Welfare and Food Stamps

A two-fer - first from The Washington Post:

In Florida, a food-stamp recruiter deals with wrenching choices
A good recruiter needs to be liked, so Dillie Nerios filled gift bags with dog toys for the dog people and cat food for the cat people. She packed crates of cookies, croissants, vegetables and fresh fruit. She curled her hair and painted her nails fluorescent pink. �A happy, it�s-all-good look,� she said, checking her reflection in the rearview mirror. Then she drove along the Florida coast to sign people up for food stamps.

Her destination on a recent morning was a 55-and-over community in central Florida, where single-wide trailers surround a parched golf course. On the drive, Nerios, 56, reviewed techniques she had learned for connecting with some of Florida�s most desperate senior citizens during two years on the job. Touch a shoulder. Hold eye contact. Listen for as long as it takes. �Some seniors haven�t had anyone to talk to in some time,� one of the state-issued training manuals reads. �Make each person feel like the only one who matters.�

And the back-story:

In fact, it is Nerios�s job to enroll at least 150 seniors for food stamps each month, a quota she usually exceeds. Alleviate hunger, lessen poverty: These are the primary goals of her work. But the job also has a second and more controversial purpose for cash-strapped Florida, where increasing food-stamp enrollment has become a means of economic growth, bringing almost $6 billion each year into the state. The money helps to sustain communities, grocery stores and food producers. It also adds to rising federal entitlement spending and the U.S. debt.

Emphases mine. I was in favor of Governor Rick Scott -- seemed to be a stable conservative but this is beyond the pale. Pulling a gimmie for federal funding without any consideration of the damage being done to the national debt. The second item is from the Boston Herald:

Tamerlan Tsarnaev got Mass. welfare benefits
Marathon bombings mastermind Tamerlan Tsarnaev was living on taxpayer-funded state welfare benefits even as he was delving deep into the world of radical anti-American Islamism, the Herald has learned.

State officials confirmed last night that Tsarnaev, slain in a raging gun battle with police last Friday, was receiving benefits along with his wife, Katherine Russell Tsarnaev, and their 3-year-old daughter. The state�s Executive Office of Health and Human Services said those benefits ended in 2012 when the couple stopped meeting income eligibility limits. Russell Tsarnaev�s attorney has claimed Katherine � who had converted to Islam � was working up to 80 hours a week as a home health aide while Tsarnaev stayed at home.

In addition, both of Tsarnaev�s parents received benefits, and accused brother bombers Dzhokhar and Tamerlan were recipients through their parents when they were younger, according to the state.

So he hated Western culture but didn't feel 'stained' by taking from it. Hypocrite -- I hope that he is enjoying his 72 white grapes of exceptional purity. I always liked this piece from The Onion. Go there and read and remember.