Among the Arizonans who lost their checks was Tamika Shelby, who first sought cash aid at 29 after fast-food jobs and a stint as a waitress in a Phoenix strip club. The state gave her $176 a month and sent her to work part time at a food bank. Though she was effectively working for $2 an hour, she scarcely missed a day in more than a year.
“I loved it,??? she said.
Her supervisor, Michael Cox, said Ms. Shelby “was just wonderful??? and “would even come up here on her days off.???
Then the reduced time limit left Ms. Shelby with neither welfare nor work. She still gets about $250 a month in food stamps for herself and her 3-year-old son, Dejon …
Part time or full time, and no matter how low skill the “job” is, paying someone a measly two dollars an hour — or the equivalent of sixteen bucks for a full day of labor — is clear evidence of deeply ingrained and systemic immorality.
It teaches nothing about becoming independent. And it imparts nothing in the way of worthy experience to be valued so poorly.
That this gentle soul hardly missed a day and sometimes even worked for free … words fail.
The now bog standard GOP view:
Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the top House Republican on budget issues, calls the current welfare program “an unprecedented success.??? Mitt Romney, who leads the race for the Republican presidential nomination, has said he would place similar restrictions on “all these federal programs.??? One of his rivals, Rick Santorum, calls the welfare law a source of spiritual rejuvenation.
“It didn’t just cut the rolls, but it saved lives,??? Mr. Santorum said, giving the poor “something dependency doesn’t give: hope.???
How do you get hope and spiritual rejuvenation from two dollars an hour part-time work?
The Marine Corps recommended booting Tea Party ninny Gary Stein today. He’ll get some manner of bad conduct discharge if a general follows the recommendation. It’s a shame.
The government submitted screen grabs of Stein’s postings on one Facebook page he created called Armed Forces Tea Party, which the prosecutor said included the image of Obama on the “Jackass” movie poster. Stein also superimposed Obama’s image on a poster for “The Incredibles” movie that he changed to “The Horribles,” the prosecutor said.
Maybe Stein was a poor Marine. But, rest assured, he’s a much worse writer and speaker if his Facebook page is any measure.
Without so much brain as earwax, it seems not to have occurred to Gary Stein yet that people without Facebook accounts can’t see his exercises in free speech. So if you want to maximize your audience you kind of have to run a website in tandem with it.
This makes Stein and the Marine Corps’ fuss over his Facebook account
another shining example of BAD in America, something dull and incompetent passed off as a battle to preserve some stalwart man’s right to boldly speak his mind.
Like this, on his Facebook page, a picture of LA County commissioners with their heads on pikes, an objection to their support of some boycott of Arizona business.
While Stein’s Facebook page shows many fans he is not a man
for all markets in California.
A poster for something called the Northern California Sheriff’s Posse Call ireads “Northern California sheriffs are leading the way back to the Constitution …”
Leading one to infer that majority of the state, where most of the
people live, is lacking proper regard for the Constitution.
In line with this, Stein advocates taking a 10-hour on-line prerecorded course on the Constitution, offered by some random certificate mill.
“A free course called Constitution 101 from Hillsdale College…. I’m starting it today… Who is with me???” writes Stein.
After I visited Stein’s page Facebook started serving me ads for patriot hoarders like this one, telling you how to prepare for the coming national collapse, brought on by the presidency of the socialist Muslim in the White House.
“With these 37 food items you’ll attract like-minded patriots and be able to rebuild the nation on the principles of the Constitution and without all that liberal crap,” it tells me.
From the wire, the Centers for Disease Control has determined the state of sex education in public schools in the the United States to be stagnant.
Sex education, the CDC states, is useful because it can reduce the risk of acquiring HIV as well as other sexually transmitted diseases. It can also contribute to less unwanted pregnancy.
The CDC does not ask school why no progress has been made in sex education. However, being scientists, many know exactly why.
And this is why the US leads in the sweepstakes of BAD in just about everything. One hallmark of BAD is that it is protected by a lack of candor in people who know better, who know exactly why something is doing poorly, but who are afraid to say so even when they are in a position that makes a difference.
In this case, stagnant sex education is the work of the irreversibly BAD Republican Party. It’s the party that hates science, hates everyone not like them, hates gay people, hates girls — women — being able to control their reproductive potential, and — therefore — really hates contraception.
We know this because of GOP Presidential contender Rick Santorum who, of course, is also BAD — witless and without any redeeming graces, pretended to be otherwise by stupid people and a party that encourages him, asking others to buy the idiot’s notion that he is someone worth respect and imitation.
