Free Republic

The nation’s newest billionaire is a rags-to-riches success story who escaped communist Ukraine as a teen and lived on food stamps in the United States before hitting it big with a messaging app that has become the hottest thing in social media. Meet Jan Koum, the 37-year-old college dropout who, with his partner and mentor, Brian Acton, just sold their startup, WhatsApp, to Facebook for $19 billion in cash and stock. Koum is now worth $6.8 billion. It’s a long way from the government-assisted, two-bedroom apartment in Mountain View, Calif., where he came of age with his mom, and even...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)DENVER — Colorado welfare recipients are using ATMs located inside marijuana retail shops to withdraw cash. The money was given to them by taxpayers to help their families survive, but an exclusive Fox31 Denver investigation found some cash benefits most likely going toward marijuana purchases. FOX31 Denver asked the Colorado Department of Human Services for its “Quest card” database of Electronic Benefits Transfer (EBT) cash transactions for the month of January, 2014. That is the first month in which Colorado marijuana dispensaries were regulated and open for recreational sales. The FOX31 Denver investigative team matched the addresses of EBT cash...

President Obama was in Michigan last week to sign a 10-year, $1 trillion farm bill. While much of the debate has centered around the spending on food stamps, buried in the 1,000-page plan are many other provisions that are indefensibly bad policy. While some are praising, and others complaining, about slightly rolling back spending on food stamps and eliminating some of the direct payments to "farmers" (who did not actually farm), the bill goes far beyond that. This bill continues special subsidy deals to farmers in every area in the country — from corn and beans to rice and peanuts...

Food stamp redemption at military grocery stores, or commissaries, has nearly doubled since the beginning of the “Great Recession,” topping out at $103.6 million in FY 2013, from $31.1 million in FY 2008. While the amount of Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, or food stamps, have soared over the past five years, the rate of increase has slowed, according to data from the Defense Commissary Agency and published by CNN Money Monday. From FY 2009 to FY 2010 the level of spending jumped from $52.9 million to $72.8 million; from FY 2010 to FY 2011 the amount of SNAP benefits...

Jerrold Nadler, Democrat Congressman from New York City, is not terribly interested in nuance. In fact, it’s fairly obvious that he is adamantly against it. Talking to a reporter yesterday, Nadler whined that the actions of Republicans was “immoral,” especially in “this recession where people can’t find jobs.” He went on his cartoonish tirade, saying, “If the Republicans wanted to say, ‘Let’s put in this extra protection, that extra protection,' that would be something else. “But they’re just using that as an excuse. They just want people to starve. And it’s disgusting.”

JESSICA DESVARIEUX, TRNN PRODUCER: On her day off from work, D.C. resident Kathy Burke heads to a local food pantry, Thrive DC. She works part-time, making $10 an hour, and she says she needs any help that she can get, even though she's on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as food stamps. KATHY BURKE, FOOD STAMP RECIPIENT: Boy. They probably sent me a letter about the food stamps. That's probably what this is. DESVARIEUX: With both a bachelor's degree and master's, Kathy says her food stamp payments usually don't last her the entire month. BURKE: Sometimes that's all...

(VIDEO-AT-LINK)You might think MSNBC is a pretty friendly venue for Democratic politicians, and usually you’d be right. But woe unto the Democrat who strays even slightly from the progressive line — as Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow found out the hard way Tuesday afternoon. Stabenow was in the middle of a victory lap with MSNBC’s Alex Wagner, after the agriculture chair’s farm bill sailed through the Senate to the president’s desk. The massive bill approves nearly $1 trillion in spending over the next decade, with most of the funding for the food stamp program. The Democratic senator explained how she was...

The long-tortured farm bill cleared Congress Tuesday, ending a two year struggle that split the old farm-food coalition as never before and dramatized the growing isolation of agriculture and rural America in an ever more urban House. Written off as dead just months ago, the giant five-year measure won final approval from the Senate on a 68-32 roll call and goes next to President Barack Obama for his signature.

Budget cuts aimed at weaning Americans off of public assistance may make the start of 2014 lean for many African-Americans. Last month, after much debate, Congress began implementing it’s budget cut plan to reduce funding for the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program otherwise known as SNAP. The program provides monetary help for families in poverty and alleviates food insecurity. SNAP, formerly known as the Food Stamp Program, is used by approximately 47 million Americans. But with funding reductions and bans for convicted felons many people wonder how Americans will finally be able to climb out of poverty. Who needs SNAP? The...

