Welfare benefits cashed in Casinos One more reason I am glad THIS has not come HERE.
Magical thinking: THIS time I will win.
More magical thinking: My money doesn’t last through the month and already, without a food pantry run I cannot feed my family. But that is ok – because THIS time I will win.
Gambling IS a child welfare issue. Parents HERE have lost their children and had their parental rights terminated due to gambling rather than buying food. And yes, I know this first hand.
Please share widely!
The gambling bill that the Legislature sent to the Governor prohibited casinos from extending any credit to recipients of government assistance, and specifically prohibited ATM’s at casinos from accepting government benefit EBT cards. (Section 31 of House 5000).
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p>Not a foolproof solution, obviously, and one that has the additional disadvantage of promoting a kind of economic caste system among the citizenry.
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p>But the issue was considered in the legislative process.
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And cigarettes. And Mountain Dew. And Ho-Hos, Ding-Dongs, and Funnybones. And pizza, McDonald’s, and Taco Bell. They pay their cable bills with it. And buy Wii games. And scratch tickets. Download Justin Bieber songs for their iPods.
Should we prohibit all that stuff, too, since they divert money from clothing, sheltering, and the proper nutrition of the children of welfare recipients?
I’m all for freedom for people to do whatever they want with their OWN money. But if the government is giving you free money for a particular purpose – it should be spent for that purpose.
Be sure and be complete, lest we think you left out something.
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p>It turns out this is awfully difficult. More than once I’ve seen a diabetic down a Coke to balance his blood sugar quickly in a pinch.
I always find it humorous that the people who rail most about “government intrusion” into their lives are willing to go so, so far into desiring the intrusion into the lives of welfare recipients.
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p>I seriously think that they have a wet dreams involving some kind of national website which detailed every single purchase of every single welfare recipient, with the ability for everyone to vote whether each purchase should be allowed or not.
I missed the passage or introduction of laws that ban sugar, fat, smoking, or fluffernutters. Please provide some links.
but my donuts and fries tasted better before trans fats were banned.
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p>Sorry, no link, but much discussed “ban”.
pack on the pounds and clog your arteries with the allowed kinds of fat. Get your donuts with more sugar on them, and use more sugar-laden ketchup on your fries, and you won’t miss trans-fats so much.
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p>For the record, “fat” has not been banned.
[By Charisse Jones and Nanci Hellmich, USA TODAY
NEW YORK – The city’s decision to ban trans fats from restaurant fare may change how food is prepared at eateries – from fast to fine dining – around the nation.
http://www.usatoday.com/news/h…
and a host of other places.
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p>So far as I know, “fat” is not banned anywhere.
… a good reason for trans fats any more. The whole point was to hydroginate the fats to use up their available molecular bonds. This is done primarily to keep them from bonding with other stuff and having the fats go rancid. That is, the whole point behind hydrogination was storage. Great stuff if it’s the 1940s and your trying to keep an army fed or the 1950s and 60s and you want to keep your bomb shelter supplied. With modern supply chains, this simply isn’t necessary anymore. The reason you don’t want to consume trans fats is because the fact that the fat has been restricted from interacting with its environment any more also restricts it from being metabolized properly. It’s very unhealthy because your body just stores it and it doesn’t get consumed easily. In fact, I believe the RDA for trans fats is 0. That is there is no amount of trans fat consumption that could be considered even marginally healthy.
that while transfats are edible, they aren’t food.
former state senator, Jared Barrios (sp?), introduced a bill to prevent schools from offering fluffernutter sandwiches in their cafeterias. He did it in a snit, and was appropriately ridiculed for it. It was never brought up for discussion, and was withdrawn.
…so it stands to reason that we might try to keep costs down with regard to unhealthy intake. Smoking of course is different anyway due to the secondhand issue.
When the rushed process began in Middleboro, the secrecy and closed door decisions sounded the alarm.
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p>When something is a GREAT deal, it’s still a GREAT deal when surrounding issues are discussed publicly and carefully studied.
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p>This is one of many issues we should be discussing publicly, not in the SLAP DASH legislation that was proposed.
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p>Any pretense about GETTING IT RIGHT was quickly destroyed watching the process, the lack of public hearings and discussion.
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p>Attending the Senate “Hearings,” I was surrounded by well paid lobbyists who thought nothing of calling legislators on their cells and dictating the terms of this legislation. Their arrogance prevented them from any attempt to muffle their communications.
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p>Meetings were conducted behind closed doors. Conference Committee meetings excluded the public and the media.
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p>Something to hide? Me thinks so.
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p>There is nothing contained within any version of this grossly flawed legislation that convinces me attempts were made to protect the public, consumers, taxpayers.
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p>The Governor is isolated and surrounded by “YES” men like Doug Rubin, who lack the testicles to tell the Emperor he has no clothes. The Governor’s support is based solely on BENEFITS REPORTS. Where are the costs?
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p>Opponents in both houses, to their credit, offered amendments to make this travisty less BAD that in most cases were ignored.
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p>The issue of Welfare Recipients is merely one of them.
How about consumer protection? self-exclusion that the House barely passed?
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p>MSM drowned out many other issues by wrongly focusing on the smoking ban.
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p>Does anyone have an issue with free alcohol being served and the ability of ‘SLOT BARNS’ to offer loans? And then being allowed to collect those debts?
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p>Is this how responsible elected officials solve a budget deficit?
to your penultimate question. I offered many ideas to alleviate the worst aspects. Smoking ban is a no-brainer to me anyway.
for anyone who watched this sham.
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p>Attending public hearings, no ‘hard’ questions’ were ever asked of the Gambling Vultures, unless forced to do so. Campaign coffers filled, why pretend to conduct the ‘people’s business’?
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p>The Ways & Means Committee was an indictment of all that is wrong with this process. The CHEERLEADERS were allowed to speak endlessly with no time limit and had little to say except for the same mindless rhetoric, yet opponents were reminded of their 3 minute time limit and then gavelled to silence when they exceeded it. Many opponents were forced to leave for personal or professional commitments or dull things like picking up kids at sitters.
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p>It should be noted that those few remaining opponents spoke AFTER the news cycle – reporters were gone.
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p>Nobody says it better than my nosy neighbor, Gladys Kravitz.
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p>United to Stop Slots in Massachusetts has called for an INDEPENDENT COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS, much like the one our neighbors to our north conducted that would prove to Masshusetts voters, the misguided Governor who surrounded himself with “YES” men more concerned about image over substance and the Bobble-headed legislature concerned about extra pay and privileges over the future of the Common Wealth that this endeavor is sheer fiscal folly as Senator Tucker’s simple arithematic proved here: Casino Dollars Will Simply Pour In! Not!. They don’t want the truth, nor do the construction unions want that information to become public knowledge. The jobs are simply NOT there.
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p>Pretend as much as you’d like, but the jobs and revenue are simply not there: Wow! 15,000 Jobs? NOT!
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p>That is NOT to say that the Republicans got it right since their testimony was focused on how to spend non-existent revenues. They NEVER asked what that BLOATED REGULATORY BUREAUCRACY would cost, instead focusing on protecting their buddies who own/invest in tracks.
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p>This is a major fiscal policy blunder that once approved, will NEVER be limited and you will NEVER rid yourselves of the Vultures you have allowed to seize control simply judging from the experience of other states.
…should ALWAYS be an option. Otherwise, what’s the point? Remember, I ultimately came down against this particular legislation largely BECAUSE of how it was handled. I was simply answering your question.