Republicans Block Legislation To Feed More Children, Improve School Lunches

[Purveyor]

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) -- House Republicans have temporarily blocked legislation to feed school meals to thousands more hungry children.

Republicans used a procedural maneuver Wednesday to try to amend the $4.5 billion bill, which would give more needy children the opportunity to eat free lunches at school and make those lunches healthier. First lady Michelle Obama has lobbied for the bill as part of her "Let's Move" campaign to combat childhood obesity.

House Democrats said the GOP amendment, which would have required background checks for child care workers, was an effort to kill the bill and delayed a final vote on the legislation rather than vote on the amendment.

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md. said the House would later hold separate votes on the amendment and the bill, which the Senate passed in August. The nutrition bill would then go straight to President Barack Obama for his signature.

Republicans say the nutrition bill is too costly and an example of government overreach.

Read more: http://www.canadianbusiness.com/markets/market_news/article.jsp?content=D9JRBORG0

[global1]

1. Michelle Needs To Get Out There And Tell The American Public The Repugs......

blocked this from getting passed. Yell it everywhere. The Repugs are blocking everything. Keep ramming that point home until the American public get it and sit on the Repugs to support the President.

[katty]

3. yes-she could hold a press conference in her WH garden

--why is the GOP willing to starve our kids?!!!

[global1]

8. In The Eyes Of The American People She Has Better Favorablity Ratings Than.....

the President. She should use that to her advantage.

[catgirl]

17. I agree- great idea

And a video collage showing the GOP "don't want to spend the money" instances would
show the country what awful people these repug politicians are and how bad they truly
are for our country and the world.

[catgirl]

19. More at Huffington Post (with video)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/12/01/house-child-nutrition-bill-stalled-gop_n_790680.html

There will be a final vote on Thursday. I wish there was more time to highlight this to the public. I doubt
we'll see much of it on MSM news stations.

[katty]

2. GOP to U.S. Kids: "Are there no prisions? No workhouses?" to

feed you? BahHumbug to ya'll!!

[callous taoboy]

4. I am a teacher so I see the SHIT that they call food in the cafeteria.

Deep fried corndogs made of chicken beaks and anuses, gross hamburger patties that most of the kids forego just to eat a bun with ketchup instead, chocolate milk that contains in one pint more sugar than a can of coke, and ice cream every day of the week. No wonder I have such a hard time capturing their attention in the afternoon.

I fucking hate MEpublicans.

[Igel]

21. That's your school.

I've eaten lunch at my kid's elementary school. It's fairly healthy.

Meaning that the hamburger patty is tasteless--we like the taste of fat. They run through the mayo like you wouldn't believe. The chocolate milk is nonfat. The kids prefer the 2% milk, but not by a great deal. The veggies are decent. The desserts low-fat. There are salads available for the kids. Even lactaid-like stuff.

When the parents are invited to eat, they nod and smile at how healthy the food is, then eat no more than their kids do. Most goes into the trash--esp. the healthy bits. The pepperoni on the pizza is a big hit; the cheese, less so. The fat-free crust sucks. If it's green it's gone, meaning the lettuce, green beans, broccoli (the temerity of the school district!).

Over 80% of them pay little or nothing for the food that nutritionists and activists feel good about, sure that it's good for the little tykes' empty little stomachs as they return to classes after lunch. You know a lot of them walk away from their free and reduced lunches. One thing for sure--they're certainly not overfed and ODing on sugar.

Make the food more nutritious and not much more appetizing and you can be sure that little additional nutrition will get into the kids, but we can still be proud to know that it'll cost a lot more and feel good about what we've done. It's foolish, of course, but feel-good politics is seldom much of a loser.

[Catshrink]

26. He wasn't talking about the fat in the chocolate milk - it was the sugar.

Sugar is a huge problem, whether kids or their parents will acknowledge it or not.

Our kids go for the nachos, mostly, and avoid anything green. Most kids do, don't they?

[callous taoboy]

38. Ah, another poster with all of the answers based on his / her kid's school.

One hour away from the school I work at is a school district that has managed to make the food healthy with plenty of choices. My friend who teaches there says it is win-win, cheap, low-fat and low sugar. Very little food is wasted. Chocolate milk is not served, again because of the sugar content. The school district runs the cafeteria in that district and responded favorably to teacher / parent / nutritionist input to reduce the amount of sugar and fat in the food. They serve lots of greens and the kids eat them because they make them palatable to kids (e.g. the broccoli is in a low-fat cheese casserole instead of by itself.... not many kids like to even look at broccoli by itself).

Why is the food at our school so lousy? Why will the cafeteria not restrict the amount of sugar and fat served? It is run by a private, for-profit company, so they can basically serve what they want. I rarely see parents in our cafeteria unless they've brought Subway for their kids.

Feel-good politics? Are you kidding? And the alternative to serving more nutritious / yet palatable food at our school would be...what? The SHIT served by a for-profit company that could care less about the rising rates of childhood obesity and diabetes? That's a fine stance you take on this issue.

