Mandatory drug screening for welfare recipients?

[Monello]

A YES vote means you are in favor of drug testing while receiving welfare benefits.

 

[limblips]

Yes, but it must be a properly run program. Testing should be carefully conducted to prevent fraud and it should be done initially and then randomly as long as the person receives any public assistance.

 

[PsyOps]

Why would we need to do this when there is an ongoing effort to legalize drugs?

 

[ICit]

i have to do drug test to support those effers...... sure they should have to do the same to get it.

 

[Larry Gude]

This poll perfectly illustrates our insane desire to control one another.

 

[glhs837]

Yes, but it must be a properly run program. Testing should be carefully conducted to prevent fraud and it should be done initially and then randomly as long as the person receives any public assistance.

Yep, FL tried this, but as far as I can tell, it was a crappy program poorly administered, and the "Let them welfare mommies take whatever they want, it's a right!!!!" crowd point to the fact that FLs program didnt make a difference as proof that such programs wont work.

 

[Pete]

This poll perfectly illustrates our insane desire to control one another.

Is it insane to attempt to control those who are unwilling or unable to control themselves for our benefit, or is it more insane to continue to feed the beast and expect a different outcome?

 

[Larry Gude]

Is it insane to attempt to control those who are unwilling or unable to control themselves for our benefit, or is it more insane to continue to feed the beast and expect a different outcome?

Well, what we are doing is not working and it is not working because the pretext is wrong; the assumption that you can make the path of least resistance work; handouts. Drug testing people isn't going to motivate them to take responsibility for their lives which should be the goal. It's just one little hurdle on the way to the feed. Agreed?

If so, then, it is insane to attempt to control them because it not only doesn't serve their interests, it doesn't serve ours.

I already agree it is insane to 'feed the beast' because it is the wrong way. exactly the wrong way to go about it in the first place.

Drug testing is arguing you can pick a turd up by the clean end. Drug testing is arguing you can make an unworkable, a bad idea, work if only you add MORE of why it's a bad idea in the first place. The path to individual freedom and responsibility is not MORE fealty to the state.

 

[sockgirl77]

:

 

[MMM_donuts]

I feel like most people don't think this through before forming an opinion on it - they just go with their emotions - which are basically that they don't want someone taking their money and using it for drugs.

Look at the reality of it: It's been tried before and it was an outrageously unsuccessful program. Welfare isn't a successful program. Why would you insist upon making it worse instead of fixing the problem?

 

[thurley42]

I feel like most people don't think this through before forming an opinion on it - they just go with their emotions - which are basically that they don't want someone taking their money and using it for drugs.

Look at the reality of it: It's been tried before and it was an outrageously unsuccessful program. Welfare isn't a successful program. Why would you insist upon making it worse instead of fixing the problem?

As long as politicians make a career out of catering to people who want something for nothing, it will not be fixed. That's just the reality of our situation.....

So, IMO, it's not about trying to polish a turd, or change someones behavior. It's about eliminating those who aren't attempting to help themselves get off the assitance. It was said above, I have to take a test to support them, I don't see it as unfair that they should be clean to recieve the assitance.

 

[MMM_donuts]

"From July through October in Florida — the four months when testing took place before Judge Scriven’s order — 2.6 percent of the state’s cash assistance applicants failed the drug test, or 108 of 4,086, according to the figures from the state obtained by the group. The most common reason was marijuana use. An additional 40 people canceled the tests without taking them.

Because the Florida law requires that applicants who pass the test be reimbursed for the cost, an average of $30, the cost to the state was $118,140. This is more than would have been paid out in benefits to the people who failed the test, Mr. Newton said.

As a result, the testing cost the government an extra $45,780, he said. And the testing did not have the effect some predicted. An internal document about Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, or TANF, caseloads stated that the drug testing policy, at least from July through September, did not lead to fewer cases. "

This is from: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/18/us/no-savings-found-in-florida-welfare-drug-tests.html?_r=0 but you can do a simple google search to find a ton of references.

 

[Larry Gude]

I feel like most people don't think this through before forming an opinion on it - they just go with their emotions - which are basically that they don't want someone taking their money and using it for drugs.

I don't want someone taking my money to feed themselves, their babies, to buy diapers or save the whales.

Our government has a responsibility to PROMOTE the general welfare. Not provide it.

Obama has, from day effing one, engaged in special interest politics, period, and done NOTHING to promote the GENERAL welfare of THIS nation.

The problem we have is not in the emotional reaction of not wanting to pay for someone elses drugs but, in the lack of an emotional response to paying for anyone's anything. As on 'No. #### no. I'll give to the charity of my choice. I don't want my gummint to be a charity."