GOP Compassionate Conservatives Cut Nearly 1 Billion in Food Aid for Poor Americans

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - On a party-line vote, a Republican-run U.S. House of
Representatives committee voted to cut food stamps by $844 million on Friday, just hours after a new government report showed more Americans are struggling to put food on the table.

About 300,000 Americans would lose benefits due to tighter eligibility rules for food stamps, the major U.S. antihunger program, under the House plan. The cuts would be part of $3.7 billion pared from Agriculture Department programs over five years as part of government-wide spending reductions.

$844 million cut: that's almost the price of a Dick Cheney kickback for another Halliburton no-bid contract paid by US taxpayers.

At the same time, the multimillionaires of Congress refused to consider upping the minimum wage at a time when basic costs have jumped exponentially while giving the president an energy plan that takes corporate welfare for corps earning the biggest profits to high new levels.