Blackwell: 'Nothing More Christian' Than Food Stamp Cuts

September 25, 2013 by 30 Comments

Ken Blackwell, the far-right former secretary of state from Ohio and now a senior fellow with the Family Research Council, gleefully endorsed the House Republican bill to cut $40 billion out of food stamps over ten years, saying there is “nothing more Christian” than those cuts.

“I think through empowering others and creating self-sufficiency…there within lies the path to sense of worthiness,” Blackwell told CP. “When I was growing up, there was fundamental belief, that there were times in people’s life when they needed a hand up…there were temporariness to hose programs, where they were structured so that they didn’t breed so that they didn’t breed dependency.”

Blackwell also suggested that there was “nothing more Christian” than “not locking people into a permanent dependency on government handouts, but making sure they are participants in their own upliftment and empowerment so that they in fact through the dignity of work and can break from the plantation of big government.”

Ah yes, that old paradise lost myth. “When I was a boy, food stamps were a temporary thing.” Guess what? They still are for the overwhelming majority of recipients. He also says that the churches will make up the difference:

In contrast, Blackwell argued that charity, not policy, would be the driver that kept the poor fed.

“America is such a compassionate nation, nothing in history that suggests that churches and communities and our families would let people die of hunger, there is absolutely nothing,” said Blackwell.

Except that the numbers are nowhere close:

Cook’s biggest worry though, was that the food stamp cuts would offset the thousands of hours and dollars that these very church ministries spend annually supporting their communities through soup kitchens, bread lines, and food pantries.

“What churches do in terms of the kind of generous giving to poor, hungry people is amazing,” said Cook. “But their work is worth $4 billion dollars annually, which is essentially equal to the annual cut Congress is proposing in food stamps.”

Blackwell reads the wingnut’s Bible, where Matthew 25:35 says “For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat declared how Christian you were by making sure I didn’t have anything to eat.”

Filed Under: Budget and Taxes, Wingnuttia 30 Comments
About Ed Brayton

After spending several years touring the country as a stand up comedian, Ed Brayton tired of explaining his jokes to small groups of dazed illiterates and turned to writing as the most common outlet for the voices in his head. He has appeared on the Rachel Maddow Show and the Thom Hartmann Show, and is almost certain that he is the only person ever to make fun of Chuck Norris on C-SPAN.

  • zenlike

    They are not even trying to look at least vaguely humanoid any more are they?

  • Chiroptera

    …there were temporariness to hose programs, where they were structured so that they didn’t breed so that they didn’t breed dependency.

    I realize that there are exceptions, but generally when right wing nuts use the word “breed” they are talking about lazy black people.

    –

    …the plantation of big government.

    Holy shit!

  • http://www.gregory-gadow.net Gregory in Seattle

    It is not like Jesus gave away free healthcare or fed the poor or anything.

  • zero6ix

    “America is such a compassionate nation, nothing in history that suggests that churches and communities and our families would let people die of hunger, there is absolutely nothing,” said Blackwell.

    Except for all those times we let people die of hunger. But, honestly, we were just preventing them from being dependent on food.

  • http://www.gregory-gadow.net Gregory in Seattle

    Oh, and if we are going to quote Christian scriptures….

    And all who believed were together and had all things in common; and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed them to all, as any had need. — Acts 2:44-45

    There was not a needy person among them, for as many as were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of what was sold and laid it at the apostles’ feet; and distribution was made to each as any had need. — Acts 4:34-35

    It is so much fun to show Talibangelicals that Marx got the doctrine “From each according to his means; to each according to his needs” from the Apostles’ own example.

    As an exercise, I invite the curious to read Acts 5:1-10, about the penalty for being greedy.

  • Mr Ed

    Even if the Bible is the infallible word of the divine it is being read by a bunch of self centered bigots with a talent for rationalization. God said feed and cloth the poor they say this can be best done by doing nothing. Christ feed the masses they complained that lazy people spent all day listening to the son of God when they could have been working. If I look up sociopath Blackwell’s picture will be next to it.

