Last week, Tom Philpott wrote a really interesting article over at Mother Jones, People on Food Stamps Make Healthier Grocery Decisions Than Most of Us. It references a number of studies that back up this claim. And it isn’t surprising. I know when I’m hungry, the last thing I want is a candy bar. Those are things that people buy when they have the rest of their nutritional needs taken care of.

The fact that we assume that poor people eat poorly is just like assuming that African Americans smoke more cannabis, “I knew this black guy and all he did was smoke pot!” Of course, African Americans actually use cannabis a bit less than whites. But once a stereotype is formed, people filter data so it fits the narrative of the stereotype. I’m sure we’ve all seen people purchasing junk with a SNAP card. But that proves nothing. And think about it: is it something so common that you don’t even notice it? Or is it something that is rare enough that it sticks out? In my case, it is the latter.

What’s more, the issue is not whether people on food stamps are perfect consumers. The question is whether they are reasonable consumers. And the studies indicate that they are better than average. But an even better question is why we are so hung up on the issue at all. Philpott correctly noted, “No one denies me the occasional candy bar or Coke; why would I feel entitled to exert that kind of control over poor people?” Don’t worry: I am well aware what most people would say in response to that, “Because they aren’t paying!”

Except: that isn’t true. I’m so tired of this ridiculous notion that people have about government programs. Every person on Social Security claims that they deserve their benefits because they paid. But then they will claim that poor people didn’t pay for their SNAP benefits. That’s a total distortion of reality. We all pay taxes to the government and we all get benefits from the government. That’s how it works. And a rich person is being served by the safety net just as a poor person is, the same way people with insurance — whether healthy or sick — are being served by it.

The main thing about welfare in the United States is that we want to make the poor feel bad about any help that they are getting. When we help more affluent people, we don’t do that. In fact, we go out of our way to hide the fact that they are even getting welfare. Every year, the government pays my sister thousands of dollars toward her house in the form of the mortgage interest deduction. Yet my sister — and maybe even you, if you haven’t been reading me regularly — doesn’t think of this as welfare. And why should she? The program is designed so that people like my sister don’t feel that they are getting a handout.

But a handout they are getting! As I discussed a couple of years ago in Fixing the Unfair Mortgage Interest Deduction, this welfare program costs the federal government $70 billion per year. This is roughly the same price as the entire SNAP program. People who want to micromanage the nutrition of food stamp recipients really need to ask themselves why they don’t want to micromanage the housing choices of people who are benefiting from the mortgage interest deduction.

Really, it all comes down to the fact that people getting food stamps are poor. Now I don’t think that the average American looks down on the poor any more than they look down on African Americans. But it is now embarrassing for people when they explicitly talk about African Americans as if they were lower forms of life. But there are no norms that stop people from speaking about the poor as though they are lesser people or children who must be taught the basics of life. In fact, we seem to be going in the opposite direction. The Ayn Rand belief that capitalism is perfect and gives people exactly the amount of money they are worth is usually presented as in, “Mark Cuban deserves his billions.” But the other side of that is even worse, “The poor deserve their poverty.” And that’s something that you can hear any day on Fox News or CNBC. It needs to stop.

On Thursday, Jonathan Bernstein made a good point, Democrats Have No Bench? Be Serious. He’s been making the case that people should lay off the criticism of Hillary Clinton. A lot of people are making this assumption that Clinton is just being given the Democratic nomination for president out of some feelings of duty on our part — rather than her having earned it. The truth is that she would be the presumptive nominee regardless. But her four years as Secretary of State sealed the deal. As a result of that, there aren’t people lining up to run for the nomination. His point is that there are plenty of really qualified (And exciting!) Democrats to run.

But I’m focused on who the Republicans are running. Bernstein lists what he and most everyone else consider to be the top tier candidates: “Scott Walker, Marco Rubio, John Kasich, and Bobby Jindal.” Are we really supposed to think that these are great candidates? The only one on that list that strikes me at all interesting in a general election is John Kasich. Walker is exciting to the press because billionaires love him. Rubio continues to come off like a 12-year-old playing at being a Senator. And Jindal is destined to be the Herman Cain of of this election.

The fact that the Republicans think that a third Bush is their best route to the White House should be some indication of how desperate the party is. And he is the only person they have that dates from a time when the Republicans can claim to have been somewhat reasonable. And this is the guy who had a law passed so he could take control of the healthcare decisions of one particular woman. And he is the main “adult” that the Republicans have to run in 2016. That’s pathetic.

It makes me wonder just what it means to be a serious candidate for president. It seems that all it means is that the mainstream media take you seriously. There is a kind of tautology here where a candidate is serious because she is serious: the media take her seriously because the media take her seriously. And along with that is the media’s disinterest in anything substantial about a candidate. I keep coming back to Todd Akin, but his example is telling. Everyone knew that he was an abortion absolutist. But when he said the wrong words, the media decided that he was beyond the pale. And like the good social animals we are, many people just followed along.

At this point, does anyone really question but that Al Franken would make a perfectly good presidential candidate? He’s one person who Bernstein mentioned but who no one talks about. But it really doesn’t matter. If Clinton drops out or implodes, the vacuum will be filled with at least a few good candidates. In the end, it’s all going to come down to the economy in 2016. None of the Republican candidates pose a special problem, just like Ronald Reagan posed no special problem in 1980. It’s the economy, stupid.