Between 2008 and 2010, the percentage of public schools teaching key topics on prevention did not increase in the 45 states surveyed, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said.
In middle schools, 11 states saw declines during the two-year period and no state saw an increase, the CDC said …
[The] question of how best to teach students about preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases remains a divisive issue in many areas, [one person told Reuters.]
“For many teachers, it’s often about fear, fear of controversy …”
Good news, lads! Good news! I found another pawn shop.
Nothing says economic fail better than a Cash for Gold shop under the glow of sodium light in the city at night. Liquidate your valuables now that you’re chronically unemployed. Or try to fence stolen goods. Your choice.
This was taken on one of my rounds, snapped on north Lake in Pasadena.
The shot including the boulevard was altered for sharpness, adding a grainy touch. The building was formerly a store selling religious books and pamphlets. It failed when the economy did in 2007-2008.
The next photo is one of the apartment complexes I worked during the 2010 census. On a very nice tree-lined street, it’s furnished corporate housing, a fancy way of describing only sort-of-posh rooming for transient indentured salaried workers.
It’s advertised as secure upscale living and keypad locks adorn most of its doors and gates.
It’s also like living in a tomb. The halls here were utterly silent, fully carpeted, windowless. Occasionally you could hear the wind whistling through those that featured small open spaces.
The apartments were fairly fortress-like, too, unless your idea of openess is a window installation with the blinds always down, one that looks out on a porch about one to one and a half square yards in area.
Management assiduously tried to defy census workers by trying to limit hours we might access the complex. However, the complex was built so that one had to cross the swimming pool area coming out of the lobby to the main quad. The swimming pool also featured a keypad and management gave its combination.
So despite all the keypad locks, the combination for every one was the same. That made it possible to simply bypass the lobby and management to get the work done, anyway.
[The census] showed the big fissures developing in American society – a large body becoming nothing but a servant class to the rich, ridiculously underpaid, often living under transient circumstances or in flophouses. — me, the Register
Good news, lads! Good news! Trespassers will be shot on sight. Survivors will be shot twice.
This is the lawn sign of a local right winger. Over the past three years, he’s unfurled a few head-turners. My favorite, although not for the reasons espoused by the owner, was one of a smiling Barack Obama in front of an artist’s conception of a bombed-out American city. Obviously, it brightened the neighborhood immensely. I wish I’d taken a photo but missed the opportunity.
And one day it was just gone.
The second part of the caption comes from another sign on the premises.
“We do know that more jobs are being created,” said Reich, professor of public policy of the University of California at Berkeley. “The problem is that the actual labor participation rate, the ratio of people who are in the labor force relative to the people who are eligible to work, it’s down to almost the lowest point it was during the great recession. We haven’t seen much pickup in that.” In February, it stood at 63.9 percent, which was down from 64.2 percent in February 2011, and significantly below the 66 percent levels of 2006 and 2007.
In addition, while the economy has been expanding for nearly three years and hiring is picking up, Reich notes, “we also see some major declines in terms of median wage. And that’s particularly true for the bottom 90 percent.”
In the past, economists argued that wage growth lagged in part because employers were spending more on benefits like health care and pensions. But that hasn’t been the case in the past few years. A recently released study from the National Institute for Health Care Reform shows that in 2010, the percentage of Americans with insurance who got insurance from employers fell to 53.5 percent …
“The ratio of profits to wages basically is the highest it has been. More corporate earnings are going to profits relative to wages than at any time since the government has been keeping track of this ratio since 1947. — from the wire
You’ve already seen, or read about, National Geographic’s Doomsday Preppers, a show capitalizing on the demographic of white kooks preparing for the fall of American civilization — and a small audience of other people you don’t want to meet who enjoy watching them, similar to those who love video of hockey fights that bring in the crowd or football players suffering career-ending hits.
The preppers are needy. So they require a dating site tuned to their interests, just like everyone else.
[A] site called Survivalist Singles has entered the online dating scene, catering specifically to this niche community of “preppers,” “survivalists” and “doomsdayers.”
Survivalist Singles, which officially launched in 2010, boasts the slogan, “Don’t face the future alone.” Its ranks are growing — quadrupling to about 1,640 members from around 400 at the end of 2010.
Members of the site range widely in their doomsday beliefs, said Andrea Burke, a 45-year-old middle school art teacher from Montana who took over the site from its previous owner last summer.
“Most will agree that something is brewing that may change life as we know it, whether it be a collapse of the economy, an EMP (electromagnetic pulse) or other natural or government disaster,” Burke said.
Love for less than a box of bullets, or something similar, is the motto.
