Tag: Benefits

Benefits For IDF Veterans

I call bullsh*t on this bit of stupidity.

It seems that American serving in the IDF can claim benefits from the US….if this idiotic bill goes through the process.

A bill introduced in the House by Reps. Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA) and Max Miller (R-OH) would extend certain benefits for Americans serving in the US military to American citizens in the Israeli military.

The legislation, introduced on May 17, would give Americans in the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) protections under the Servicemembers Civil Relief Act (SCRA) and Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA).

The SCRA protects US service members from civil legal action while they’re on active duty and for up to a year after. The USERRA protects the civilian employment of active and reserve military personnel when they’re called to active duty.

“Over 20,000 American citizens are currently defending Israel from Hamas terrorists, risking their lives for the betterment of our ally,” Reschenthaler said in a statement on the legislation.

The Washington Post reported in February that an estimated 23,380 American citizens are serving in the Israeli military. Many are dual citizens who were already living in Israel, but as of November 2023, about 10,000 people living in the US had traveled to Israel to report for duty with the IDF after receiving draft notices. According to Responsible Statecraft, 21 American citizens serving in the IDF have been killed in Gaza, and one was killed in northern Israel near the Lebanon border.

Reschenthaler said his legislation will “ensure we do everything possible to support these heroes who are standing with Israel, fighting for freedom, and combating terrorism in the Middle East.”

(antiwar.com)

Who do you think paid for this bit of nonsensical legislation?

Go ahead…..venture a guess.

Does anyone remember the days when it was illegal to fight in another’s war wearing a foreign uniform?

I have a strong opinion on this serving in the IDF….my though is if they serve in another country’s military then that is their primary citizenship and get nothing from the US….if they cannot serve in our military then nothing is what they get.

I have had enough of these bullsh*t bills that the GOP and even some Dems have offered up for consideration….this country needs help and we had rather focus on this dust bowls around the globe.

Time to get to work on this country and screw the rest let them fend for themselves.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Means Testing

The buzzword used by GOPers and conserv Dems to stop people from getting the help they need.

What is this policy to prevents people from assistance?

A means test is a method for determining whether someone qualifies for financial assistance to obtain a service or good, for instance, welfare payments. It looks at the means, or monetary resources, a person has available to them to pay for a particular service or good, then determines that person’s access to financial assistance based on their ability to pay for it.

The Senate is in the middle of reconciliation which means that conserv Dems will screw the rest of us….hard and steady.

Personally I am against such programs….and I am not alone……

As Democrats weigh what to include — and what to cut — in their budget reconciliation bill, lawmakers are grappling with an existential question: who should qualify for vastly expanded social services.

Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) is among the moderate Democrats who have pushed to prevent the well-off and wealthy from receiving benefits like universal pre-K or free community college, as lawmakers try to get the $3.5 trillion bill closer to $2 trillion. “I cannot accept our economy or basically our society moving to an entitlement mentality,” Manchin said in late September.

But this call for means testing, policy parlance for limiting eligibility for social programs based on income, overlooks a few problems, experts say. Means-tested benefits can actually be more expensive to provide, harder to sell politically, and less effective than universal social programs, and they can place both a social stigma and discouraging bureaucratic requirements on Americans in need.

Means testing have also long been associated with a moral argument that some segments of the population are deserving of government benefits, while others are not. This idea undercuts the belief that a social safety net is intended to help support those broadly in need, and shifts the burden onto individuals to prove that they’re worthy of getting basic help.

https://www.vox.com/2021/10/15/22722418/means-testing-social-spending-reconciliation-bill

I have a hard time with this burden of proof thing…..we do not seem to demand such proof from our representatives….we just roll over and play dead as they go about screwing your neighbors.

We need Medicare For All….

Time for the American people to learn to get involved with the government beyond some beauty contest ever 2 to 4 years.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Screw Those Old Farts! (Again)

Closing Thought–10Aug20

This is for all those old farts that still support the president…that would be Trump in case you are not sure…..

Trump has liberally used the power of the Executive Order when he cannot get his way from Congress and he has a new idea for his next EO.

A cut in payroll taxes,,,,yes it will give the worker more money but at the same time will begin the gutting of Social Security…..

An advocacy group representing more than four million American retirees warned Thursday that President Donald Trump took a dangerous step toward “single-handedly” dismantling Social Security by announcing he plans to sign an executive order suspending collection of the payroll tax as early as Friday afternoon.

