Class Warfare

Rand Paul Just Accused 5 Million Disabled Americans Of ‘Gaming The System’

As you probably know by now, the Republican controlled 114th Congress attacked Social Security on the very first day of their new session. They specifically targeted the disability fund of the program that is in danger of running short in 2016. Republicans passed a rule that will no longer allow the reallocation of funds from the retirement program to the disability program.

This means that 11 million disabled workers, spouses, and children will see their funds cut by 19%, about $200 a month for the average person.

Rand Paul isn’t bothered by any of though, because he believes about half of those people are “gaming the system“:

“The thing is, in all of these programs there’s always somebody who’s deserving. But everybody in this room knows somebody who is gaming the system.

What I tell people is, if you look like me and you hop out of your truck, you shouldn’t be getting your disability check. Over half of the people on disability are either anxious or their back hurts. Join the club,” he added. “Who doesn’t get up a little anxious for work every day and their back hurts. Everybody over 40 has a little back pain.”

In 2013 the Government Accountability Office estimated that about 1% of the people on disability could work.

WOW! That sure sounds like a rampant fraud problem! It ranks right up there with the almost nonexistent voter fraud.

Obviously Rand Paul has never dealt with a severe back problem and if he had one, let’s be real, he’s not exactly working his butt off in the Senate. That job is hardly comparable to a blue collar job.

He also doesn’t realize just how bad someone’s anxiety can be. Severe anxiety is absolutely a disability, some people can’t even leave their house. Furthermore, anxiety is just one of the mood disorders that 14% of the disability beneficiaries suffer from.

Realizing that he put his foot in his mouth, he released a bandaid statement “apologizing” to the people he insulted:

“We absolutely should take care of those truly in need of help. But the system is broken, and when people can game the system, they are stealing from those who are truly disabled and won’t receive the care and aid they need,” Paul said.

Even his apology is stupid. The reason disability fraud is so low is because it is unbelievably difficult to obtain. Close to three quarters of applicants are denied their initial claim and 60% of them are denied their appeal.

People are not gaming the system and just because he keeps saying that doesn’t make it suddenly true.

The reality is that Paul and company have wanted to privatize the entire program for years. So they are attempting to chip away at it because they hate it. It’s another reminder that they do not serve us, they serve corporations and Wall Street.

What it all boils down to for Paul and his party is simple: I got mine, screw you.

Send to Kindle
Shannon Argueta

You may also like

haley boe 2

A Marxist-Loving Republican Governor Is Kissing Corporate A*s To Stifle Unions

Azucar_Bakery_Cake

Colorado Issues Ruling On Bakery That Refused To Put Anti-Gay Message On Cakes (VIDEO)

Rainbow_Flag_Cross

Christian Bigots Behind Indiana’s Anti-Gay Law Did, In Fact, Mean For It To Be Anti-Gay

screenshot

WATCH: Cops Plant Drugs On Man After Dragging Him From Car And Beating Him (VIDEO)

credit: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/11/kansas-gov-sam-brownback-somehow-survives-his-failed-economic-experiment/

Kansas Proves Trickle Down Is A Bad Joke - Schools Forced To Close Early, More Radical Schemes Announced

A proposed law in Kansas will prohibit welfare recipients from spending their benefits at certain businesses.

No Cruise For You! Kansas Bans Spending Welfare Benefits At Certain Businesses

Grilling_Steaks_(with_border)

New Missouri Bill Would Police Everything Poor People Put In Their Shopping Carts

lepage

GOP Governor Gets Lubed With Vaseline And Storms Off Like A Toddler (VIDEO)

fox-news-hosts

WATCH Fox News Admit Indiana ‘Religious Freedom’ Law Was Discriminatory After All (VIDEO)

  • Kingminnie

    Just another example of the complete lack of empathy held by our elected “leaders”. Yes, indeed, let’s make him POTUS.

