Need help debunking/countering please re: TANF and work requirements

[reflection]

Am getting drilled by RW idiot who apparently is concerned about the whopping 2% of the federal budget that goes to food stamps and such. He's telling me that Obama is rescinding the "welfare to workfare" aspect of TANF without congressional approval.

I've tried telling him that he's the one that chirps every day about how there are no jobs under Obama, and wouldn't it be unfair to drop someone off the food stamp rolls that literally has no job to find, but I would prefer to outright pummel his larger argument.

Is he pretty much full of shit? I've researched it to some degree but everything I find is basically op-ed pieces and that's not very useful. If someone has a good working knowledge of TANF and what Obama has done/is doing with respect to it I would appreciate a primer. Thanks.

[Firebrand Gary]

1. See this thread by Apples and Oranges.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10021047351

[reflection]

2. Thanks.

I'm actually in that thread, and rec'd it as well, but it doesn't really address the nuts and bolts of TANF (unless I missed it). What I drew from that thread was that assistance isn't exactly allowing people to live large. I'll go look at it again just in case.

I really wanted to skewer this guy I'm sparring with on the actual claim that Obama is doing away with the work requirement and just giving people handouts to do nothing. Whether I get him on the factual nature of his argument or the reasoning behind Obama's thinking, I don't care.

[mercuryblues]

3. idiots as usual

I usually start with this reply.

States receive a block grant from the federal government, with guidelines. Each state in return set up their Tanf eligibility, within those guidelines. If you have a problem with how the federal government applies TANF benefits, you are misplacing your outrage. Send your complaints to your LOCAL government.

As far as I can tell the Obama admin has decided to block grant the welfare to work program back to the states. The states must achieve certain results, to maintain the grant. The states can also receive waivers for some parameters, if they come up with a better plan to implement. Again they must achieve certain results.

So what part of a STATE controlling how they run their state programs you don't like? I thought your party was all about a state's right and authority?

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/19/obama-administration-defends-change-to-welfare-to-work-program/

[reflection]

4. Perfect!

Thank you so much. This is exactly what I was looking for. I owe you one, sir/madam.

[mercuryblues]

7. You are more than welcome

It is easy enough to debunk any welfare/TANF claims with the reply that the state has the right to make eligibility requirements and implement it. That usually shuts them up. Some go on to insist that they see and know people who are abusing the system .

My standard reply to that is twofold. I tell them to google the welfare abuse hotline for their state and report them.

I then ask why are they so against helping a poor family have shelter and food, when corporations like wal-mart garner millions [if not billions] of profit each year, yet get taxpayer subsidies on their taxes owed and tax payers build roads for them? Did you know that wal-mart employees take home so little pay that a good percentage of them qualify for Medicaid and tanf? So in essence companies like walmart are double dipping into tax payers pockets.Walmart is not the only company that uses these practices, but they are the most egregious.

Why do you have a problem with a person who on average receives about $425 a month in welfare benefits, but it is okay by you for multi billion dollar companies to get millions of dollars a year of tax payer money? Who is really cheating the system here? I say start investigating the million dollar frauds first; then worry if a single mother is cheating the tax payer out of a few hundred a year, or not.
that is always follwed by complete silence.

[reflection]

8. That was the tack I was taking,

asking him why he was so worried about someone getting a free meal, as we shovel incomprehensible amounts of money into the enormous military industrial complex and corporate welfare. His stock answer was that those entities provide public services and "don't sit around doing nothing."

I told him he's got to get rid of this mindset that all welfare and foodstamp recipients sit around doing nothing, that most of them are either children, elderly or simply cannot find work. Only a tiny percentage are gaming the system. But no, he scorns the poor. If only those poor sons of bitches would make better choices, they wouldn't be poor! Bastards! How dare they choose to be poor instead of being wealthy!

[mercuryblues]

9. that is why

I point out that walmart employees earn so little money that they qualify for benefits and compare it to the benefits that walmart recieves from the tax payer. double dipping into the tax payer pocket.