[alp227]

5. Background checks for child care workers? Wha...?

While there should be background checks, I don't see how it's relevant to a school lunch bill. Oh yeah Republicans, here's some more costly things than (horrors!) feeding the needy:
- A war on false pretenses
- Tax cuts for people who can afford way too much food and other luxuries
- Bailouts to fiscally irresponsible banks
- "Abstinence-only" education
- Handouts to "faith-based" orgs
- Poorly run charter schools

When will voters quit being sheep and learn their lesson that Republicans are nothing than greedy "me me me" legislators who snuggle with similarly greedy lobbyists?

[Iliyah]

6. The tea bats GOP

don't care about the commoners. They are only for the rich. Heck they probably feel that most of the children are illegal anyway, where both or one of the parents were not born in the United States, hmmmmmmm with the exception of the Cubans and the Europeans or from Canada.

Heck, next they will try and stop the food stamp program b/c ya know thats un-American also. I mean what the heck, stop all the programs which help people in need and help children succeed and become more healthly. This is NOT the American way, I mean, America should only be for the rich so they can keep the power in tact - TOTALILARIAN way of governoring.

[bergie321]

7. Hunger

Is a great motivator for children...

:sarcasm:

[KamaAina]

9. Today's Worst. Persons. In The World!

First they pull the unemployment rug out from under the 99ers. Now they tell their children, and millions of others, "If you won't eat our agribusiness contributors' fattening crap, you won't eat at all!" :grr: :banghead: :argh: :nuke:

[No Elephants]

10. Is that really AP?

[Metta]

11. Too bad karma isn't always instant.

These mf'ers would wake up in a hot New York minute, I'd bet.

[catgirl]

12. Republicans block child nutrition bill

Source: Associated Press

WASHINGTON – House Republicans have temporarily blocked legislation to feed school meals to thousands more hungry children. Republicans used a procedural maneuver Wednesday to try to amend the $4.5 billion bill, which would give more needy children the opportunity to eat free lunches at school and make those lunches healthier. First lady Michelle Obama has lobbied for the bill as part of her "Let's Move" campaign to combat childhood obesity.
House Democrats said the GOP amendment, which would have required background checks for child care workers, was an effort to kill the bill and delayed a final vote on the legislation rather than vote on the amendment.
Because the nutrition bill is identical to legislation passed by the Senate in August, passage would send it to the White House for President Barack Obama's signature. If the bill were amended, it would be sent back to the Senate with little time left in the legislative session.

-snip-

"It's not about making our children healthy and active," said Rep. John Kline, R-Minn., the top Republican on the House Education and Labor Committee. "We all want to see our children healthy and active. This is about spending and the role of government and the size of government — a debate about whether we're listening to our constituents or not."

Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101202/ap_on_bi_ge/us_congress_school_nutrition

---

So your constituents would prefer children to go hungry? Ugh.

[bluethruandthru]

13. Again, repukes have no problem spending for the wealthy...

but the poor can go f themselves.

[elleng]

14. CAP the headline:REPUBLICANS BLOCK CHIILD NUTRITION BILL!

[azurnoir]

15. Klines constituents are MN's 2nd district a mostly well monied

"white flight" area of 3rd and 4th tier suburbs of the Twin Cities it used to be mostly rural and agricultural but urban sprawl changed that, but my guess is his supporters do not give a flying f*ck about other peoples kids or anything else for that matter

[defendandprotect]

16. GOP destroyers -- on and on --

[melvin702]

18. I'm trying to figure something out here...

Here are the ugly numbers. Oh, and they come straight from the government.

www.usdebtclock.org

Then there's an article from cnnmoney stating 47% of households pay NO Federal Income Tax.
I know we need a progressive tax system, but my god, half the country is skating, not 10 or 20 percent.
What happened to "everyone must have skin in the game"?

http://money.cnn.com/2009/09/30/pf/taxes/who_pays_taxes/index.htm

The rich are moving assets and jobs offshore left and right. Just look at outsourcing. They aren't stupid.
They can see the sinking ship that we are. Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, Fannie and Freddie are all deep in the red.

You can get rid of the all waste and fraud, the pentagon, and it wouldn't even make a dent.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6Q14HOBThM

Our corporate tax rates are already the second highest in the developed world, according to OECD.

http://www.taxfoundation.org/taxdata/show/23473.html


How much more do you expect to take from one group and give to another before the whole thing just tips over?
Do you want the next 2 or 3 generations to pay a tax rate of 80% + of what they earn so we can keep funding
this, that and the other thing? Enough already. It's not about what you want. It's about what we can afford.