    • Shari D

      Empathy is only one of the many qualities lacking in the Tea Party Republicants. In fact, its one of the REQUIREMENTS for bring a member of that incredibly bigoted clan. Bigoted against anyone who isn’t just like they are. And thank heavens I am not one of them!!! I feel for everyone who suffers the conditions that qualify them for disability, and the struggles that so many are required to suffer by a system that seems to be set up against them succeeding in getting the benefits they deserve to have. Yes, there are a few, a very few, who milk the system, and get government benefits they don’t deserve, but that is why there is oversight, and why they are usually caught at some point down the road and punished by making them repay all they have received by deceiving the government. And there may be a very few of the deceivers who don’t get caught, but why are these assholes so intent on punishing the people who really deserve it by taking it away from everyone??? This is not the military boot camp, where you punish the entire squad for the misbehavior of one member!
      As I lay here in my bed, or sit propped up in a recliner, every day, turned from being a self supporting, hard working, productive member of society to a totally nonproductive individual, on Disability for going on two years now, to have a slug like him say something like that to me is enough to make me want to hit him in the stupid empty head he carries around for a hat-rack with my canes!!! My BACK is the victim of an inherited condition over which I have NO control. I have had two highly qualified spine surgeons tell me that a third surgery will not be in the picture for me because it will do me no good, and I was sent to pain management. I cannot stand longer than ten minutes maximum before my right leg starts to go painfully numb. Showering is extremely painful just from the standing.
      In fact, I worked very hard in Operating Rooms as a Certified Surgical Technologist, for over fifteen years and for four years past the time I should have, and could have easily received disability. I worked for a total of over 40 years of my life, but my work in surgery was to have been the career from which I retired at 65. Unfortunately, my body wasn’t having it.
      I also have a genetic heart condition, which 8 hours of surgery did not completely repair. As well as a permanent disability in my dominant shoulder from a work injury that two surgeries by a highly qualified specialist could not repair, degenerative knee damage from an accident and “old fashioned” repair done to it 38 years ago, leaving the joint bone-on-bone now.
      In fact, my physical issues are such that when I applied for disability in November of 2012, using a Disability lawyer, and going to two Social Security Disability doctors for evaluation in addition to my own four doctors evaluations, Social Security didn’t even blink - I was approved the following February. Period. I did not have to appeal anything, and there weren’t even any back payments from which the lawyer’s office could draw their fee. I only owed them about $38 for paperwork and postage charges. So, with THEM even agreeing that I was “entitled” to the coverage I spent 40 years of my working life paying for out of payroll taxes, plus four of my own doctors who had been on me to stop working for years, and two of their own doctors’ reports confirming, nobody on this planet can tell me I am “milking the system” or whatever blather is falling out of that man’s head. F*** him and the horse he rode in on!! Shame on him and all the rest for attacking the most desperately needful of this nations citizens.

      • kwkurtz44

        I hear you buddy…I suffered from severe debilitating depression, after loosing my job and all of my possessions and being rescued by friends who literally dragged me to the hospitals and Social Security offices, after over 2 years finally was approved for disability at age of 60. the toll the depression took on me deteriorated my physical health as well and ended up with heart disease. I also suffer from severe arthritis in both knees and my right shoulder for many years now. I didn’t understand depression, you can’t your sick. I felt undeserving of help and extreme guilt, even though I worked and paid in to Social Security since I was 16. It took almost 6 months of therapy to get me to the point where I was able to accept my disability, and look at myself in a different way. Most people don’t really want to be “on the system” they would give anything if they could go to work and be a productive citizen like a normal person. You are made to feel guilty for being ill. The difference between me an a politician is that they take with no guilt or shame, and degrade those who are deserving.

