Just over a year ago, I was writing about The Hunger Games and how this futuristic morality tale reflects our own cruel and unequal society. At the time, presidential candidate Mitt Romney had just written off 47 percent of Americans, labeling them as lazy and irresponsible.
This November, the second part of the Hunger Games movie trilogy, Catching Fire, was released in theatres. The release coincides with Congress’ last-ditch debate over the Farm Bill and Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. So this fall I am seeing other writers draw the comparison between America and the Hunger Games.
As the editors of The Miami Herald noted in a piece titled “Hey Congress, hunger’s not a game”: “That the program [SNAP] has been an unmitigated success is irrefutable — if ensuring that Americans don’t go hungry in this land of plenty is one’s mission. That it has been a cesspool of waste, fraud and abuse, as lawmakers who want to make brutal and inhumane budget cuts contend, is simply not true. It’s a ruse, an excuse to throw poor people under the bus.”
I find it ironic we are still battling over SNAP funding during a season supposed to be focused on gratitude and generosity. And I am disappointed we cannot see past petty, divisive and judgmental, not to mention false, arguments to push lawmakers to do the right thing.
This is urgent for people in every community, though we may not acknowledge it. As Kevin Concannon, undersecretary for Food, Nutrition and Consumer Services wrote on Huffington Post: “On November 1, SNAP families began receiving fewer benefits each month due to an automatic benefit reduction. For many families, coping with this cut will be tough, particularly during the holidays. Fortunately, this is the time of the year in particular that food pantries and food banks are aided by generous Americans. But they cannot fairly be expected, and they are telling us that they cannot fully meet the need in their communities if SNAP is cut further.”
Concannon notes that many of these families include children, the elderly, disabled persons and working people. And he lays out all the ways – counter to the prevailing myths about SNAP administration and recipients – the program works. In fact, he notes that fraud in the program has been reduced over the last 15 years to about 1 percent.
But, I have to wonder about American society when we are willing to allow cuts to a program that feeds people in need, especially in a time of economic instability and high unemployment. And I am not alone.
Washington Post columnist E.J. Dionne laid it out beautifully in this post titled, “On Thanksgiving, understanding what gratitude requires.” He writes: “A call to responsibility lies at the heart of gratitude. If faith without works is dead, gratitude without generosity of spirit is empty. By reminding us of how much we owe to others, or to social arrangements, or to fate, or to God, gratitude creates an obligation to repay our debts by repairing injustices and reaching out to those whom luck has failed. Gratitude is a response to acts of love. It demands more of the same — nothing more, nothing less.”
We should be demanding Congress act on a Food, Farms and Jobs bill to restore SNAP and focus on economic stability for all. True gratitude requires it.
Showing posts with label SNAP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label SNAP. Show all posts
Wednesday, January 1, 2014
Thursday, July 25, 2013
Thanks for the discussion, but stick to the facts
On July 1, I attended Sen. Charles Grassley’s Montgomery County Town Hall. Given the moderate turnout, Sen. Grassley offered an open forum. A true town hall discussion ensued.
At first, I sat back to hear what was on the mind of area residents. First, the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) came up in relation to Medicare and the Independent Payment Advisory Board or IPAB, as Sen. Grassley referred to it.
In his effort to explain the panel’s role, Sen. Grassley used the term rationing. Later, he responded to my raised hand, and confirmed my understanding that the IPAB’s role is to examine best practices to provide the most effective treatments, which may be less expensive than newer treatments or technologies, thus helping control Medicare costs.
According to Shawn Kennedy of the American Journal of Nursing, “ . . . IPABs are about reducing costs of programs, not passing judgment on individuals.” And in testimony on Capitol Hill, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius stated: “The statute is very clear: the IPAB cannot make recommendations that ration care, raise beneficiary premiums or cost-sharing, reduce benefits, or change eligibility for Medicare. The IPAB cannot eliminate benefits or decide what care Medicare beneficiaries can receive.”
Yet Senator Grassley opined the panel would come between patient and doctor, to which a member of the audience remarked that insurance companies already do.
