Maybe I’m too sympathetic to conservative causes, but I find it difficult to support a government welfare program that essentially is killing people. SNAP provides a modest benefit to the very poor who otherwise would go hungry but it also encourages bad eating habits that are leading to diabetes, heart disease, kidney failure and early death. Expensive complications whose health coverage is picked up by tax dollars. Top purchases on SNAP include meats, often hamburger, soda and processed food. Things wrapped in excessive glossy plastic packaging. Hamburger Helper will a glass of soda might temporarily forestall hunger but it’s killing the body. There are no restrictions on SNAP besides it must be food or an artificial food “product”, can not be alcohol or tobacco or warm when purchased. But it can be fully prepared like a hot pocket or TV dinner, ready to be tossed in the microwave and then the packaging in the dumpster.
For women with infants and young children an enhanced benefit is available known as WIC. Unlike SNAP, it is a comprehensive nutrition program, that covers specific foods that have been determined to be healthy for infants and young children to avoid health complications due to malnutrition during infancy. It’s a good program, hardly controversial. But it as retailers and farmers note, much more complicated to administer as and a lot fewer retailers accept WIC. Would farm stands and farmers markets accept SNAP if they had to go through the limitations and paperwork of WIC? I would argue they should exempt direct to consumer sales like farmers markets from lists of healthy foods.
Big retailers and even corner stores could accept a SNAP like WIC program. But many object – especially the corner stores which have lower sales and it can be difficult to keep fresh fruit and vegetables fresh. One option might be frozen fruits and vegetables. Other small retailers say they don’t use bar codes and tracking individual purchases would be impractical. Indeed, many more retailers currently accept SNAP then do WIC. But a lot of the opposition, couched in helping the local bodaga and small rural retailer is actually hiding the fact that soda and processed food sales are so profitable. Even Walmart would cringe if they couldn’t sell soda or processed foods to SNAP recipients.
Truth is if SNAP became restrictive like WIC, a lot of retailers who don’t currently accept WIC due to all the limitations on what is covered, would start to accept a WIC-style SNAP program. There is a lot of money to be made by selling products to those with SNAP benefits. Billions and billions of dollars. Even rural retailers and bodagas who currently do not do WIC would feel it necessary to adopt the systems the necessary to cover such purchases. WIC lists can be confusing, but retailers could support such customers by labeling what products on the shelf are eligible for purchase with the SNAP like WIC program.
The health benefits are clear to limiting what can be purchased with SNAP. But people say that’s overly putative to the poor. Grocers and farmers, and particularly processed food manufacturers would prefer added benefits to those who buy healthy, rather then limiting what can be purchased with SNAP. But I disagree. Tax dollars should be used wisely, SNAP recipients are free to buy whatever treats they want with their own money. Many may not have a lot of money for that occasional ice cream treat, but that doesn’t mean taxpayers should be the one paying. Indeed, arguing for limitations on what SNAP purchases doesn’t mean that there should be a reduced benefit – but only that the benefit should be designed to buy healthy foods to fuel healthy bodies and minds. It’s quite possible that a more restricted food list would lead many not to fully utilize their benefits, which could allow the government to expand the benefits for others who more fully use the program to fuel their bodies.
but I don’t like all the worship of government workers. It seems like every other highway is named for some dead government worker. Yet, it’s rare to see anybody in the private sector? Rather then offer more holidays and commemorations, why not work on making the jobs of government workers safer and paying them better wages? I know holidays are cheap. It would have been so crappy driving back from Madison County, 
though maybe the snow would have been purty. I will do a long weekend out that way come December once rifle season is done. 
and I bit gassy by evening but whatever. It was damn good. Already also finished off one of the loaves of bread 
I baked yesterday and dipped in lots of balsamic vinegar and olive oil, eat a bunch of spaghetti squash from Shauls. Yes, the balsamic vinegar in plastic, because I can pretend to put it in the recycling bucket 
then take it and smash it down in the white garbage bag and use it for starting fires up in woods. 
It is after all National Recycling Week, well on November 15th GIS Day for us map makers of the world, and they remind you to recycle right which for the suburbanite doesn’t involve fire or hogs. I should do that with all the burnt-out cans and that one or two glass bottles the yeast comes in the next time I’m out at the folks house. 
Honestly, if you want to recycle, it’s best to get hogs and chickens, eat mostly things that come in natural packaging, and feed the rest. Then use any remaining burnables for starting fires. 
Just don’t tell a liberal such things, they’ll freak out about dioxin and a million other trace chemicals like any woke nuterered person would do.
but I’m resisting turning the heat up to 50 degrees downstairs as long as I can without worry about frozen pipes. Truth is I like the cold, I’d rather wear my blaze orange hoodie with all the permanent coloring from the muck and burn holes at home, to stay warm, and the head under the covers after dinner. I actually the feel of the cold on my face when I get out of bed in the morning, though if it’s really obnoxious, I’ll sit by the Space Heater but I mostly prefer the heated blanket at night, and that doesn’t use that much power – 175 watts at high but I can’t stand the much warm at night. Truth is the cold inside in my apartment makes the cold feel less bad when I ride my mountain bike to work. 
And when I’m camping in the wilderness, mid-winter, desprate to get away from the city the cold doesn’t feel so cold if you’re used to it. 
Made a delicious 
omelet with lots of chopped onions for Shauls along with frozen vegetables and lots of Frank’s Hot Sauce. There is a lot of shit I need to get done in my office, and I’m sure it will feel ungodly hot 
there after all the time in my unheated apartment yesterday, snuggling under the heated blanket for most of yesterday, that was when I wasn’t eating hot soup and bread. Make money, buy more plastic and gasoline, head back up in wilderness to have fires and smoke grass. And good times, as the say. Charged the bike lamp up so should be good at rush hour for the ride downtown to catch the bus home in the pitch black. 
Didn’t get as much cleaning as I wanted to do yesterday, spending more time reading. 
Finished up reading Backyard Foraging on Libby, and Martin Krause’s The Complete Developer about Modern Javascript which I got into a bit before returning. I should learn more modern Javascipt but its hard to learn when I don’t have a practical use for the day. Today, riding to work I’m continuing listening to Goats for Dummies. 
Maybe that’s why I’ve been posting so much about goats lately. 
but Saturday looks good but maybe snow and rain in the evening. I am thinking Pine Bush and Salvation Army/Goodwill to look for more work clothes, as many of my shirts are getting a bit threadbare. But for $5 or $6 at the thrift store and using them for two years, pretty dang good value. I am glad I donated those baggy, but good jeans to the store after I lost weight. 
I feel like it’s giving back and I’m not only just taking from the Thrift Store, though I know it’s still good regardless as I’m buying shit helping these organizatons and recycling clothes otherwise destine for the garbage dumping grounds in Pine Bush or Colonie. 
I want to get a picture of that John Wolcott sign and maybe ride trail in the Pine Bush, where there is likey to be fewer hunters compared to other places where rifle season craziness is underway. 
I should be good on groceries for a while, though I always notice a few things low, like noting I’ll need more grated cheese come he weekend. But whatever. 
