Jon Stewart on Food Stamp Recipients- Daily Kos

Wed Mar 05, 2014 at 05:35 AM PST

MUST-SEE: Jon Stewart BLASTS Fox News for attacking food stamp recipients

 VIDEO LINK;

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/03/05/1282278/-MUST-SEE-Jon-Stewart-BLASTS-Fox-News-for-attacking-food-stamp-recipients?detail=facebook

by BruinKidFollow

• 
  
• Tweet
• Email
• 61 Comments / 61 New

Last night, Jon Stewart tore in Fox News for their constant attacks on people who receive food stamps.

10/26/2011: NEIL CAVUTO: Bailouts from cradle to grave, Connecticut Democrats pushing for the government to pay for diapers for low-income families with babies.
NEIL CAVUTO GUEST #1: If they choose diapers, what's next?  Toothpaste?  Car seats?

(shocked audience laughter) If these poor children are safe and hygienic, how will we be able to tell the Dickensian street urchins from the normals?

Video and transcript below the fold.

So, we don't want food stamp recipients eating junk.  But we also don't want them taking our nice human food.  What's the right mixture of quality and class-based shame poor people should aim for in their meal planning?

STATE SENATOR TONY SMITH, R-MS (3/16/2013): Not very long ago, it was only for staple items, you know, your flour, your meats, those type of things.

Flour and meat!  Mmm.  Well, it looks like it's somebody's birthday!  (audience laughter)  Steal a ketchup packet from a local establishment, you got yourself a 3-course meal!  Meat porridge a la Hines!
Are there any other non-fish related problems?

HERMAN CAIN (3/11/2013): On my radio show, a guy called in who said he owns fitness centers. ... The government has even allowed food stamp recipients to use their cards for fitness training programs!

Oh... my... God?  Now far be it for me to criticize... former Republican presidential frontrunner Herman Cain.  But food stamps cannot be used for fitness training programs.  You're confusing food stamps with Medicare Advantage, or a couple of state Medicaid programs which provide vouchers for fitness.  I guess, because they think it might be cheaper than heart transplants or diabetes medicine. But food stamps are used for food.  It's a fact you can remember with this little mnemonic I use: FOOD.  It stands for Food stamps can only be used for food.  Oh.  Oh.  Dummy.  (audience laughter)  It's a simple mnemonic.
Is there anything else public assistance-wise that y'all have an issue with?

10/26/2011: NEIL CAVUTO: Bailouts from cradle to grave, Connecticut Democrats pushing for the government to pay for diapers for low-income families with babies.
NEIL CAVUTO GUEST #1: If they choose diapers, what's next?  Toothpaste?  Car seats?

(shocked audience laughter)
If these poor children are safe and hygienic, how will we be able to tell the Dickensian street urchins from the normals?

Other than, of course, their pockets bursting with government-provided crabbed legs?  (audience laughter and applause)
Obviously that pundit is coming off relatively unsympathetic.  Watch the rest of the panel remove the qualifier "relatively".

NEIL CAVUTO GUEST #2 (10/26/2011): If you can't afford these new-fangled diapers, what's wrong with going back to old school? ... The swaddling cloths were good enough for Baby Jesus, they're probably good enough for your baby too.

(shocked audience reaction) You know, it's like that bracelet I have.  WWJS.  Where Would Jesus Soil?

(audience laughter and applause)
Ultimately, it's about a philosophy, one that prizes self-sufficiency and despises government dependency.  Or to put that in fortune cookie terms:

SEAN HANNITY (6/25/2012): We want to teach people to fish, give them an opportunity, and not have them dependent on President Obama. STEVE DOOCY (9/25/2013): Ronald Reagan used to quote a famous Chinese saying where: if you give a man a fish, he eats for a day.  If you teach a man to fish, he eats for a lifetime.

You know what, finally we have some clarity.  I owe Fox an apology, they don't mind poor people eating seafood, as long as the poor people catch the seafood themselves.  Then obviously, it is a win-win.  Yes?

CLAYTON MORRIS (4/28/2013): I had a viewer write me this morning who worked at a bait shop, and so this person witnessed this person using food stamps to come in, buy bait to go and fish with.  Using food stamp money, taxpayer money to go and buy bait, to go out and bass fish.

I stand corrected!  (audience laughter)  For some fucking weird reason, they really do not want lower income individuals eating any seafood!  We'll be right back.

Jessica Williams then examined post-racial America.
Meanwhile, Stephen had a brief history lesson about Crimea, and looked at how neocons are attacking Obama over his response to the situation there.
Stephen then had a great segment tearing into Rep. Steve King (R-IA) for his latest stupid-ass comments about gay people, ending with Stephen asking all gay people out there to send King "proof" that they're gay, and flood his Congressional office with videos of themselves "proving" their homosexuality to King.  Oh boy.
Stephen talked with tech wizard Jaron Lanier, and Jon talked with Jim DeMint, which of course ran long.  Here's the unedited interview in three parts.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3

Originally posted to BruinKid on Wed Mar 05, 2014 at 05:35 AM PST.

Also republished by Daily Kos and Electronic America: Progressives Film, music & Arts Group.