A Delay In Food Stamps?

[Popular Front of Judea]

If this memo is legit it looks like we are reaching a tipping point with the government shutdown. We may very well be looking at a delay in food stamps and if the debt ceiling starts to kick in Social Security checks could be impacted. And of course this all happening as we are heading into Thanksgiving. This is so fucked.

Oh well let's talk about whether the Soviet Union circa 1938 was indeed a degenerated workers state yet again and whether goatees were permitted in Hoxha's Albania.

http://i.imgur.com/XjQZzd2.jpg

[Dennis the 'Bloody Peasant']

..I cannot imagine US citizens (those affected directly and those who see what's happening for the bullshit that it is) standing for this / forgiving it. There has to be a backlash, whether boots hit the streets or a punishment at the polls come election time. It will be interesting to see the fallout but hope shit gets sorted soon for the sake of those being hung out to dry while Senators and Representatives see who can piss the highest.

[Danielle Ni Dhighe]

My only income is social security disability payments, and I can only afford food thanks to food stamps. I'll be so screwed.

[Red Commissar]

I haven't heard anything about food stamps recently beyond the computer glitch issue which has just been posted here (http://www.revleft.com/vb/food-stamps-shoppers-t183971/index.html). That being said SNAP is administered through USDA which has been hit hard by furloughs so it wouldn't surprise me if the program has gotten to this point if the shutdown continues longer.

What doesn't help is on account of the furloughs the USDA site, and by extension the Food and Nutrition Service (FNS) which manages SNAP is down and they aren't putting anything out publicly. I've been trying to look around the internet to find some other coverage of this, but it's hard to find the occasional good story/blog buried in the midst of tea baggers claiming this is Obama's plot to incite a massive race war/riot. Or holier than thou suburban fucks complaining about waste/fraud when they've never been in a poverty situation in all likelihood.

[Loony Le Fist]

..I cannot imagine US citizens (those affected directly and those who see what's happening for the bullshit that it is) standing for this / forgiving it. There has to be a backlash, whether boots hit the streets or a punishment at the polls come election time...

Well whether you agree or don't agree with Che Guevara's methods, there are some of his words that come to mind.



Che Guevara:
Where a government has come into power through some form of popular vote, fraudulent or not, and maintains at least an appearance of constitutional legality, the guerrilla outbreak cannot be promoted, since the possibilities of peaceful struggle have not yet been exhausted.


Let me point out, that I personally don't advocate armed rebellion unless necessary against a direct threat. I'm using the quote in this context to point out that it's hard to get people to rebel (peacefully or otherwise) unless there is a combination of solidarity and education about the reality of how they are being exploited.

[cyu]

From http://www.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/1okkvs/foodstamp_program_shutdown_imminent_due_to/ccsvk3s

The Food stamp program does more to maintain the public order then the police, I shutter to think of what millions of desperate and hungry people are capable of.

http://www.technologyreview.com/view/425019/the-cause-of-riots-and-the-price-of-food/ (http://www.technologyreview.com/view/425019/the-cause-of-riots-and-the-price-of-food/)

[argeiphontes]

I've been watching MSNBC. Looks like there's going to be a deal. Cruz backed down.

[Loony Le Fist]

The Food stamp program does more to maintain the public order then the police, I shutter to think of what millions of desperate and hungry people are capable of.


Good article. The graph from it is striking in terms of demonstrating the coorelation between food prices, and riots.


http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/files/68282/Riots.png

In a sense, it almost makes one wonder if by getting rid of these programs it might help in inspiring some kind of revolution. However the question becomes what comes afterward?

[Popular Front of Judea]

I've been watching MSNBC. Looks like there's going to be a deal. Cruz backed down.

A) The deal if it goes through just permits the government th function -- at sequester levels -- through the holiday season. It ends January 15. It authorizes the debt ceiling until February 7.

B) It only goes through if it is voted on, and passed in the House.

[Creative Destruction]

A) The deal if it goes through just permits the government th function -- at sequester levels -- through the holiday season. It ends January 15. It authorizes the debt ceiling until February 7.

B) It only goes through if it is voted on, and passed in the House.

Well, it is certainly going to pass the Senate and there's a near certainty that it'll pass the House.

[Popular Front of Judea]

In a sense, it almost makes one wonder if by getting rid of these programs it might help in inspiring some kind of revolution. However the question becomes what comes afterward?

There may be some looting of grocery stores in certain depressed area but overall capitalist life would go on.

[cyu]

Cruz backed down.

http://static4.quoteswave.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/12/Power-never-takes-a-back-step.jpg

[argeiphontes]

^ Oh of course. I don't think he backed down for any other reason. There's a real interest on the part of the rich to avoid default, esp. in a financialized economy. The S&P500 is up after all.

edit: excuse me, 'plutonomy'.

[Red Commissar]

In a sense, it almost makes one wonder if by getting rid of these programs it might help in inspiring some kind of revolution. However the question becomes what comes afterward?

It's not that simple of a cause-effect. Upheavals have indeed been greatly influenced by food availability and prices in the past- even in the French Revolution this was a major factor. But it has to be related to other factors within the state itself and how much actual authority it has and the accommodation of different groups within its apparatus. Egypt and Tunisia, despite having pervasive repressive mechanisms which have weathered previous threats, grew to the point that the state itself was merely a self-contained bubble for kleptocrats and their associates with a complete disconnect with other segments in society. Egypt was still subsidizing petrol and bread prices even running up to the revolution, so it wasn't even a case of these programs having just been cut but being unable to do anything in the face of rising food costs because of inflation, or at least the state not seeming to care about it.

I don't see a revolutionary situation arising from the US in this kind of case unless we had a very major disruption of food supplies, and in such a event this'd be a global problem. At most you'd see some localized rioting and/or looting but the state would wait it out- the US state apparatus is able to absorb disturbances more robustly than some of the other states listed in the graph. An explosion of rage, but one not channeled into a solution.

But let's entertain this for a moment. In such scenarios as this it not even be what happens after but during and before- there is a reason why with these upheavals in the past years that socialist groups were often a minority if not nonexistent, while more conservative groups pushing populist promises got more prominent. They had a greater clout among the population through their organization and outside funding, and a tighter real, organic connection to them. This isn't even considering what influences outside events might have on the internal situation of a state. This has seemed to be the case among many of the nations listed there where this did turn into a full-blown insurrection, the notable ones being in the Middle-East and North Africa. Look at examples Tunisia, Yemen, Jordan, Bahrain Egypt, Libya, Syria who've all gone through this differently to begin with. Some have gone past them, some have been overturned, some have pushed back against it, some are holding out when neighbors folded.

Unstable situations do destabilize the state but this does not immediately translate into a revolutionary situation. Class consciousness doesn't build up like this (the labor situation in the US is utter shit and yet you do not see the level of strikes that France has which has relatively better labor laws)- there needs to be coherent movement among the working class that represents their interests rather than a piggybacking with a party that promises it will meet some of their demands once the officials are thrown out of office.

[Loony Le Fist]

Unstable situations do destabilize the state but this does not immediately translate into a revolutionary situation. Class consciousness doesn't build up like this (the labor situation in the US is utter shit and yet you do not see the level of strikes that France has which has relatively better labor laws)- there needs to be coherent movement among the working class that represents their interests rather than a piggybacking with a party that promises it will meet some of their demands once the officials are thrown out of office.

A lack of class consciousness seems to be pervasive in the US. That is definitely something that has to be overcome with good counter-propaganda.