  • Alverant

    Blackwell also suggested that there was “nothing more Christian” than “not locking people into a permanent dependency on government handouts, but making sure they are participants in their own upliftment and empowerment so that they in fact through the dignity of work and can break from the plantation of big government.”

    1) So he honestly believes that without foodstamps people will start working again?

    2) Since he believes religious charities will pick up the slack from the cuts he wants people to join the plantation of big church (which he thinks is an improvement for some reason)

  • Jordan Genso

    @7 Alverant

    Of course. If the government provides assistance to the poor, it creates dependency. So instead, we need to have churches provide assistance to the poor, because that will not create dependency. Because… well… just because.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1360322113 aaronbaker

    “Nothing more Christian than food stamp cuts,” said another servant of Mammon.

  • http://en.uncyclopedia.co/wiki/User:Modusoperandi Modusoperandi

    Unemployed people not having SNAP creates jobs. That’s just common sense.

    Charity provides about $4B in coverage currently. We’re cutting SNAP by $4B in the future. Ergo, somehow, they cancel out. That’s just common sense.

  • magistramarla

    I grew up on welfare, with a mother who was too physically and emotionally disabled to work.

    I endured a lot of physical and emotional abuse at her hands.

    I happened to be a good student and I listened to my teachers and applied for and received scholarships and grants which allowed me to go to a good college to escape from a bad situation.

    Thanks to those monthly food stamps, I didn’t have to also endure hunger as a child and young teen.

    Because of my experience, I would never, ever deny any child a chance at daily food and an education.

  • brucegee1962

    My first reaction to this was, “Oh, apparently Blackwell thinks that all of those children who are being fed by food stamps are a bunch of lazy loafers who ought to go out and find a job!”

    But then a deep chill fell on me, because it occurred to me that that’s what’s up next. In another few years, surely they’re going to start pushing to repeal child labor laws. “Look at the hungry children — how can you deny them the opportunity to work to support their familes?!”

    Plus that solves another big problem — our failing public schools. Surely they’d run so much better and cheaper if they didn’t have so many poor children attending them!

    I’m going to assign more Dickens to my students — if some people have their way, we’re going straight back to the 1850s.

  • bmiller

    There is a fundamental error in thinking here. Globalization, technology (automating more and more jobs), centralization (instead of thousands of local book shops, Amazon), etc. etc. How many “jobs” will there really be? Many of the jobs which can be exported or automated pay poverty wages. Most people on food stamps are working. Exactly how does this smug hypocritical bastard expect people to survive in the New Economy?

  • Akira MacKenzie

    Once again, the “No True Christian” fallacy rears it’s ugly head.

  • Akira MacKenzie

    Edit: …rear its ugly head…

  • Akira MacKenzie

    Sigh… I should just stop trying.

  • ShowMetheData

    “….there were temporariness to those programs, where they were structured so that they didn’t breed dependency.”

    He must be talking about the military????

    No?

  • http://www.facebook.com/den.wilson d.c.wilson

    “Family Research Council,” an organization advocating for polices that harm faimilies and proving once again that my theory that all wingnut groups are named ironically is true.

  • smrnda

    The problem is that plenty of people who are poor work; it’s just they don’t get paid enough to live without government benefits.

    I get sick of any swipe at ‘dependency’ – unless you’re living off the land somewhere in the wilderness, you are dependent on other people. The wealthy are dependent on their being proles to screw, but somehow that sort of parasitic dependency is considered good… but, poor people’s inability to make rich people pay them more or make jobs appear out of thin air is somehow ignored in the call to ‘responsibility.’

    Also, churches are in no position to handle this, and church ‘help often comes with strings attached. What right wingers hate about government aid is that it ISN’T so much a plantation – I was on disability, I got my aid, went to a Dr, and that was that. BUT wonderful non-government ‘private’ charity gets to pick and choose who really gets aid and what hoops you need to jump through, including requiring you actually participate in WORSHIP to get a tiny bit of help.

  • http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100000263140906 Donovan

    If you’re against both government aid AND raising the minimum wage, you are a monster. It’s that fucking simple. Either we demand that the companies that benefit from the labor of the working poor, as well as from the continued patronage of that same class (ahem, Walmart), pay a livable wage, or we tax those companies to support a fair form of government assistance capable of leading people out of poverty.