With congressional negotiations over the next Covid-19 stimulus package still at an impasse, Trump told reporters Thursday that executive orders to suspend the payroll tax, extend boosted unemployment benefits, and reestablish an expired eviction moratorium are “being drawn now” despite questions over whether the president has the authority to unilaterally take any of those actions.

Trump said he expects to sign the orders “tomorrow afternoon or maybe the following morning” if White House negotiators and Democratic leaders don’t reach a deal. Both Democrats and Republicans in Congress have rejected the idea of cutting the payroll tax, the primary funding mechanism for Social Security.

Richard Fiesta, executive director of the Alliance for Retired Americans, said in a statement that “after learning that Democratic and Republican congressional leaders would not go along with his harebrained scheme to cut Social Security’s dedicated funding source, President Trump lashed out and announced he would begin dismantling the system single-handedly.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/08/06/retirees-vow-fight-attempt-gut-social-security-trump-announces-executive-order/

Once again the seniors will take a good screwing and yet they will continue to vote for the toads that are raping their benefits.

I am still working on where the logic in that sort of politics….

But I will admit I can see Trump’s point……his proposed EOs…..

The workweek came and went without a deal in Congress for pandemic relief, and that’s despite a two-hour meeting Friday with Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Treasury’s Steven Mnuchin, and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows. Afterward, the latter two said they would recommend that Trump issue executive orders, and the president pledged to do just that in a Friday evening press conference, reports USA Today. Details are scarce—including on where the money would come from—but Trump said he planned to tackle four main issues, per the Hill:

  • Pay enhanced unemployment benefits through the end of the year
  • Defer student loan payments and forgive interest for the near future
  • Reinstate a federal moratorium on evictions
  • Defer the payroll tax until year’s end

Gridlock brought this about……

Trump signed four executive orders to act where Congress hasn’t, contending Washington’s gridlock had compelled him to act as the pandemic undermined the country’s economy and imperiled his November reelection hopes. Perhaps most crucially, Trump moved to continue paying a supplemental federal unemployment benefit for millions of Americans out of work during the outbreak.

However, his order called for up to $400 payments, one-third less than the $600 people had been receiving. Congress allowed those higher payments to lapse on Aug. 1, and negotiations to extend them have been mired in partisan gridlock, with the White House and Democrats miles apart. Now, Trump, who has not spoken with Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi since last year, sought to play the role of election-year savior, with the $400 weekly assistance, as well as a deferral of payroll tax and federal student loan payments and the continuation of a freeze on some evictions during the crisis. “It’s $400 a week, and we’re doing it without the Democrats,” Trump said, asking states to cover 25% of the cost.

This according to the conservs of Lincoln Project……

This defunds Medicare.

This defunds Social Security.

Tax collection is just deferred.

You’ll still owe these taxes next year.

Stop calling it Washington gridlock…it is the Senate that does nothing and I mean NOTHING….

Image

I still think the payroll tax thing is the beginning of the assault on Social Security and Medicare……I give Trump his props for doing what the Congress could not….but I still question his motives.

Something to think about……

President Donald Trump on Saturday afternoon openly vowed to permanently “terminate” the funding mechanism for both Social Security and Medicare if reelected in November—an admission that was seized upon by defenders of the popular safety net programs who have been warning for months that the administration’s threat to suspend the payroll tax in the name of economic relief during the Covid-19 pandemic was really a backdoor sabotage effort.

Announcing and then signing a series of legally dubious executive orders, including an effort to slash the emergency federal unemployment boost by $200 from the $600 previously implemented by Democrats, Trump touted his order for a payroll tax “holiday”—which experts noted would later have to be paid back—but said if he won in November that such a cut would become permanent.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/08/08/trump-just-admitted-live-television-he-will-terminate-social-security-and-medicare

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I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–18May20

It is sad enough that 30 million people are unemployed and having to subsist on the unemployment benefits to make ends almost meet…….now there are those that are committing fraud over these benefits and NO it is not some persons in this country….Nigeria is the culprit.

If you thought the Nigerian prince scam was all there was….then think again……

The Secret Service has detected a large-scale foreign attack on the U.S. unemployment system that is processing record numbers of jobless claims amid the pandemic, according to The New York Times. 

In a Secret Service memo obtained by the Times, the agency described the attack as a well-organized Nigerian fraud ring that could lead to “potential losses in the hundreds of millions of dollars.”