A very good article that explains it even further. I never source to this article, but google the points I want to make and use other sources. That way I can avoid the 'liberal spin' claim.


http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Corporate_Welfare/WalMart_Welfare.html

[teach1st]

5. Further ammo

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/us/politics/welfare-to-work-shift-angers-republicans.html?_r=1

State support of waivers is not a new phenomenon. In 2005, 29 Republican governors, including Mr. Romney and Mr. Huckabee, asked Senator Bill Frist, the majority leader, for more “flexibility to manage their TANF programs and effectively serve low-income populations.”

“Increased waiver authority, allowable work activities, availability of partial work credit and the ability to coordinate state programs are all important aspects of moving recipients from welfare to work,” the letter read.

Peter B. Edelman, a professor at the Georgetown University Law Center and director of the Georgetown Center on Poverty, Inequality and Public Policy, called Republican opposition to the waivers “totally ridiculous.”

“This is an advisory that is all about making it easier to get a job, which I thought is what the Republicans wanted,” Mr. Edelman said. “To say that this is somehow against the concept of TANF is bizarre, because what we have here are restrictions that Congress enacted that, on the ground, make it harder to get from here to there.”

[reflection]

6. Outstanding!

I just delivered a smackdown of epic proportions. And more importantly, I understand it myself better. I try to argue to learn, not to win. Thanks to everyone who responded.

[sinkingfeeling]

10. Here is where that's coming from. And then there is the fed document on the subject.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/18/us/politics/welfare-to-work-shift-angers-republicans.html



WASHINGTON — A move by the Obama administration to give states more latitude in running federal welfare-to-work programs has set off a firestorm among Republicans, who say it undercuts the work requirements set forth in the 1996 overhaul of welfare policy.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced last week that it would grant states waivers to experiment with how they administer the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which distributes aid to the poorest Americans while they look for work.

The directive results from a broader effort by the Obama administration to peel back unnecessary layers of bureaucracy and allow states to spend federal money more efficiently. But Republicans, who characterize the move as a power grab by the executive branch, have criticized the waivers, saying they prove that the president and Democrats support providing welfare money without encouraging the recipients to find work.


http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/opre/other_resrch/tanf_ccdf/reports/work_requirements.pdf

[reflection]

11. A minor victory (update)

I actually got him to say that Todd Schnitt (his "source" on this, good lord) was wrong in the way he painted it. He said, "this actually sounds like a promising idea, though I have concerns about its implementation."

He also said that he probably needs to do more reading and less listening to talk radio. He was a little embarrassed that he had been lied to about something he was trumpeting so hard.

While he is still carrying the water for the RW, I will consider this a minor victory. He actually took a step backward, admitted he was wrong. I'll consider the weak "concerned about implementation" an attempt to save face.

But hey, he's thinking! And that's a good thing. Maybe in time he can be turned. Maybe.

[mercuryblues]

12. congrats!

when you get them to realize that they have been duped once, they do question any further info the talking head spouts. Unfortunately they tend to backslide after a week or so and go back to an unthinking follower. So keep on him.

I too have concerns on its implementation, however not for the same reasons.

The republicans are very vocally misrepresenting this plan. Which tells me that they will make sure it fails. The quickest way to ensure that is by fraud and embezzlement. Instead of making this a state/private venture with oversight, the red states will award their political donors with contracts and no oversight. Money will be siphoned off and/or work not done. Kickbacks and campaign donations made. No oversight and no investigations into why it failed. Certainly no perp walk.

If I read the articles correctly if goals are not met, the federal government can take back control. But who loses in the meantime? Certainly not the politician or their cronies. They have made millions and shipped that money into private accounts.

[Bluerthanblue]

13. WOW not a minor victory imo-

Kudos to you for sticking with it, and for giving him the facts in a way that he could actually hear you, and not stay stuck in his ignorance.

It isn't easy-

[reflection]

14. Everyone upthread deserves that applause.

Not me. But I certainly appreciate it, thanks. DU is so good for stuff like this.

Which reminds me, I need to donate this evening when I get home.

[Bluerthanblue]

15. yes they do, but you took the time to ask

and follow up. I agree DU is an incredible place.
Long may it live!