DragonI

Replying to @realDonaldTrump

The twice divorced, thrice married, porn star raw dogging dumpster fire of an #IMPEACHED "president" is basically elevating himself to Jesus status. Thing is, Jesus was a dark Jewish dude. You are a blasphemous, Burnt Umber Beelzebub. You are also demented. Resign. #IMPOTUS

— Lesley Abravanel @lesleyabravanel

Impoverished children with access to food stamps become healthier and wealthier adults | Microeconomic Insights

Adults who participated in the Food Stamp Program, renamed the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) in 2008, as children are healthier and better off financially than poverty-stricken families who did not have access to the program, according to findings in joint work with Douglas Almond and Diane Schanzenbach (this paper and a companion paper Almond, et al. 2011).

microeconomicinsights.org

• SNAP’s positive impacts start before birth
• SNAP’s impacts persist through adulthood

Children with access were more likely as adults to graduate from high school, earn more, and rely less on government welfare programs as adults than impoverished children who did not have access to SNAP. 

Women, in particular, are substantially more likely to self-report they are in good health and are more economically self-sufficient in adulthood. 

individuals with access to food stamps before age 5 had measurably better health outcomes in adulthood with significant impacts for those in early childhood.

In 2012, SNAP lifted 4.9 million children out of poverty, and also lifted more than 2.1 million children out of deep poverty, which is defined as an income level less than half of the poverty line (Sherman and Trisi 2015). 

In addition, two-thirds of total SNAP benefits go to families with children. 

In terms of policy, it’s important to recognize that the benefits of SNAP not only include improved food security in the short-run, but the program also helps prevent negative, long-term, and lasting effects of deprivation during childhood, such as less education and earnings as adults, along with health problems like obesity, heart disease, or diabetes.

Because these individuals are healthier and more financially sound, the benefits also pay out to taxpayers. Healthier Americans leads to less cost when it comes to future health care for the average taxpayer. Additionally, by increasing self-sufficiency, SNAP today can reduce the future costs of safety net programs and also increase tax revenues in the long run.

Warnings That Millions More Could Go Hungry as Trump Pushes $4.5 Billion in Food Benefit Cuts

"The Trump administration's latest proposal to cut SNAP would leave millions of people, including struggling families, seniors, and people with disabilities, with less help putting food on the table."

www.commondreams.org

In its latest potentially devastating attack on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, the Trump administration on Tuesday unveiled a proposal that would slash food stamps benefits by $4.5 billion over five years, a move analysts warned would increase hunger for millions of low-income families.

The new plan, announced by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), would cut food benefits for nearly 20 percent of the millions of households that use SNAP to afford groceries.

"While some households would see a small increase in benefits under the proposal, nearly 1/5 of SNAP households would experience an average monthly benefit cut of $30 per month," Dean tweeted. "That can be days or weeks worth of groceries."

"The Trump administration describes its SNAP proposals as a means to 'modernize' SNAP, but they all would reduce benefits or eligibility," Dean added. 

"Americans struggling to put food on the table will be worse off if the administration's regulatory agenda for SNAP moves forward."

"Prosecutions for sex trafficking of children under a law used against financier Jeffrey Epstein last week are down 26.7 percent over the past fiscal year," TRAC reports. "This is the second year in a row that prosecutions for sex trafficking of children under [federal criminal law] have fallen—a reversal of the grown trend during the Obama years."

The New York Times reported last year that federal drug prosecutions in states near the border also dropped by 24 percent after the Justice Department announced its “zero tolerance” policy at the border, while prosecutions of illegal border crossings increased by 121 percent.

New Jeffrey Epstein accuser: He raped me when I was 15

Jennifer Araoz says she was recruited outside her New York City high school to provide sexual massages to the wealthy financier.

www.nbcnews.com

• Trump’s Attorney General Bill Barr will NOT recuse himself from Epstein’s child sex prosecution. Barr has known Epstein since the early 1970s.  Will Barr interfere as he did with the Mueller Investigation into Trump and Russia? #YouBetcha
• Trump’s Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta helped Epstein by ending an FBI investigation into Epstein’s sex-trafficking ring.  #PedophileIsland #ChildProstitution  #ChildRapist

Jennifer Araoz says she was 14 years old when a young woman approached her outside her New York City high school in the fall of 2001.

The woman was friendly and curious, asking Araoz personal questions about her family, her upbringing, their finances. Soon she began talking to Araoz about a man she knew who was kind and wealthy and lived nearby.

His name, the woman said, was Jeffrey Epstein.

"She was saying he's very powerful, he's very wealthy, he's a great guy," Araoz recalled. "He's almost like a fatherly figure to her, which had meaning for me at that time because I was maybe longing for that."

The first few times Araoz went to Epstein's Manhattan townhouse, all they did was talk, Araoz said, and the friendly woman came along. Araoz told him about her dream of becoming a Broadway actress and about her late father, who had died of AIDS when she was 12.

Before they left, Epstein gifted the woman who'd brought Araoz to the townhouse a brand new digital camera.

Epstein talked about donating money to AIDS charities, which struck a chord for her given her father's death, and wanting to help with her career.

Araoz would return to that room regularly over the next year, she said, manipulated into stripping down to her panties and giving Epstein massages that ended with him pleasuring himself to completion and her leaving with $300.

In the fall of 2002, Epstein pressured her to do more, Araoz said. He told her to remove her panties. Then he grabbed her 15-year-old body.

Epstein, Araoz said, ignored her pleas. She never returned to his home after that day and her life spiraled downward over the next several years as a result of the trauma, she said