True Things 12, With Some Opinions at the End

I was interested in how many of Mike Johnson's constituents receive SNAP benefits* and came across a map of House districts, which indicated the percentages of SNAP recipients in each.  In Johnson's district, Louisiana's 4th, 16.9% of the residents receive SNAP.  And won't, starting tomorrow.

Percentage ranges are differentiated by color on the map - the darker the green, the higher the percentage.  The highest range - 18% and over (ooh - Mike missed it by 1.1%!), is represented by a very dark green, indeed.  

There are only 33 Congressional Districts in which the percentage of SNAP beneficiaries is 18% and over, so I looked into it.  They range up into the high 20s, with Pennsylvania's 2nd District at 32.7%.  That's northeast Philadelphia, clearly a tough place to live.

I wondered who represented these districts, arguably the poorest in the country.  I looked it up (Wikipedia is a great help), and here is the answer:

  Democrats:    26

  Republicans     7

No wonder the Republicans are letting SNAP expire, and not using the very funds put aside for this emergency to ensure that it continues.  Although it's hard for me to understand how those seven Republican Congressmen (and Mike Johnson, who's 1.1% from being the eighth) live with themselves.   

* - Opinion:  none.  Mike Johnson has a constituency of one.

True Things 11

You probably saw this, but I just read about it:

Two days ago South Korea presented Donald Trump with a gold crown. This occurred on the sidelines of a global economic summit that Trump did not attend.

It's a replica of an ancient crown, and only gold plate, not solid, but it's not clear that Trump knows this.

Question:  Is this a brilliant dunk on Donald Trump by the South Koreans?  Even a little bit?  Trump was also awarded the ancient Kingdom's highest honor - the Grand Order of Mugunghwa.  Really?  I would be the last to poke fun at someone else's cultural artifacts, but - really?  This is the President who awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom to Ed Meese, a bunch of sportsball players, Antonin Scalia, and Rush Limbaugh.  So... ?

True But Not True Thing

 "No more SNAP benefits for you until the Democrats let us take away your health care."

                                                                                    Speaker of the House Mike Johnson

He said it, but just not in those words.  What he actually said:

"I haven't seen that.  I don't know anything about that."

Or was that what he said about expiring Medicaid benefits?  Or about the President hijacking the appropriation process?  Or about not swearing in Adelita Grijalva?  Or about the Epstein files?  Or about Donald Trump's effectively abolishing the House of Representatives?

He did say that he "'deeply regrets' that millions of Americans will lose SNAP benefits," after working hard to pass the Big Ugly Budget Bill in July, which cut $186 billion from SNAP, and after not using his leadership position to release the $6 billion SNAP emergency fund.  

So once again, a prominent Republican is either ignorant, or lying.

Could it be that we are seeing the resurgence of the Know-Nothing Party?  

Nah.  Still the Lying Liars that Lie Party.

The Local View

 

                                                                                                   Provincetown Independent, today

That's No Ballroom...

 

                                                                                                                                - Mark Hamill

Breaking My Word

From Heather Cox Williamson this morning:

Yesterday the Trump administration said it would not use any of the approximately $6 billion the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) holds in reserve to fund the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The government shutdown means that states have run out of funds to distribute to the more than 42 million Americans who rely on SNAP to put food on the table...

... Yesterday’s USDA memo also says that any states that tap their own resources to provide food benefits will not be reimbursed.

So even when the government is functioning (?) again, it will not allow SNAP recipients to use the food reserves they applied for and were guaranteed.

Remember:  SNAP benefits will be eliminated (Nov. 1) because the government is shut down.  The government is shut down because Congressional Republicans and the President (?) don't think that a particular segment of America should get the health insurance supports that they were promised.

This means two things:

1 - Republicans have no interest in using government to make sure we all have the bare minimum.  This pisses me off, but it's nothing new

2 - Republicans have broken America's word to Americans.  Which means they've broken my word to my friends and neighbors.  The really pisses me off.

True Things 10

"I'm the President and the Speaker."

                      President  (not Speaker) Donald J. Trump

"We don't need to pass any more bills."

                     President Donald J. Trump, to GOP Senators

“It is clear that Donald Trump has effectively abolished the House of Representatives”

                      Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi

Two things about these things:

1.  Trump is saying that the separation of powers, a foundation of the Constitution, is no more.

2.  Trump is saying that he is consolidating power.  This is a foundation of Fascism.

All these things are true things. 

True Things 9 - Karma

You're familiar with this response to a bizarre occurrence:  "You can't make this stuff up."  In some cases, you can't make it up because if you did, it wouldn't be realistic enough for anyone to 1) believe it or 2) enjoy it as entertainment.  Even fiction needs to comply with the unwritten rules of connection to the real world:  it needs to fit, somehow, with our notion of how the world works.  If it's just randomly bizarre, or extreme, or improbably coincidental, it's not worthy of our attention.

With that in mind, today's True Thing, and the coincidental fallout:

• President Trump today cut off tariff negotiations with Canada over a TV ad, produced and aired by the Province of Ontario, that showed Ronald Reagan speaking negatively about tariffs.  (This is a whole other thing in itself).
• The first game of the World Series will be played in Toronto tonight,* watched by millions all around the world.**
• The 'Star Spangled Banner' will be played before the game.

What happens during that rendition of our national anthem - in a huge stadium populated mostly by Canadians - is anybody's guess.  My guess is it will include the word "Boo!!" and it won't be referring to Halloween.

* -  The Toronto Blue Jays are the only reason why the term "World" Series has any legitimacy at all, as flimsy as that is.

** - 15.2 million last year.

Priorities

 “Since you can no longer afford insurance that covers X-rays, I can instead show you the plans for the White House ballroom.”

                                                                                                                            The New Yorker, today

No Poetry Inside

 Can I just repeat a post I did in April?  I listen to a community radio station, where all the DJs are volunteers and they play whatever they want.  One has started his three-hour show each week, at least since April, with "Broken Truth" by Tim Grimm.  Each week, and we still hear it, reliably, at 9:30 AM on Monday.  I just finished listening to it.  Again.

Here are the lyrics that I posted in April.  Nothing's changed.    

Last verse:

 Nine years we’ve lived with sorrow, nine years we shook our heads

The Times they are a Changin’, and Honey in the Lion’s head

It’s time we lift the hammer and ring them bells instead.

It’s time we stamp these fires out and let the Peace be spread...

Chorus: 

    Don't it break your heart ? Cause it breaks my heart

    Damn that man who tears this country apart

    He's got no shame, got no soul

    Got no poetry inside to make him whole...

That's what we've been doing, isn't it?  Lifting the hammers - not to break or damage anything or anyone, but to ring them bells.  Not to set fires, but to stamp the fire out.  It's hard, though, to stay positive, constructive, hopeful.  Most revolutions were, in part, at least, violent.*

It still breaks my heart.

* - The Velvet Revolution in what was then Czechoslovakia is a notable exception.  Vaclav Havel and the Czech people created a peaceful transition from post-WWII Communist rule to a parliamentary democracy with free and fair elections.  Havel is a particular hero** of this half-Czech American.

** - No just because he was friends with Mick Jagger.