If we are trying to break the cycle of poverty (and I think we should be) we need to qualify fewer prepared foods and spend the money saved on education. Shaun had some good points. Some people - both poor and better off - don't know squat about nutrition and how to cook. That's one reason we have so many overweight people in the US. Nutrition education should go hand in hand with nutritional assistance.
Unfortunately POP had a great point too, "The government is as much in the pockets of the agribusiness / processed-crap-masquerading-as-food industry as it is beholden to the ever-growing dependent class." Taxpayers are getting squeezed from both the consumers and producers of junk food, and between them I don't see legislators changing things much.

Excellent point, ought to be a mandatory requirement to qualify.

No doubt. So why then does the first lady catch unending **** when she tries to move on the disgusting crap we serve our kids in schools?

Food stamps, as well as other types of welfare, should be considered TEMPORARY assistance to provide only the ESSENTIALS to maintain a minimal and frugal lifestyle.

I consider anything beyond those definitions to be excessive.

We'll forget for a minute that she should be more concerned that SHE has enough junk in the trunk to fill three cabooooses.

As soon as they get the power to decide what kids can eat, they start deciding what kids CAN'T eat.
It stops being up the parents and the nanny state takes over. And that is always bad.

The idea of free school lunches is total commie BS but beside that fact, Who TF thought it would be a good idea to give these food nazis any power?

You've read the stories, mental "little people" administrators who went into education out of necessity, punishing kids because the big powerful grown-ups don't APPROVE of what a kid has in his or her sack lunch.

They wouldn't last long in the real world.

The whole food stamps/EBT thing is a big can o' worms.

Personally, I think it should be temporary, with restrictions on what you can buy, and not with a card so you can pretend you're not on the dole.

Interesting what you can buy with them: 11 Things You Didn

People like to think it's a liberal program, but it's not

Farm Bill Still Hanging: More Than 70 Groups Lobby on Food Stamps | OpenSecrets Blog

Food Stamps: More Benefit to Big Food Than to the Poor? | TIME.com

9 Big Companies That Benefit From Food Stamps

FYI, I voted.

Pretty sure I was the first vote because after the page reloaded it was Yes 1, No 0.

Fint was the one who passed judgment on notfarnows mothers decision to forego some other staple in order to give him at least one good day.

It's not the same as buying cakes, cookies, chips, smokes, and booze every trip.

Knowing how selfless moms tend to be she very likely gave up something she needed in order to give him a party.

Unenforceable... What you rich folk don't know is the low income crowd sell their food stamps for cash so they can but what the heck they want.

So... poor people are lazy AND working 2-3 jobs?

The problem with the first Lady's program is that it didn't distiguish between a 90 lb seventh grade girl, and a starting senior lineman on the football team, they both got the same amount of food on the plate, and then it was probably good for them, but not necesarily good to eat.

I can't survive on tuna pitas, carrott sticks, and a 1/2 pint of milk like the designers of the school program (thin, health conscous, women), and I don't expect poor/underpriveleged people to have to eat that stuff in small quantities either.

There is plenty of good food to fix in a grocery store without allowing them to buy chips, cookies, and other sugary, fattening things on the government's (our) dollars.

Making more rules solves nothing, they will buy beer with cash and use food stamps for what they can. Food stamps allows them to use their money on other things.

It's a checkbox list of factors that effect food purchase and preparation by the poor. Each person/family will be able to check off 1 or more boxes.

Some people are lazy. Some people work 2-3 jobs. They would not check both boxes.

It's a knee-jerk reaction from the right. Like Pavlov's dogs, they don't think when they see the name "Obama" they just start to slobber.

Almost anyone that has bought groceries has at some point been in line behind someone using a EBT or food stamps card. On one of my recent visits I was behind a well dressed lady that had a cart full of stuff and the checker rang it all up and THEN the customer whips out her EBT card. Of course the teller had to void the sale and start over because so much was not eligible for food stamps. She re-rang it and the lady pulled out a wad of cash to pay for the stuff that she could not get on the card. Of course the other lines were moving right along and the line I was in came to a stop.

She was finally done and I paid for my few items and was out the door right behind the lady. She was loading everything into a brand new car with temporary tags.

My tax dollars at waste.

It is possible she was buying food for her elderly mother, or that she had just replaced her old car after the old one was totaled in a wreck. There are many possibilities, but I suspect it was a low-life living large on the dole.

unfortunately you are correct.

We were on food stamps for a period of time when I was around 11 y.o. It was a booklet with $1-5 coupons that you tore out and used as cash, I think there was around $50 in coupons that you purchased for a lesser fee out of your assistance money. You had to try and get as close to the total amount when purchasing so that they weren't giving you a bunch of change in actual money that you would be able to spend on soda, cigs, etc. Man, I hated going to the store and using those.

I definetly don't think EBT should be used for Jack in the Box, McD's and other fast foods. I can go to the store and buy a whole roasted chicken, veggies and broth and make a big ass pot of soup in 20 min that will last 2-3 days. Total cost around $12. Nothing wrong with that.

As I drive by multiple commercial retail centers that sit empty I've always wondered about the feasibility of a Gov't run or contracted "EBT Store" that stocks Vegetables and ingredients that are nutritious and simple to prepare. No soda, no junk food. When you buy a can of soup, it may not be Campbell's Chunky, just a generic, no frills brand.

The reason you see EBT Accepted Here signs in front of fast food restaurants and liquor stores is exactly because it IS a liberal program. It is a huge government pork program that is lobbied by big business such as the food packaging companies, grocery and retail giants, and the government mandated organizations that are supposed to regulate Ag production. Make no mistake, all of this is orchestrated quite purposefully by your elected representatives. You don't see farmers driving their pickups to the Capitol to testify. You see lawyers and lobbyists who were put there by government to do the bidding of government.

I lived for a time in Frazier Park, a mountain community in North L.A. County. Lots of welfare people up there. I'd be in line buying beer at the small liquor store after a hard day of work and there would always be a small group of 20-25 y.o., pierced and tatted up (usually a few fresh tats in the group), toting some snotty kids (must have had them at 16). They'd cash their welfare check, buy junk food, root beer and ice cream with EBT, and pay cash out of the welfare for beer and cigs. They were usually jacked up on meth or weed. These aren't assumptions, these people were trash.

She clearly didn't understand the system, so she was either new to it or shopping for someone else.

So the bleeding heart liberals secretly own the big corporations that lobbied for universal EBT acceptance?