Grassley facilitated a civil discussion and moved on to additional topics. However, I was disappointed to hear a number of inaccuracies go unaddressed. These included:
— Decreasing deportations of undocumented immigrants. As the Christian Science Monitor reported last December, “The United States deported more than 400,000 illegal immigrants in 2012, the most of any year in the nation’s history, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reports.”
— Excessive and expensive Presidential trips on Air Force One. According to Factcheck.org, President Obama has traveled no more than previous presidents and less than President Bush. FactCheck addressed this issue two years ago, saying, “These latest chain e-mails are part of a continuing pattern of indignant, anonymous authors spreading false and misleading claims about the travels of the president and the first lady.”
— Extensive use of executive orders. In 2012, FactCheck.org addressed a number of chain e-mails about President Obama’s use of executive orders, outlining the historic and constitutional precedents. They also noted, “He has signed slightly fewer orders than President George W. Bush during this point in his first term, according to the University of California, Santa Barbara, which tracks executive orders.”
— SNAP fraud. In March of this year, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities updated their evaluation of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program under the title, “SNAP is Effective and Efficient. The report states: “SNAP has one of the most rigorous quality control systems of any public benefit program, and despite the recent growth in caseloads, the share of total SNAP payments that represent overpayments, underpayments, or payments to ineligible households reached a record low in fiscal year 2011.”
How can we make good decisions if we do not have good information? Our job as citizens is to call out misinformation wherever we find it, not blindly accept what’s presented. We’re also called to discuss and develop solutions together.
I’d say on July 1, we made a start.
At first, I sat back to hear what was on the mind of area residents. First, the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) came up in relation to Medicare and the Independent Payment Advisory Board or IPAB, as Sen. Grassley referred to it.
In his effort to explain the panel’s role, Sen. Grassley used the term rationing. Later, he responded to my raised hand, and confirmed my understanding that the IPAB’s role is to examine best practices to provide the most effective treatments, which may be less expensive than newer treatments or technologies, thus helping control Medicare costs.
According to Shawn Kennedy of the American Journal of Nursing, “ . . . IPABs are about reducing costs of programs, not passing judgment on individuals.” And in testimony on Capitol Hill, Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius stated: “The statute is very clear: the IPAB cannot make recommendations that ration care, raise beneficiary premiums or cost-sharing, reduce benefits, or change eligibility for Medicare. The IPAB cannot eliminate benefits or decide what care Medicare beneficiaries can receive.”
Yet Senator Grassley opined the panel would come between patient and doctor, to which a member of the audience remarked that insurance companies already do.
Grassley facilitated a civil discussion and moved on to additional topics. However, I was disappointed to hear a number of inaccuracies go unaddressed. These included:
— Decreasing deportations of undocumented immigrants. As the Christian Science Monitor reported last December, “The United States deported more than 400,000 illegal immigrants in 2012, the most of any year in the nation’s history, US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reports.”
— Excessive and expensive Presidential trips on Air Force One. According to Factcheck.org, President Obama has traveled no more than previous presidents and less than President Bush. FactCheck addressed this issue two years ago, saying, “These latest chain e-mails are part of a continuing pattern of indignant, anonymous authors spreading false and misleading claims about the travels of the president and the first lady.”
— Extensive use of executive orders. In 2012, FactCheck.org addressed a number of chain e-mails about President Obama’s use of executive orders, outlining the historic and constitutional precedents. They also noted, “He has signed slightly fewer orders than President George W. Bush during this point in his first term, according to the University of California, Santa Barbara, which tracks executive orders.”
— SNAP fraud. In March of this year, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities updated their evaluation of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program under the title, “SNAP is Effective and Efficient. The report states: “SNAP has one of the most rigorous quality control systems of any public benefit program, and despite the recent growth in caseloads, the share of total SNAP payments that represent overpayments, underpayments, or payments to ineligible households reached a record low in fiscal year 2011.”
How can we make good decisions if we do not have good information? Our job as citizens is to call out misinformation wherever we find it, not blindly accept what’s presented. We’re also called to discuss and develop solutions together.
I’d say on July 1, we made a start.
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