“We are actively running down every lead we are getting,” Roy Dotson, a special agent who specializes in financial fraud at the Secret Service, said in an interview with investigators obtained by the Times. 

https://thehill.com/homenews/news/498160-secret-service-unearths-overseas-fraud-ring-stealing-millions-in-unemployment

It is sad that fraudsters use the pandemic to enrich themselves.

My opinion is these people are worse than lowly slugs and should be punished harshly.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The G I Bill

When I left the US Army in 1971 I wanted to use my GI Bill benefits for my education….the only thing that I ever asked of my country for my service…..I got the education I wanted and think that all service people should have a good GI Bill.

The Trump admin has signed into law a new GI Bill…..

President Donald Trump on Wednesday signed into law an updated veterans’ education bill that marks the largest expansion of college assistance for military veterans in a decade.

The Forever GI Act immediately removed a 15-year time limit on the use of GI benefits. The measure also increases financial assistance for thousands serving in the National Guard and Reserve, building on a 2008 law that guaranteed veterans a full-ride scholarship to any in-state public university, or a similar cash amount to attend private colleges.

Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin, who joined Trump for the signing, said the new law also provides benefits to Purple Heart recipients whose injuries forced them to leave the service. Benefits can also now be transferred to the eligible dependent of service members who are killed in the line of duty.

Veterans would get additional payments for completing science, technology and engineering courses, part of a broad effort to better prepare veterans for life after active-duty service amid a fast-changing job market. The law also restores benefits if a college closes in the middle of the semester, a protection that was added after thousands of veterans were hurt by the collapse of for-profit college giant ITT Technical Institute and Corinthian Colleges.

“This is expanding our ability to support our veterans in getting education,” Shulkin told reporters at a briefing after Trump signed the measure at his New Jersey golf club upon returning there after two nights at his home at New York’s Trump Tower. Journalists were not permitted to watch Trump sign the bill, as the White House has done for earlier veterans’ legislation he has turned into law. That includes a measure Trump signed at the club Saturday to provide nearly $4 billion in emergency funding for a temporary veterans health care program.

Glad to see that the troops are still foremost on the minds of our government….

It falls short of what I wanted to see…..the first four years of a public college would be free as long as a C+ average was maintained.  I believe that is a small price to pay for what we ask our troops to accomplish.

Better Late Than Never!

You know whenever conservs talk about Jimmy Carter it always a mention of a wimp or worse and it always comes back to the Iranian hostages and the failed rescue attempt……it always the fault of him being a ….wait for it…..a liberal.

Speaking of the hostages….I read a report during the Christmas break about these people……

Survivors of the Iranian hostage crisis will be awarded up to $4.4 million each, more than three decades after their 444 days in captivity. The terms are laid out in a spending bill President Obama signed into law last week, which also includes reparation for victims of other terrorist attacks, including the 1998 US Embassy bombings in East Africa, reports the New York Times. The 1981 agreement that secured the release of those taken hostage at the US Embassy in Tehran on Nov. 4, 1979, barred them from seeking amends. Legal appeals were later blocked, though renewed pleas for compensation followed the release of 2012’s Argo. Finally, when bank BNP Paribas was forced to pay $9 billion for violating sanctions against Iran, Sudan, and Cuba, this year, Congress moved to set aside $1 billion for terrorism victims.

The 37 surviving hostages will receive up to $10,000 per day of captivity, while spouses and children can receive a lump sum of up to $600,000, per the Times. The money should be awarded within a year. “The money can’t bring back family members, or the 444 days of their lives. But it would bring some closure and some justice,” Georgia Sen. Johnny Isakson tells the Telegraph. “I had to pull over to the side of the road, and I basically cried,” a former embassy security guard says of hearing the news, noting it took “36 years, one month, 14 days” for Iran to be held accountable. “I don’t believe that they will ever, ever apologize,” he adds. “They don’t believe that they did anything wrong.” Officials note many of the hostages were tortured and continue to suffer, including from PTSD. The law signed Friday also designates $2.8 billion for victims of the 9/11 attacks and their families.

After I read this I had a thought…..what can we expect from a country that treats its veterans so shabbily or the treatment that the 9/11 first respondents have had to endure…..why would the Iranian hostages get some sort of expedient justice?

Nothing says love or thank you like being screwed for 35 years.  But hey…that is just what we do when people out use their usefulness.

I am sick and tired of our politicians trying to appear to care…they do NOT and NEVER have!  And I am beginning to think badly of the American people as well……