OK, last one, I promise...

Poverty and "Responsibility"

This is so good:

The poor use up an enormous amount of their mental energy just getting by. They’re not dumber or lazier or more interested in being dependent on the government. They’re just cognitively exhausted...

The thing about not having much money is you have to take much more responsibility for your life. You can’t pay people to watch your kids or clean your house or fix your meals. You can’t necessarily afford a car or a washing machine or a home in a good school district. That’s what money buys you: goods and services that make your life easier. 

And the Mayor of Phoenix, Arizona, tries to live on Food Stamp money for a week and kept a Facebook diary about it. He reported feeling "hungry and tired", and after he was running late and didn't have a chance to make breakfast or pack a lunch one day he wrote:

I’m facing a long, hungry day and an even longer night getting dinner on the table, which requires making EVERYTHING from scratch on this budget. It’s only for a week, so I’ve got a decent attitude. If I were doing this with no end in sight, I probably wouldn’t be so pleasant.

Every single politician who wants to cut food stamps should be required to do this. Every. Single. One.

Another good piece here.

And because I just can't let the Big Bird Meme (or "Sesame Street vs. Wall Street") go:

Oh great

Mitt Romney at the debate last night (via Laura Clawson at Daily Kos):

I'm sorry, Jim, I’m going to stop the subsidy to PBS. I’m going to stop other things. I like PBS, I love Big Bird. Actually like you, too. But I'm not going to—I'm not going to keep on spending money on things to borrow money from China to pay for. That’s number one.

However, Forbes says (emphasis mine):

For fiscal year 2010, federal funding for PBS through CPB accounted for about 12% of PBS’ revenue. In terms of dollars, that works out to about $300 million. There’s not much wiggle room to be had: the money that actually goes to CPB is split according to a mostly statutory formula. For 2015, Congress has budgeted $445 million for CPB. That’s less than 1% of the budget. Way less. It’s about 1/100th of a 1%.

(I just wanted an excuse to use this picture again.)