    You don’t get to send jobs overseas, pay wages 1/3 of poverty level and refuse to offer full time employment, send the cost of benefits skyrocketing for hourly employees, spill oil and fracking water all over the land, and tell US that WE need to take some responsibility. How are republicans buying this shit? How the fuck can they be so stupid?

    I’m not asking the rich to give over everything. I’m asking the rich to stop taking my money. I fucking earned it when I showed up to work and did they job they profited off of. Why do strikes work? Because the owners and executives don’t, and won’t.

    How is asking for a fair wage suddenly demanding a handout? FAIR wage! Fucking FSM!

    Sorry. This whole thing is pissing me off. [/rant] I feel better. Thanks =)

  • kantalope

    Seems y’all don’t understand modern christianinanity at all. If Jesus wanted these people to eat, then rocks would turn into bread. Rocks do not turn into bread; ergo Jezeus does not want them fed. It is logic people.

    And as you are sure to be aware – every cut in government services or taxes results in not only job creation but an angel gets his wings.

  • John Pieret

    I suppose the poor could pray for Jesus to come back and start passing out loaves and fishes again. Of course, he only had experience feeding five thousand people for one day, so he might be a bit hard pressed feeding 47+ million people all the time.

  • raven

    They are not even trying to look at least vaguely humanoid any more are they?

    Some of them get insulted when you call them vaguely humanoid toads. A simple “toad” will do.

    The vast majority of people on food stamsp are children (50%), the disabled, and the old. Who are also lazy, I guess.

    Blackwell: ‘Nothing More Christian’ Than Food Stamp Cuts

    This is true for the modern xians known as the fundies.

    A mean group of liars, haters, and hypocrites. You couldn’t expect anything better.

    PS If you look who gets food stamps, a lot of them are going to be fundies. They tend to be lower socioeconomic and live in out of the way places. Not all of them but many.

  • http://polrant@blogspot.com democommie

    A lot of fat, pissed-oof, old, white guys with gunz are prolly not goin’ after their social and economic betters. But, after the working poor kill all of them AND take their gunz, well, look out, Mr. Cheney.

  • scienceavenger

    I guess it would be entirely too demanding of the wingnuts to ask for a single study that supports their contention that giving people welfare saps their drive to be self-sufficient. They chant this mantra as if it were as established as the shape of the earth, when in fact it is typical speculedge – speculation pretending to be knowledge – from the “party of facts”.

  • freehand

    Mr. Blackwell can kiss my cat’s hairy atheist butt.

    About 100 million dollars in food stamps this year are going to families of active duty US military. Are they lazy? Jerk.

    I would never want a child to go hungry.

    In 2009, 4,425,000 jobs were lost before Obama took office. Did four million plus Americans just suddenly decide to live the life of Riley by kickin’ back on the ole in-law’s sofa, getting fat on food stamps? Really – all at once? After working five, ten, twenty years?!

    Freakin’ sociopathic wax-faced, coprophagic homonculus.

  • Matrim

    I’m reminded of a fellow student I dealt with in my Campaigns and Elections class. They were an early twenty-something conservative Catholic from an upper to upper-middle class household. They were always good for matter-of-factly stating ridiculous things as if they were reasonable. The one instance that stands out more than any other is when they said something along the lines of “government aid is bad because it makes Christians lazy and less likely to donate to charity.” I responded with “that sounds more like a problem with Christians than a problem with government aid.” They were not happy with that counterpoint…

  • Ex Patriot

    Religion in general Bah-Humbug. It all is useless waste of timeTo the previous poster please do ot insult the toads, move farther down he scale to lets say pond scum or lower..

  • abb3w

    I suspect Blackwell is more looking where the wingnut’s Bible highlights 2 Thessalonians 3:10 in giant type:

    For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: “The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.”

  • bushrat

    From now on I’m going to look at Fundies much like I look at parrots. A mildly interesting creature that can be trained to repeat phrases, but has no understanding of what those phrases mean. I’m pretty sure this guy has read or hear passages from the New testament, but he sure didn’t understand any of them.