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PaperclipPerfector  2mo ago (text post)   1779 thread views

Small-Scale Question Sunday for September 22, 2024

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Is it really mainstream? I scrolled to somewhere in the middle randomly and they're talking about restricting money spent on food stamps. We're talking about a program that's 2% of federal outlays and about 20% of Americans have used food stamps at some point. Does anyone actually give a shit about cutting this program?

It's created by the Heritage Foundation and is generally in line with the Republican party agena of the past few decades. Heavier on social conservatism than libertarianism, as Heritage is a social conservative think tank.

I'm curious if any Republican candidates have run on cutting SNAP. I suspect not.

There's multiple ways you can read what Newt Gingrich says here. I'll let you decide if this counts.

Cutting welfare in general is a mainstream conservative position (cutting any specific program tends to be quite unpopular, but you gotta start somewhere). Poor people actually tend to be fatter than middle class or rich people, so there seems to be a caloric excess on the margin among food stamp recipients.

As you pointed out, 10% of EBT goes to hyper-sugary drinks which are essentially poisons for the people on food stamps.

We're subsidizing shitty food or playing some endless whack-a-mole of trying to paternalistically stop the underclass from eating themselves to death. It seems like they're hellbent on doing it anyway, so I'm not a fan of food stamps.

I'm not saying that a motte contrarian can't talk himself into it. I'm wondering if it's actually "mainstream conservatism" given that people want to win elections.

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