Former Clinton USDA Official: “Our political system is basically evil versus spineless now" [View all]

[cali]

Following an initial Senate vote Monday night and a House vote last week, today the Senate is expected to pass a farm bill that cuts food stamps by over $8 billion in the next decade. The White House has signaled that President Obama will sign the bill, ending a two-year fight in which key Democrats and Republican disagreed over how much — but not whether – to cut the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

“Our political system is basically evil versus spineless now,” former Clinton USDA official Joel Berg told Salon following the House’s vote. Berg, the executive director of the New York City Coalition Against Hunger and author of “All You Can Eat: How Hungry Is America?,” blasted White House “disingenuousness,” Republican “race-baiting,” media “class bias,” and progressive “weakness” for the ultimate outcome. “There is no mechanism now,” he argued, “to hold people accountable for shafting poor people.” A condensed version of our conversation follows.

The Associated Press described the ultimate deal as having “a mostly symbolic cut in food stamps.” Is that accurate?

It’s not accurate, and shows you in a few words virtually everything wrong with the American media today. It shows you class bias, reporters listing as a fact something that’s an opinion, it shows you lack of empathy.

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http://www.salon.com/2014/02/04/red_meat_to_the_tea_party_how_factory_farm_handouts_beat_food_stamps/