        • Shari D

          I hear ya. I really do. One of the doctors I was sent to by Social Security was a qualified, experienced psychiatrist for a psych eval. It wasn’t even an issue I was consciously considering dealing with. But by the time we were done with our chat, I was in tears, and she told me that she was impressed by my intelligence and personal strength, and that she normally didn’t discuss the results of her findings in detail with the people who are sent to be evaluated, but she was going to make an exception in my case. She said that I was doing a very good job of managing it on my own, but that I should consider seeking out some additional assistance with dealing with what she found to be fairly severe clinical depression. Not that I was in any particular danger, but that it could make it easier to deal with and probably get myself out of. She said her report was going to say she found me socially well developed ~ clean, well groomed, nicely dressed, appropriately responsive and so on, but also severely clinically depressed and definitely meeting the required guidelines for qualifying for Disability due to that and the additional physical issues shown on my medical reports that she had been sent as part of my file.
          I thanked her for being so frank and forthcoming, and that if I found at any time going forward that I was getting worse, or at least not getting better, I would definitely seek out additional help. Fortunately, since then I have managed to climb out of that deep, dark abyss with some help from my husband, some of my favorite music, and some therapeutic guidance on an informal basis from my son-in-law, who is a licensed marriage and family therapist. I’m still not completely out of the darkness sometimes ~ I can find myself once in a while teetering on the edge ~ but it’s not nearly as bad as it was a few years ago. I’ve been here before, many years back, and found that most of the medications used were not very effective on me, and I had some scary side effects that I simply could not live with. They affect everyone differently though, and for some they work very well.
          I wish you, and all of us, a lot of luck dealing with these selfish, self-serving, thoughtless, bigoted, antisocial, empty-headed assholes that got elected into office by such ignorant fools, and others just like them to plague us with their lack of empathy and thoughtlessness.

          It might interest you all to know that my husband and I recently read the results of a study done to determine the basic intelligence and empathy levels of liberals and conservatives. You’ll not be surprised to know that liberals as a group were found to be more empathetic, to care more for their fellow man, to be more informed and MORE INTELLIGENT than conservatives across the board. So, it’s been established by a study that was unbiased in either direction. Pure, simple fact. Which is what they absolutely refuse to acknowledge. But, like I said, we’re not surprised, are we?

  • Monica V Lucas

    I’m sorry that the USA is turning into a third world country that cares nothing for its citizens. My boyfriend has well-documented mental and physical disabilities too, and had to get an attorney so he wouldn’t get turned down for the third time. All that for almost 900 bucks a month, after working the majority of his life. He’s not going to make it either on 700. What is WRONG with these politicians? And what is WRONG with those who keep putting them in office?

  • elf1

    I’m 62 my back never hurts and I’m 100% disabled can Rand Paul prove that I am not medically able to work by merely looking at me from a distance?

    • Depressivedarking

      Hell no he can’t. That’s why he’s an idiot. He has no clue what he’s talking about, or what it means to be disabled.

  • George Neidorf

    a politician talking about gaming the system. that’s rich.

  • Cynthia Davis

    Let’s REWORD his Quote “We absolutely should take care of those truly in need of help. But the system is broken, and when people can game the system, they are stealing from those who are truly disabled…” to We absolutely should take care of those truly in need of help. But the system is broken, and when CONGRESSMEN can game the system, they are stealing from those who are truly disabled…Millionaire Congressmen SHOULD FORGO THEIR GOVERNMENT STIPEND and ENTITLEMENTS because THEY CAN AFFORD TO AND DON’T NEED monetary “assistance”!!!

  • tamcocar

    And I accuse him of gaming the system because he collects a paycheck from taxpayers, and doesn’t work for it. I wish my MS on him, his entire family & all of his psychotic colleagues who have waged a war on people much less fortunate than they are. What evil piece of garbage attacks the disabled? He can kiss my ass & the ass of every other person who has worked extremely hard our whole lives, and has been stricken down by an incurable illness.

  • kb3chb

    some time ago I saw on a news magazine on television a report about an attorney whose only job is to get people on disability. And yes, he was a sleazebag!