americans to destroy extremists in their country, and by so doing help their country whether they realize it or not.

Well excuse me.

Not news, communist propaganda.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RN2spQrjyk
 
It certainly isn't news, unless you consider 'the US government owes everyone a living and its so heartless not to be providing' to be news. Government in the US is feeding what? 1/4 to 1/3rd of the people with food stamps? Sending millions over seas as assistance...providing welfare, unemployment and now medical care but! We're not providing enough for overseas people who help Americans to destroy extremists in their country, and by so doing help their country whether they realize it or not.

Well excuse me.

Not news, communist propaganda.

how soon people forget ''standing shoulder to shoulder" :mischief:
 
Is that the slogan for we're over there helping them to help themselves?
 
Oh yeah...that one. Helping them not to come up with a new plan to destroy our buildings with our airplanes. That's a good one. ;)

Commodore, were the interpreters paid wages for their efforts? I suggest that in the future we pay such folks well and maybe give them a camel and show them the direction to where sanity prevails...in their own country. If that actually occurs anywhere.
 
Oh yeah...that one. Helping them not to come up with a new plan to destroy our buildings with our airplanes. That's a good one. ;)

well it did sound like a good plan :)
should have listen to the military, they say "no plan servives contact with the enemy", or is it reality never sure on that.. :mischief:
 
Ya. No easy answers are there Graf?

Maybe explaining to them that they can't go to the US but heck, we'll give them $500 to tell us where the minefield is so our troops don't get killed would get the job done.
 
It certainly isn't news, unless you consider 'the US government owes everyone a living and its so heartless not to be providing' to be news. Government (working people's taxes) in the US is feeding what? 1/4 to 1/3rd of the people with food stamps? Sending millions over seas as assistance...providing welfare, unemployment and now medical care but! We're not providing enough for overseas people who help Americans to destroy extremists in their country, and by so doing help their country whether they realize it or not.

Well excuse me.

Not news, communist propaganda.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9RN2spQrjyk

Your little Fox News anti-SNAP video refuses to report accurate facts and only shows a few extreme examples of people abusing the system in a pathetic attempt to galvanize the people against a necessary program that helps a lot of people.

For example: The video says the regulations for SNAP were wiped away by Obama. That is simply not true at all. In my state of Ohio a single, able-bodied adult with no children must work at least 20 hours a week or be in some sort of vocational training program to remain eligible for SNAP. Unpaid volunteer work does satisfy the work requirement as well as long as you are doing 20 hours of volunteer work a week. Similar regulations exist in a significant number of states as well, so the claim that Obama just gave everyone a free pass to get SNAP is nothing more than conservative anti-public welfare propaganda.

Nice try though.
 
Ya. No easy answers are there Graf?

Maybe explaining to them that they can't go to the US but heck, we'll give them $500 to tell us where the minefield is so our troops don't get killed would get the job done.

well I agree with the OP, so maybe we can invite them to come to Australia... I think I'm on the same page as CH here... :D
 
Well thanks for the info Commodore, I didn't know that stuff. I actually didn't know it was FOX, guess I didn't pay much attention. Been away a long time...

I wonder though at any unsustainable system in any country. Seems it grows and grows until all is consumed. "When I grew up" (I guess I'm getting old enough to start using these words) if you didn't work you were screwed. However that's before the ultra rich sold our manufacturing jobs to China for a bump in the bottom line, the SOBs.
 
Well thanks for the info Commodore, I didn't know that stuff. I actually didn't know it was FOX, guess I didn't pay much attention. Been away a long time...

I wonder though at any unsustainable system in any country. Seems it grows and grows until all is consumed. "When I grew up" (I guess I'm getting old enough to start using these words) if you didn't work you were screwed. However that's before the ultra rich sold our manufacturing jobs to China for a bump in the bottom line, the SOBs.

I just hate how the anti-public welfare crowd try to make it seem like the federal government is responsible for all of this when they aren't. Most welfare programs in the United States are funded with federal dollars, but eligibility requirements and regulation of those programs are handled by each individual state.

So the anti-welfare crowd go out and find the few that abuse the system in the few states that have lax regulations and try to claim that is how it is across the entire nation and the federal government made it that way.

Public welfare spending in the US is also hardly at unsustainable levels. The most recent numbers put spending for safety net programs at an estimated 12% of the entire federal budget. That hardly seems like an unsustainable amount of spending to me. The problem is there is a lot of propaganda out there that only shows people the absolute numbers for spending to make it seem worse. For example: the anti-welfare crowd will report that the federal government spends about $398 billion on safety net programs. Now to the average person that would seem like a ridiculous number and would make the average citizen angry. However when that $398 billion is viewed in proportion to the rest of the budget and the amount of income the federal government has coming in, all of a sudden the number doesn't seem that bad.
 
Sure, but during the time LBJ created 'The Great Society' was it? The percentage wasn't even near 1%. Now its 12% you say? Okay. So the trend is clear, yes? Or am I wrong and such spending is going down? :) Also the US is so far in the red that even what its currently spending on everything is too much, yes? Or can we keep the QE programs going forever? Will printing money solve all our problems?

Actually I'm for a complete cutting of all trade with any country in which the people can't vote out the miserable *******s in power. That would bring home manufacturing and get folks back to work and paying taxes. Those taxes would return us to solvency in which we can afford the much reduced social programs.

Btw this thread led to my new sig. :)
 
Return us to solvency? Do you have any evidence the United States is insolvent? I will give you $10,000 if you can prove to me the United States government is financially insolvent right now.
 
No takers, at least not me, and not yet. Maybe in a few years... What I meant is to get us to reasonable debt levels. What's the % now? It was aprox 40% of every dollar the gov spent was borrowed. Think its dropped a bit though.
 
Sure, but during the time LBJ created 'The Great Society' was it? The percentage wasn't even near 1%. Now its 12% you say? Okay. So the trend is clear, yes? Or am I wrong and such spending is going down?

It would seem according to this source the welfare spending in fiscal year 2015 is only going to make up 9% of the budget and will hold at 9% in 2016; so maybe we are on a downward trend in welfare spending.

It also makes sense that welfare spending would increase as the income gap between Americans increases. Also with stagnate wages despite rising costs of just about every essential good and service out there, it makes sense that more people would seek public assistance as their paychecks don't go as far as they used to.

So instead of advocating austerity and a scaling back of welfare programs, it would seem the real solution would be to address the income gap problem in the US and find a way to get wages back on pace with inflation.
 
I'm all over that. My plan to return manufacturing to the US returns the middle class to the middle. Plus I'd definitely make unionism the law. On the day I'm elected president...;)
 
Sure, we should just spend spend spend to create true wealth, got it, and thank you Hygro! :)
 
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