It is hard to be a defender of Venezuela in this country. I find that I constantly have to add caveats to what I say. Because the truth is that Venezuela has real problems. And it is hardly perfect when it comes to human rights and press freedom. The problem is, it is so much closer to perfection than it is to the despotic hellscape that is portrayed in US media. And that’s probably the main reason that I defend Venezuela: it is the best example I know of to show what lapdogs the press is in this country.

Glenn Greenwald wrote a good article earlier this week that highlights the problem, Maybe Obama’s Sanctions on Venezuela Are Not Really About His “Deep Concern” Over Suppression of Political Rights. It is in direct response to the new sanctions against Venezuela that are based upon the country being “an extraordinary threat to the national security” of the United States. That’s just too pathetic. I’m always amazed that countries like Venezuela are both about to crumble because they don’t show our corporations enough love and so powerful that they will destroy the US. Of course we know what the problem is: our government just doesn’t like Venezuela because its government doesn’t do what our government wants.

But good luck finding a mainstream source that will do anything but parrot back official US policy about Venezuela. Or, as Greenwald noted, Saudi Arabia. If there were anything objective about which countries the US likes and doesn’t like, we wouldn’t even be talking to Saudi Arabia. This is Saudi Arabia:

But this is nothing compared to Venezuela having a state run television network and generally being suspicious of the “independent” media who were involved in the most recent coup against the democratically elected government in Venezuela. Yes, I know there are worse things that have been done by the regime. But there is no doubt if the coup had been successful and the US liked the government, Venezuela could do far more and the United States — most especially its media — would be just fine with it. Any criticisms would be countered with apologetics, just as I can easily provide an apologia for the current regime in a single word: coup.

Here is Greenwald on this issue:

The main thing, however, is that even among liberals, it is hard to find defenders of Venezuela. And it’s strange. Somehow, because Venezuela is an official enemy of the American power elite, it’s wrong to defend Venezuela unless it is perfect. Meanwhile, most liberals stand silent as Saudia Arabia is presented as some bastion of freedom in the Middle East. Regardless, the US government shouldn’t be able to get away with claiming that Venezuela is a threat to us. But it isn’t even questioned. Undoubtedly, the people of Venezuela deserve a better government. But the government that we want to give them would be much worse. And if we continue to do everything we can to destroy the democratically elected government in Venezuela, it has no incentive to become more of what I would like it to be. Of course, our government — and the media that supports it — have no interest in that happening; they all just want a government in Venezuela that supports our power elite.

Afterword

You should also read Mark Weisbrot’s great article, Obama Absurdly Declares Venezuela a Security Threat:

See also: Venezuelan Protests Get Usual US Media Treatment

Paul Krugman wrote a good article in which he came out against the trade agreement, TPP at the NABE. Basically, he makes the same arguments that I’ve been making: there is already free trade and this is mostly about enhancing support for intellectual property law enforcement. He estimates that even a 0.5% increase in global incomes is probably a major exaggeration. This deal is not going to do much for the economy. So you have to ask why it is there is so much interest in the Obama administration and elsewhere in the American political system in favor of this deal.

I think it is the same as it was during the Bush administration and all the talk of drilling oil on federal land in Alaska. At the time, everyone understood that it would have a negligible effect on the oil supply and thus prices in the world and specifically in the US. People wanted to do it because it meant a whole lot of money to the corporations doing the drilling. A billion dollars is nothing in the US — much less the world — economy. But it is a huge amount of money for a company. And that’s why the Bush administration cared about the project: it was good for their friends.

The same thing is going on here. Pharmaceutical companies and Hollywood studies are looking at huge gains from this deal. People will claim that we must do this to incentivize “innovation!” But that’s not true. For one thing, as Dean Baker talks about all the time, there are other (And better!) ways to incentive creative work. Regardless, this is about trying to extract ever higher rents from work these companies have already done. We are not going to get more or better movies as a result of this deal. And even if we got more from the pharmaceutical companies, what would it be? Yet another erectile dysfunction drug?

I have a more fundamental problem with this and all other “trade” deals: in our current economic environment, little gain is going to go to workers. So even if this deal was going to increase average incomes by 50%, what would it matter when 93% of it went to the top 1% and the rest went the next 9%? And that is what will happen. That is the way that the economy is set up. Given that the lower classes don’t share in prosperity, why should we be in favor of deals that increase the prosperity of the already prosperous?

Here’s an idea: maybe the Obama administration could use some of its political capital to work on things like a higher minimum wage, given that that is what an increasing number of college graduates makes? Or perhaps some effort could be put into strengthening unions? We could start just by enforcing the laws that are still on the books. But there are other things we could do as well like card check and repealing these awful Orwellian “right to work” laws. But for some reason, there isn’t intense interest about this kind of thing — even from Democrats.

I say we make a decision right now: no more “trade” agreements — not even negotiations — until America starts working for Americans. If Hillary Clinton wants to prove to me that she ought to be president, she could start by talking about this. But my expectation is that she is going to be even worse than Obama and her husband were. They all know that these deals work because, “A rising tide lifts all the yachts of my friends!” No more trade deals.