Drug Gang Border Violence - Should welfare recipients be drug tested?

[WhiskeyGirl]

Sen. Jack Goodman, R-Mount Vernon, said his constituents had been frustrated for years that “hard-working low-income people put in money for a system that subsidizes drug habits.”

The bill would require the state Department of Social Services to administer drug screenings to those applying for temporary assistance for needy families if there was reason to believe the person was abusing drugs. If the applicant’s test came back positive, benefits for the individual would be denied while his or her children would continue receiving a payment.

“They cannot help the fact that their mother or father is addicted to drugs,” said Sen. Victor Callahan, D-Kansas City. “This bill is a good sound bite, but it needs a lot of work.”

http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/2009/may/14/senate-keeps-welfare-drug-testing-item-from/

If the parent's have a drug habit, how are they paying for it?  Does the money go to care for the children or to enable the drug habit? 

[WhiskeyGirl]

As for constitutional concerns, LaBruzzo said he believes language saying the tests would be intended to "test applicants' job readiness" would satisfy the courts. He compared the resulting testing model to potential employers requiring drug tests of all job applicants.

http://www.nola.com/politics/index.ssf/2009/05/labruzzos_welfare_drug_testing.html

If you're on welfare, how can you get a job if many employers require a 'pre-employment' drug test?

If drugs are legalized, will that mean that drug test policies will have to be changed too?

People who are high or under the influence will be driving school busses?  Trains?  Airplanes?

When does government 'wake up and smell the coffee'?

[WhiskeyGirl]

...what’s the...excuse for not requiring welfare recipients to take random drug tests? Could it be that it would drastically reduce the welfare rolls? Would it encourage illegal aliens to go home? Which is it? No excuse was offered. The cost of drug treatment programs would be substantially less than the money doled out to illegal drug users who obviously pay for their drugs with taxpayer money. Testing might have an effect on California’s leading cash crop – marijuana.

read more here -
http://www.northstarwriters.com/gl077.htm

[WhiskeyGirl]

There exists violence at the border due to drug gangs.  For some reason, no one wants to test welfare recipients for drugs, and cut benefits...

Something is wrong in America when drug use in enabled by government programs.  If no one on welfare is using or abusing drugs, testing shouldn't be a problem.  Drug tests are simple and cheap.

Many people on the job are subject to random drug tests.  Why isn't the nation testing welfare recipients?  Isn't being 'drug free' necessary for job readiness?

[WhiskeyGirl]

Imagine if you saved one child from being born addicted to drugs, just one crack baby -

“Many private companies require drug testing as a condition for employment. If it is good enough for the private sector, why wouldn’t we make it a condition for receiving benefits that are paid for by the hard-working taxpayers of Illinois,” Mitchell stated in a news release.
He noted that many state jobs require drug testing.

...He offered this defense for an anticipated attack:

“To the ACLU, who say I am picking on defenseless people, I say OK — make every person running for the General Assembly test for drugs,” he offered. “If they test positive, they are automatically removed from the ballot.”

“Our booming Medicaid obligation has become a major drain on the state budget,” he wrote in the news release. “Illinois ha a budget deficit ranging somewhere between $7 and $11 billion and owes around $1.7 billion in unpaid Medicaid bills. We owe it to the taxpayers to take a hard look at where their hard-earned dollars are being spent.

“I also believe we need to send a strong message to the recipients that if they want to receive public assistance, they need to stay off drugs.”

He said 52 percent of babies born in Illinois are born into welfare. “Crack babies are very expensive,” Mitchell said in Clinton. At $9 billion, the Medicaid budget is the biggest in state government squeezing out K-12 education, he said.

read more here -
http://www.clintondailyjournal.com/V2_news_articles.php?heading=0&page=72&story_id=2568

I wonder how much money society would have to spend on education if there were no crack babies?

How much money is going to pay for drug related healtcare expenses?  What if education did not have to compete with illegal drugs for tax money?