Free Republic

Yesterday was actually the 16th anniversary of a historic piece of legislation coming-into-law: it was called the 'Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act', a trailblazing welfare reform bill passed in 1996 by the first GOP Congress in 40 years) that was considered a major cornerstone of House Speaker Gingrich's legendary Contract with America. What it did -among other things- was to add a work requirement which resulted in a significant jump in employment among many of those who -prior to reform- seemed permanently glued to the government teat (and their sofa).  The long-term effect was even more dramatic: both welfare and poverty rates declined significantly during...

Tampa police estimate that 80 to 90 percent of the tax refund fraud they encounter is committed by people on public assistance. "The people who are benefiting most from our taxes are the ones doing it," said police spokeswoman Andrea Davis.

Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano are mum on why the legal requirements that immigrants and visa applicants not be reliant on government assistance have been watered down, according to some lawmakers. The deadline for Clinton and Napolitano to respond to a letter regarding admission of immigrants on or likely to be on assistance programs from senior Republicans on the Budget, Judiciary, Finance, and Agriculture Committees came and passed Monday. On Tuesday Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions, the ranking member on the Senate Budget Committee, blasted the pair for their failure to comply. “It is...

Vice President Biden presented America with what liberals might call a “teachable moment.” Race has long served as a trump card silencing opposition. Whites wilt when challenged by race. But Biden ups the ante by insinuating Republicans trying to ease financial regulation harbor sinister intentions. Biden warns blacks, “they gonna put y’all back in chains.” More freedom, via less red-tape, translates as slavery. America is apparently so endemically prejudiced, “institutionally racist” some say, that minorities risk grave calamity without Washington’s muscular intervention. President Obama re-confirmed Biden as running-mate and refuses to repudiate him. Team Obama’s divisive message: Racist Republicans would...

Dear Friend, In this video commentary, I discuss how Obama has put one-third of America on welfare! Tune in!

FTA: Tampa police estimate that 80 to 90 percent of the tax refund fraud they encounter is committed by people on public assistance. "The people who are benefiting most from our taxes are the ones doing it," said police spokeswoman Andrea Davis. Tampa led the nation in refund fraud last year, with thieves duping the IRS out of $468 million. That's according to a recent analysis by a federal watchdog agency, which put the national loss at $5.2 billion. The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration said it detected characteristics of refund fraud in 88,724 paid Tampa returns. No one...

Are taxes a form of charitable donation? Republican presidential challenger Mitt Romney seemed to suggest that he might think so last week, when he responded to questions about how much he pays in taxes by suggesting that people should take into account his total contributions to the government and charities. The comment was a quick one — a by-golly insistence that despite paying a relatively low tax rate on his vast income, the millions he has given to charity show that he’s not a greedy guy. But experts who research public attitudes on philanthropy on both sides of the political...

We’re living in two Americas. But unlike 50 years ago, when Michael Harrington’s “The Other America” shone a spotlight on poverty among certain groups within the U.S., today’s “other America” is one of profound differences in the most precious of all commodities – the length of our lives. We’ve known for some time now of the health and longevity disparities between blacks and whites. But, as new findings by the MacArthur Foundation Research Network on an Aging Society, recently published in Health Affairs, demonstrate, the story about these longevity gaps has gone through some rather startling changes.

Mitt Romney has chosen as his running mate U.S. Rep. Paul Ryan, the author of an ill-conceived budget plan that he ambitiously named "The Path to Prosperity." In fact, Ryan's budget plan aims to put more money in taxpayers' pockets through massive cuts to many programs that have a direct impact on the quality of life in the United States. There is more to "prosperity" than money in our pockets. Financial prosperity does no one any good if there is not concomitant happiness or, at least, contentment. The ability to lead a happy and satisfying life is the best measure...

“They’ll turn us all into beggars ‘cause they’re easier to please.” So goes a Rainmakers song. Beggars also are easier to control. Just ask the drug dealer. It is not compassion that motivates him to give away the first hits of heroin for free; it is the promise of control. President Obama wants to give you free stuff. Lots and lots of free stuff. At least, he’d like you to believe it’s free. Free health care. Free welfare checks. Free food stamps. But as the saying goes, free stuff or freedom: Choose one. As any teenager knows, you don’t escape...

Muslim immigrants with more than one wife will see an increase in their social welfare benefits beginning in 2013, when reforms to the British welfare system come into effect. Although polygamy is illegal in Britain, the state effectively recognizes the practice for Muslim men, who often have up to four wives (and in some instances five or more) in a harem. Currently the state pays extra wives in polygamous households reduced amounts of individual income support, in addition to the normal amount received by the husband and his first spouse. Under the new rules, however, the extra wives will be...

