Walmart’s Food Stamp Scam Explained in One Easy Chart

Walmart, the nation’s most profitable corporation, may also be the greatest beneficiary of the taxpayer-funded Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), commonly referred to as food stamps.

But how has Walmart managed to make so much money off of taxpayers? For the short answer, take a look at the chart below where we’ve illustrated the scam. For the long answer, keep reading.

Step One: Pay your employees so little that they are forced to rely on food stamps to survive.

Even at Walmart’s definition of a full-time job, an employee earning the company’s average wage of $8.81/hour makes just $15,500 per year, placing them well below the federal poverty line for a family of four. With such low wages, even when working full-time hours, many associates are forced to depend on taxpayer-funded assistance such as food stamps and Medicaid to survive. In other words, Walmart is shifting responsibility onto the public for ensuring their associates’ basic needs are met. One study showed that a single Walmart can cost taxpayers anywhere from $904,542 to nearly $1.75 million per year, or about $5,815 per employee for these programs all because one of the world’s most profitable retailers is paying substandard wages and benefits. A more recent report by Americans for Tax Fairness revealed that Walmart’s reliance on programs like food stamps cost federal taxpayers an estimated $6.2 billion a year.

The rest: http://www.jwj.org/walmarts-food-stamp-scam-explained-in-one-easy-chart

It's FRIDAY PUPPY FIX Time! Git yer tails a waggin'!

Ran into a Republican today...

Christian ‘prophet’ loses his buttocks to a hungry lion while trying to prove God would save him

Alec Ndiwane was filled with the Holy Spirit when he decided to “challenge” lions at the Kruger National Park.

The Zion Christian Church Prophet was at the park with his fellow church members when, according to GhanaWeb, he went into a trance and began speaking in tongues. The group approached the pride of lions while they munched happily on an antelope, but that’s when Ndiwane ran toward the lions.

Out To Africa lists humans as the major predator to lions, so it’s no surprise that the lions took on the challenge. Once he realized what was happening, Ndiwane made an about-face and immediately ran away. Unfortunately, lions are fast and fierce animals and when one of the lions snapped her paws on him, Ndiwane sustained injuries to his buttocks.

The ranger fired his gun into the air to scare the lions off and rush the prophet to the hospital where he underwent emergency surgery to ensure he didn’t lose a majority of his buttocks.

“I do not know what came over me,” Ndiwane confessed. “I thought the Lord wanted to use me to show his power over animals. Is it not we were given dominion over all creatures of the earth.” He was eventually stitched up and discharged after spending the night in hospital.

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/03/christian-prophet-loses-his-buttocks-to-a-hungry-lion-while-trying-to-prove-god-would-save-him/comments/

Kasich ad: "He'll do for Michigan what he's done for Ohio."

This is my crack, baby!

Hateful Twitter nutters use Nancy Reagan’s death to bash First Lady Michelle Obama

Former First Lady Nancy Reagan visits the White House on June 3, 2009. Official White House Photo by Samantha Appleton

With the advent of Twitter, the death of any controversial figure immediately leads to both condolences and insults directed at the dearly departed, and the passing of former First Lady Nancy Reagan was certainly no exception.

While there are more than a few rude comments directed at the wife of former President Ronald Reagan, her death also prompted some conservatives to lash out out at current First Lady Michelle Obama.

Fox News host Charles Gasparino went a step further blasting President Barack Obama for not immediately issuing a statement on the former first lady, writing, “fitting: no comment yet from @POTUS on nancy reagan’s death because he’s on a golf trip.”

Michelle Obama, however, was the main focus on a day for some when most Americans — both conservative and liberal — paid condolences to the Reagan family.

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/03/hateful-twitter-nutters-use-nancy-reagans-death-to-bash-first-lady-michelle-obama/comments/

This coming Tuesday is election day here in Michigan... And the Scorpios are registered to vote.

Here in the primaries, you can only vote for one party or the other and, of course, we're both voting for a Democrat... Period.

Who that Democrat will be... I'm not telling. I'm not interested in this internecine war that the Dems are waging right now. Because when it comes to November, I would happily vote for ONE OR THE OTHER. The way I see it, both of our choices have more in common than they do have not in common, despite what their most fervent supporters have to say.

If you've known me all of these years, you would know that I hate Republicans more than I even like Democrats. I know who my demons are and they are a far better improvement over RWNJs.

My concern is more with the country than any certain politician, because I know that the powers that be will still be around no matter who the president will be. I know that we're all co-opted in ways to put oligarchs in charge because they've convinced too many of us to make their interests our own. It's not like we can divorce ourselves from our cars, our loans, our food, the electrical grid and the way those things are provided to us, without creating some sort of general upheaval and subsequently, a backlash. But most importantly, it's going to take way more than picking a president to change any of that, if we want to revolutionize these things for the better. Our political process is too entrenched, too disconnected, too convoluted, too dependent on too much money, too susceptible to silly nonsense, too absent of voter savvy and too vacant of voter interest to create the sort of sea change that so many people are expecting from any ONE politician. (My answer is to engage in more of an effort to fix fucking Congress and to never let up trying to force issues even in years WITHOUT elections. But that's a conversation for another time.)

IF you want a revolution, you need to expect it to be a big one... And big revolutions are rarely pretty.

Picking your choice IS an extremely important one, but it's only the least of things that can be done. America will always be America. And the main problem with this concrete fact, whether we like it or not, is that America's wealth, power, influence and hunger creates mayhem, especially when it's subjected to unwanted change. American foreign and domestic policy will always take questionable turns regardless the party in charge.

No one can dispute that that those turns will be more questionable when taken by Republicans than by ANY Democrat. I don't care how much anyone hate's the other Dem opponent... I know that Democrats aren't perfect. But goddammit, the GOPers are all crazy and incompetent. No matter who you plan to vote for, because of how America is organized and what our long term interests are, chances are pretty good that you'll stand to be disappointed at some point in their term of office by some action taken by the person that you're now supporting. Quite frequently, inhabitants of the Oval Office are given ONLY two choices, bad and worse.

This is the sad fact about the country we're all living in: Situations will invariably render unfavorable decisions by leaders, politics will be politics no matter what and voters are usually far too few and far too uniformed to outgun powerful and protracted interests. Wealth and power has spent a lot of time, effort and money on the institutions that protect them, because those protections work. No one president will ever have the power to sweep them away, especially when there's an entire other party and their electorate to oppose that president, even for mostly stupid reasons.

Now, if you're not hearing me right now, that's alright. It really doesn't matter to me, simply because I'll still vote for your candidate anyway in November without a qualm. Just remember that I'm only interested in outcomes... Winning, to me, is the ONLY thing.

My only expectation is for YOUR choice (whomever that will be) to win this god-damned primary, so we can ALL go kick GOPer ass come the general election. Now, if you want me to vote for your choice in November, just make sure that you get your choice on that ballot as the Democrat.

It's as simple as that.

When the relationship goes to the next level...

Fans...