[zogofzorkon]

37. You are right. We should give whats left to those who have more than

enough. Melt the ice from under the "skaters", lower those high corporate taxes so they can post more obscenely high profits, keep the waste and fraud and high defense spending,at least the money goes to the right people. How can we afford to feed children and keep our yacht of state from keeling over. Let them go hungry, w/o warm coats or shoes for they have brought this upon themselves for unlike the rich they are stupid. Pay no attention to Matthew 25:34-46

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

39. Oh, the poor oppressed rich.

:eyes:

[mvd]

20. Everything is too costly to them except for tax cuts & war

This is the kind of evil that Obama is trying to deal with. You just can't deal with them.

[drawingfool]

22. Unbelievable

I have heard Republicans bitching about this bill saying "Isn't it the parents responsibility to feed their children?" or "If their so poor why do they even have children?" When they said that I asked them "So does that mean you're for poor people getting abortions?" That shut them up.

[sakabatou]

23. God, when will the evil end?

[dmosh42]

24. Won't be reported on major networks! n/t

[Blandocyte]

25. Do they want those children to die and decrease the surplus population?

Christmastime is a great time for catching how Scrooge-like republicans are.

[justiceischeap]

27. Well, you see, kids most likely to need free meals

Are probably going to grow up and vote for the Dems. And a lot of them, you know, are probably black, so we can't have them getting anymore hand-outs. So, you see, it all makes perfect sense. :sarcasm:

[sabra]

28. GOP Blocks Childhood Nutrition Bill

Source: CBS News/AP

Dems Call Last-Minute Amendment to School Lunch Bill a Delay Tactic, GOP says Its About Spending, Gov't Overreach

(AP) House Republicans have temporarily blocked legislation to feed school meals to thousands more hungry children.

Republicans used a procedural maneuver Wednesday to try to amend the $4.5 billion bill, which would give more needy children the opportunity to eat free lunches at school and make those lunches healthier. First lady Michelle Obama has lobbied for the bill as part of her "Let's Move" campaign to combat childhood obesity.

House Democrats said the GOP amendment, which would have required background checks for child care workers, was an effort to kill the bill and delayed a final vote on the legislation rather than vote on the amendment.

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/12/02/health/main7109285.shtml?tag=stack

[Countdown_3_2_1]

29. They don't even have the majority yet!

So WHO in the Democratic party went along with this?

[Zoeisright]

30. That's the repukes for you. Hungry, homeless children.

That's what they want and that's their trademark.

[Winterblues]

31. Not sure I understand. Is there something wrong with child care worker background checks?

It seems pretty normal government procedure to me...I must be missing something..

[TayTay]

32. Heritage Foundation rep on this bill at a hearing in July

Why we shouldn't spend so much money to feed the poor or feed poorer kids lunch or breakfast.

Hearing before the House Committee on Education and Labor, July 1, 2010
by
http://edlabor.house.gov/documents/111/pdf/testimony/20100701RobertRectorTestimony.pdf">Robert Rector
Senior Research Fellow
The Heritage Foundation

Food Insecurity and Obesity

While temporary food shortages are a concern, what is rarely discussed is that the government’s
own data show, paradoxically, that the overwhelming majority of food insecure adults are, like
most adult Americans, overweight or obese. Among adult males experiencing food insecurity,
fully 70 percent are overweight or obese.11 Nearly three-quarters of adult women experiencing
food insecurity are either overweight or obese, and nearly half (45 percent) are obese. Virtually
no food insecure adults are underweight.

Food insecure men are slightly less likely to be overweight or obese than men who are food
secure (70 percent compared to 75 percent). But food insecure women are actually more likely to
be obese or overweight than are women who are food secure (73 percent compared to 64
percent).

Thus, the government’s own data show that, even though they may have brief episodes of
reduced food intake, most adults in food insecure households actually consume too much, not too
little, food, over the long term.. To improve health, policies must be devised to encourage these
individuals to avoid chronic over-consumption of calories and to spread their food intake more
evenly over the course of each month to avoid episodic shortfalls.

Republican logic, poor people eat too much, therefore we shouldn't feed them.

[Bigmack]

33. Does anybody point out...

... when assholes say shit like this in hearings, that the poor eat shitty food because it's cheap. Hi-fructose corn syrup and cheap fat is cheap.


Macaroni & Cheese Dinner - the Cheesiest Prepared (Kraft)
Serving Size: 1 cup prepared, Calories: 410, Fat: 19g, Carbs: 48g, Protein: 9g

Broccoli Steamed (Homemade)
Serving Size: 1/2 cup cooked, Calories: 25, Fat: 0.1g, Carbs: 3g, Protein: 0g

[Jackpine Radical]

34. This is absolutely surreal.

The cheapest foods are hi-carb, high fat and dietarily bad.

Obesity in the poor is a result of trying to get adequate nutrition out of food that is stuffed with empty calories.

[blackspade]

35. What a shock.....

:sarcasm:

Yet another attack on the poor of this nation by the Republican Party.
And yet another opportunity wasted by this administration to tighten the screws on these assholes.

Sign...

[sabra]

36. GOP Blocks Childhood Nutrition Bill

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