Above, Hunger Games poster for the Roger Corman version

The REAL hunger games have begun in the Capitol: This week the House is voting on $36 billion in cuts to nutrition assistance, or SNAP, which would kick 2 million people off the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (formerly food stamps), reduce benefits for 44 million more, and drop 280,000 low-income kids from school lunch.

Visit Half in Ten to learn more—and how you can stop the Capitol from winning.

An Austerity Backlash: From Sen. Bernie Sanders’s website, May 7, 2012

France handed the presidency on Sunday to François Hollande, who declared that “austerity can no longer be inevitable.”  In Greece, Germany and Italy, parliamentary and local elections Sunday were seen as setbacks for austerity measures. Sen. Bernie Sanders saw a lesson for the United States in the European elections.

“In the United States and around the world, the middle class is in steep decline while the wealthy and large corporations are doing phenomenally well. The message sent by voters in France and other European countries, which I believe will be echoed here in the United States, is that the wealthy and large corporations are going to have to experience some austerity also and that that burden cannot solely fall on working families. 

In the United States, where corporate profits are soaring and the gap between the rich and everybody else is growing wider, we must end corporate tax loopholes and start making the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. At the same time, we must protect Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Austerity, yes, but for millionaires and billionaires, not the working families of this country.”

 
Via Think Progress

 
Did you see the footage of Republican Congressman Paul Ryan hot-footing it to his SUV to avoid being handed a Bible at the Faith and Freedom Coalition meeting yesterday? The young man who accosted Ryan, I believe is named James Salt. My hat is off to you, James. Bravo, sir! That took balls, and I’ll bet it was fun!

Via Swampland:

These days, when people question a politician’s “morality,” they usually mean his or her personal behavior and choices. But an interesting thing is happening right now around the GOP budget proposal. A broad coalition of religious voices is criticizing the morality of the choices reflected in budget cuts and tax policy. And they’ve specifically targeted Ryan and his praise for Rand, the philosopher who once said she “promote[d] the ethic of selfishness.”

Across the street from the Faith & Freedom Conference Friday afternoon, a group of religious leaders continued the attack on what they now consistently refer to as “The Ayn Rand Budget.” Father Cletus Kiley, a Catholic priest, declared the Ryan budget “does not pass our test” of Catholic teachings, and suggested that supporters of the budget “drop Ayn Rand’s books and pick up their sacred texts.”

Rand’s influence on Ryan’s politics is also the subject of a new ad produced by the religious group American Values Network, which hopes to run the spot in Ryan’s district. It’s a stinging attack, and again, one that was wholly unanticipated by the Republican rising star.

BRILLIANT!!!! 100% gold-plated genius. LET HIM HAVE IT! They need to make it really hot for this guy…

You won’t hear this in the embedded video below, but in another video of the same event from a different camera, James Salt says: “He [Ryan] will have to account for the suffering he will cause.”

I don’t think James was referring to voters here, when he says Ryan will be held accountable, do you? It’s a pity Ryan didn’t hear that bit…

As YouTube commenter Dr. Frank Crosby quipped: “The mistake the conference organizers made was assuming that Representative Ryan with his hate-filled policies is a Christian.”

”+1,” as the kids say…+1.
 

 
Not exactly, but he might as well be talking about the so-called “Ryan plan” from beyond the grave…

The more things change, the more they… oh wait, nothing’s changed!

This video is as evergreen as it is brilliant, a “one size fits all” discourse of the futility of capitalism that lends itself to an infinite number of different blogging contexts. Today, it’s the “Ryan plan.”
 

 
Via Crooks and Liars