Reply #12: I don't see this as hypocrisy. Not at all.

[truedelphi]

We the Public are afloat in regulations that cost us a lot, but still don't protect us. S just why shouldn't people who have been paying their taxes for the EPA and MMS, and now have their livelihoods wiped out by the oil spill, not at least receive a few food stamps back their way?

Yesterday the local paper "The Press Democrat" had a full one page story on how many different agencies are geared up and running to protect us from ourselves.

The article talked about toys and eggs facing fierce regulations.

And how we need to be kept safe from things that we can not really be kept safe from. Ex here: there are new regulations afloat that will basically BAN wildlife from farms. Wildlife BAD BAD BAD. (Hmm - maybe we could just have the oil spill extend into the nation's farmland and kill off everything there as well as everything in the sea.) And these regulatory actions are all part of an effort to keep the American populace from having food poisoning. But the real source of food poisoning is that people in restaurants and at home do not follow basic food safety practices such as washing their hands after using the rest room, and not letting chicken drippings ooze over the salad fixings, etc. (Maybe we should ban people?) It has gotten to the point that you almost expect to see a label on every baggie in the produce department - "Do not attempt to wear this over your head or suffocation will occur."

But when we REALLY need regulations, do we have them? No - the recent oil spill in which BP applied for and received an exemption is a prime example of how despite the vast costs of these regulatory agencies to the American public - what it really comes down to is that some drug store owner in Toledo Ohio will be fined if a small toy made in China is being sold there, but that BP can allow for 32.5 million units of oil to float around and kill of the oceans without so much as a word or penalty from MMS, EPA etc.

We have become this nitwit of a bureaucratic nation, and yet the bureaucracy is doing squat about what matters. When the Tea Baggers and others protest the Big Arm of Big Government, this is part of what they are upset about.

And in a sense, at least the Food Stamps are their tax dollars coming home to them. And it is rather sad that that is all we have to show for all this regulation - the fishermen and women who will be affected get Food Stamps, while the BP officials know that they will still be the executives running their firms and still have their nice end of the year bonuses.