State lawmakers are again pushing for welfare reforms after a convicted South End drug dealer allegedly tried to use funds from his taxpayer-funded EBT card to post bail, according to a report in the Boston Herald. Kimball Clark, 45, and his attempt to use EBT funds to make bail has spurred some on Beacon Hill to call for immediate reforms to Massachusetts’ welfare system. Overheard in Boston Clark was arrested on drug dealing charges Friday, and was overheard using his obligatory phone call to request the person on the other end retrieve his EBT card and withdraw cash from an...

(CNSNews.com) – The Social Security Administration posted a blog on Thursday to explain why it was planning to purchase 174,000 hollow point bullets. SSA posted a "Request for Quote for Ammunition" on the FedBizOps.gov website on Aug. 7. The request listed the commodity that SSA desired as ".357 Sig 125 grain bonded jacketed hollow point pistol ammunition." The quantity listed was "174 TH." The SSA’s Office of the Inspector General’s said it posted a new blog on the agency’s website, “Beyond the Numbers,” “as we strive to be a transparent and accountable government organization for all of our stakeholders. “With...

Why are Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan talking about welfare so much? It doesn't have anything to do with the economy. It's not a big part of the budget. And the claim that President Obama "gutted" the requirement that recipients try to find work is false. Yet they've mentioned it in several speeches, and the campaign has released ads about it. Why? Racism, according to some liberal reporters. It's not that Romney or Ryan are racist, it's that their campaign knows that a lot of white voters—but definitely not all—are, and they want to make sure those people vote for...

The U.S. welfare system sure creates some crazy disincentives to working your way up the ladder. Benefits stacked upon benefits can mean it is financially better, at least in the short term, to stay at a lower-paying jobs rather than taking a higher paying job and losing those benefits. This is called the “welfare cliff.” Let’s take the example of a single mom with two kids, 1 and 4. She has a $29,000 a year job, putting the kids in daycare during the day while she works. As the above chart – via Gary Alexander, Pennsylvania’s secretary of Public Welfare...

A Walpole baker’s controversial refusal to take EBT card payments for her gourmet pastries exploded into the national spotlight yesterday, as her whoopie pie fight with a local farmers market emerged as the latest battle in the growing welfare policy war. The Herald’s report on Andrea Taber’s dispute with the Braintree Farmers Market, which wants her to accept tokens paid for with EBT cards for her baked goods, was read online by more than 250,000 people nationwide, garnering more than 750 comments. It made the rounds on Facebook and Twitter, and was picked up by The Drudge Report, Fark.com, Reddit.com,...

A Walpole baker — appalled that welfare abuse now seems almost as American as apple pie — is putting her whoopie pies where her mouth is in a dispute with the Braintree Farmers Market, refusing to take EBT cards for her baked treats." I don’t think American taxpayers should be footing the bill for people’s pie purchases,” said Andrea Taber, proprietor of the Ever So Humble Pie Co. in Walpole, who peddles her wares at the Braintree market on Fridays and now finds herself in the middle of the state’s raging fight over welfare benefits.

Just days before young, undocumented immigrants can begin to apply for work permits, state officials Monday announced $450,000 in grants to groups that can help them out. President Obama’s move — announced with great fanfare in June — lets immigrants who came to the U.S. illegally as kids or overstayed their visas apply for a temporary legal status called “deferred action.” “It is critical that we get information out to our immigrant communities so that people will know who is eligible for deferred action and so that they can avoid being scammed,” Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said. The grants will...

Solicitation Number: Notice Type: AG-DSSB-S-12-0117 USDA's Farm Service Agency, Kansas City Commodity Office (KCCO) intends to issue solicitation AG-DSSB-S-12-0117 for procurement of Sunflower Seed Butter Products for domestic food assistance programs. Deliveries are to various locations in the United States on an FOB destination basis. The solicitation may include various small business set asides pursuant to the Small Business Act (15 U.S.C. 631, et seq.). This may include partial or total small business set-asides, service-disabled veteran-owned (SDVO) set-asides, quantities reserved for 8(a) and AbilityOne firms, and price evaluation preferences for qualified HUBZone small businesses. Quantities reserved for 8(a) and SDVO firms where...

By choosing Paul Ryan to be his running mate, Mitt Romney has ensured that a “far-reaching debate about the broader role of government and the entitlement state,” in the words of Politico’s instant analysis, will dominate the final, decisive twelve weeks of the presidential campaign. The long-term budget plans that Representative Ryan has advanced in recent years will be scrutinized, attacked, and praised. Ryan is invariably portrayed as the GOP’s wonkiest politician — these arguments will often sound like the panel discussions most Americans put up with for entire nanoseconds before channel-surfing past C-SPAN. A strange election will get stranger...