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Friday, May 25, 2018

Paul Ryan Will Go Out Killing the Poor, 1 Mil off Food Stamps

Slate:

Paul Ryan has had three overarching goals during his political career: to cut taxes on the wealthy, to cut government spending on the poor and old, and to make the needy work if they want government help. Last year, the House Speaker finally checked the taxes bit off his Congressional bucket list. But his dreams of clipping the safety net have proven more elusive. The Obamacare repeal bill Ryan jammed through his chamber would have made the historic reductions to Medicaid that Republicans have been chasing for decades. But that effort died with a thumbs down from John McCain.
"At the end of 2017, Ryan made it clear he wanted Republicans to make one last effort at “welfare reform” before the midterms potentially swept them out of power. The point was not to save money, he insisted, but to do “workforce development.” This was his dry, bureaucratic euphemism for making more adults work in order to qualify for federal aid like food stamps. Some Republicans were skeptical of this “workforce development” plan—perhaps because literally taking lunch money from the poor seemed like a dubious election year strategy—but the White House said it was on board."
read more:

https://slate.com/business/2018/05/paul-ryan-is-trying-to-kick-a-million-people-off-food-stamps.html


Thursday, May 24, 2018

Midterms are in Putin’s cross hairs, ex-spy chief says

Politico:

James Clapper believes the Kremlin’s effort is active and even more complex than the 2016 meddling campaign.
By 
Not content with installing Donald Trump in the White House in 2016, Russian President Vladimir Putin is now revising his sophisticated meddling operation in order to outflank U.S. security agencies and tip the scales in the upcoming congressional midterm races, former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper told POLITICO on Wednesday.
Clapper made that assertion as part of a wide-ranging interview timed with the release of his memoirs about his 50-plus years in the U.S. intelligence community, “Facts and Fears: Hard Truths From a Life in Intelligence,” which he wrote with Trey Brown.
 
05/23/2018 07:56 PM EDT
 
Updated