The dilemma faced by preppers is plain. The image projected is poor because they’re … kooks. A Bible-beating white guy/militia man in Wyoming, the Dakotas, Idaho, Utah, the Piedmont or the wastelands of Texas who dresses in camo is a hard sell.
“It’s hard to connect with someone … You can’t explain why your truck is packed like you’re always ready for an expedition …” reads one quote from a user looking for connection.
“Some members, though, have already found love on the site … Iron Ranger … found his soul mate, or “twin flame,” only two days after joining Survivalist Singles … They live six hours away from each other so they have only met in person twice …” reads another.
Familiarity breeds contempt, as the saying goes.
“When you have somebody within single digit feet of you … the dynamics of that situation are just going to be a wee bit different than somebody 25 yards away, who you have a clear shot at …”
Everyone knows the incredible danger the world would face if irrational theocrats controlled a nuclear arsenal, (except for the thirty-two percent who support Rick Santorum.) …
The candidates instead prefer the more hawkish, “All Painful Death Options Are On The Table Of Flaming Hellfire With The Fork Of Vengence For Your Eye” policy.
Looking ahead 20 years was the subject of my last question posed to readers. The responses varied in tone …
A comprehensive perspective was contributed by L.R.K., from South Euclid, whose full comments appear online.
He has a cautionary view of the future …
“What will the world look like in twenty years? That is a very interesting question. I wrestle with it because my grandchildren will be in their mid-20s then. In the next 20 years we, the United States, will be or have been engaged in at least two regional wars. I don’t like the idea; but our enemies tend to choose us (as with Afghanistan) rather then we them (as with Iraq). My nightmare is not a nuclear war, which although possible is not likely, but an EMP attack which would put American society back to the 1820s. It would be totally devastating, and also relatively inexpensive, and therefore is more likely.”
The Cult of Electromagnetic Pulse Crazy is everywhere, indelibly written into a unique mythology alleged modern Americans hold dear.
Neem oil and turmeric are prescribed for smallpox, just in case the disease comes to your bugout location after the collapse. Turmeric is said to be good for acne, too.
Smallpox was eradicated in the world population in the late Seventies.
Watch now. The prepper disables embedding when she discovers the wrong people are watching. Hee.
You can also do the overdub the soundtrack trick I did with the Scorpions and Taxi Zum Klo a week or so back. Mute the smallpox prepper vid and immediately launch Act Naturally, below.
Much better!
All they gotta do is act naturally … I hope you’ll come and see ’em in the movies.
State representatives on Friday advanced legislation to launch a study into what Wyoming should do in the event of a complete economic or political collapse in the United States.
House Bill 85 passed on first reading by a voice vote. It would create a state-run government continuity task force, which would study and prepare Wyoming for potential catastrophes, from disruptions in food and energy supplies to a complete meltdown of the federal government.
The task force would look at the feasibility of Wyoming issuing its own alternative currency, if needed. And House members approved an amendment Friday by state Rep. Kermit Brown, R-Laramie, to have the task force also examine conditions under which Wyoming would need to implement its own military draft, raise a standing army, and acquire strike aircraft and an aircraft carrier.
population of Wyoming 538,000
population of Pasadena, CA 137,000
population of LA County 9.8 million
I’m betting Pasadena has more books and more people with advanced degrees than Wyoming.
In any case, this isn’t new.
Down through the ages the hinterlands have been filled with unthinking, easily influenced paranoids. If you still watch Glenn Beck, or read his publication — The Blaze, you’d think the country was going to collapse next week.
National Geographic’s Doomsday Preppers has monetized the kooks and televised them nationwide. The country is coming to an end, they all insist.
In decades past in Allentown, PA, I was sent to cover a local municipal meeting of a local ‘burg just prior to the first Gulf War. There, a couple of the local townsmen talked of emergency preparations for a town of about three thousand, in case Saddam Hussein destroyed the local interstate with a Scud missile.
Paphlagonians were drawn in crowds by the news. Only their outward appearance distinguished them from sheep. The thick and uncultured natives of Pontus and Paphlygonia were easily deceived … Alexander, who had medical training, prescribed ointments made of bear’s fat as one of his quack remedies … [Real Paphlagonians were] shod in heavy leather clogs, they belched garlic fumes. Garlic, as well as a readiness to believe false oracles, was an insulting leitmotif that went back to Aristophanes …
Reads Toward the Rhetoric of Insult:
Paphlagon is so named because he is allegedly of Paphlagonian ancestry (Paphlagonia, at the eastern limits of the known world, is like Al Capp’s Slobbovia …)