Wal-Mart stores and its Sam's Club chain are apparently hurting from the cuts in the federal food stamp program that went into effect in early November. The impact from the government's reduction in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits had a much greater effect on the world's largest retailer than originally expected by the company. Combined with consumer fears about the economy and winter storms that also hurt store business nationwide, the cuts made a bad situation for Wal-Mart even worse, according to a statement from Wal-Mart Chief Financial Officer Charles Holley carried by the Associated Press. The estimated $5...

Elected Democrats and movement progressives are up in arms over the meager cuts to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP - commonly known as food stamps). Hot Air's Erika Johnsen covered the non-drama over the farm bill yesterday and noted the very meager reforms included in the legislation, but some Democrats are bemoaning the $800 million in yearly cuts to SNAP in apocalyptic terms. The overall SNAP program costs $70 billion per year. Hipster congresswoman Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.) said "Congress has lost its way" and described the farm bill as "reverse Robin Hood legislation that steals food from the poor."...

Companies blame all sorts of things for profit warnings, real and imagined. There’s at least some reason to believe Wal-Mart Stores WMT -1.14% when it blames food stamp cuts and bad weather. First, the assertion that food-stamp cuts impacted the company’s bottom line: On Nov. 1, the Great Recession boost to the food-stamp program — known as the Supplement Nutrition Assistance Program — expired. That meant as much as a 5.5% reduction in benefits. A family of four, for example, would get $36 a month less.

… The bill will cost nearly a trillion dollars over ten years. But, considering the bill itself is 702 pages long, the bill will cost about $1.4 billion per page. If that doesn’t garner the attention of taxpayers, there was something else that bothered at least one member of the House today—how settling on cutting $8 billion of waste could be a called “compromise” between a $40 billion House cut and a $4 billion Senate cut. …

Proving that neither party really wants to do anything about escalating costs of anything, in typical D.C. compromise action, the House Passes $956B Farm Bill in a bipartisan vote. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) all voted for the bill. Democrats are howling over minuscule cuts in SNAP (food stamps). For example, an inane headline on the Daily Koz reads House passes food stamp-slashing farm bill. Supposedly there will be $8.6 billion in devastating food stamp cuts. Even if that happens it is less than a 1% cut in an...

Subsidies: Former Indiana congressman (and now state governor) Mike Pence used to quip that he was 99% capitalist but 1% socialist, and that turns socialist "when it comes time to vote on a farm bill." At least he was honest. Just what is it about farm bills that make Republicans abandon their principles of limited government and fiscal restraint? The sad answer: Farm bills are classic examples of Republican pork delivered to their own voters. The $1 trillion bill that will be voted on this week is another big pail of slop. It includes subsidies for corn, cotton, wool, sugar,...

The Associated Press reported today that 28 percent of households that receive food stamps are headed by someone who has at least "some" college experience. In 1980, this figure was eight percent. Seven percent of households who receive food stamps are headed by someone with a bachelor's degree. In 1980, this figure was only at three percent....

A House plan to make major cuts to food stamps would be scaled back under a bipartisan agreement on a massive farm bill, a near end to a more than two-year fight that has threatened to hurt rural lawmakers in an election year. The measure announced Monday by the House and Senate Agriculture committees preserves food stamp benefits for most Americans who receive them and continues generous subsidies for farmers. The House was expected to vote on the bill Wednesday, with the Senate following shortly after. The compromise was expected to cut food stamps by about $800 million a year,...

"Economists say having a job may no longer be enough for self-sufficiency in today's economy."

Members of Congress have been alerted that a deal on the $1 trillion farm bill, stalled for the last three years, could come on Monday, allowing for a House floor vote next week. The alert went out from the House Agriculture Committee to members of the farm bill conference committee requesting that they return to town by Monday for action on the stalled legislation. "Conversations are ongoing and we remain optimistic that we can reach agreement in time to be on the floor next week," the alert stated. It said that Monday could feature a conference meeting to vote on...

(CNSNews.com) -- A record 20% of American households, one in five, were on food stamps in 2013, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA). The numbers also show that there were a record number of individuals on food stamps in 2013 and that the cost of the program, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), was at an all-time high.