I removed all of the conservative influencers who shilled for soda companies in the past week. These influencers were soundly mocked and denounced by conservatives.
Does this happen in progressive circles? Does anybody mock and denounce pay-for-play posts that are funded by Big Pharma, for example? I was very proud to see how conservative media self-cleansed from these dishonest operators. But we need this kind of community responsibility among progressives, too.
Clarissa's Blog 
Recently caved and got a xitter account again: you really can’t beat it for breaking news that isn’t being covered by MSM outlets, like the syria thing.
And yeah, I Xed every name on the soda-shill list.
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It was so disgusting, so transparent. They used the same words, sometimes the same photos. Abandoned all principles for a payout.
I agree that X is unavoidable if one wants fresh news. The Google news button is dying, offering me news from two months ago when I put in something like “Berlin today”. If you want news, I really don’t know where else to go.
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Yeah, I really, really do not like the part where there seems to be only *one* place to pick up breaking news on anything that matters to me. The sources I had come to rely on… all were getting their news from xitter anyway. Sigh.
But in practical reality, what that means is, if you want to axe public access to real news for most people, all you have to do is take out Xitter. Centralization isn’t good here.
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I’m out of the loop: what happened with soda?
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The Trump administration decided to remove soda as a possible item to get with food stamps. A bunch of conservative influencers got paid by soda companies to oppose this decision. Because, you know, freedom. That people are completely free to buy all sorts of junk with their own money escaped their notice.
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“remove soda as a possible item to get with food stamps”
Food stamps are federally regulated? (real question… I don’t know)
Back when I worked in a store (with a non-digital cash register) we had to learn what food stamps could be used to buy and what they couldn’t.
I honestly don’t remember if soft drinks were okay or not but most prepared snacks (like sandwiches) or prepared meals weren’t. There were also rules about giving change… it could only be in food stamps and less than $1 in coins within a certain time frame (to prevent someone from making several small purchases and then building up enough coins to buy beer or cigarettes….).
Fortunately I didn’t work that long at the store that had the highest food stamp traffic and was moved to one where it was much less common, just one or two customers per shift.
As for this scandal… what do you expect… the US is in the all scam all the time economy and I fear the only way out is through the bottom…
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Throughout this debacle, I discovered that a ready-made rotisserie chicken is not covered. Which is dumb. It’s definitely some sort of a corruption that those chickens aren’t allowed while Coke is.
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I had given up sugar and Xitter for Lent so was unaware of this bs. We pay taxes so that people can buy soda so they can get metabolic disorders so we can pay for their medications. And then pay for medication for the side effect of their medications. and pay for the insurance that gets kickbacks on the medications!!
it is lunacy
Amanda
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apologies for hyperbole. The last statement doesn’t apply to government insurance program.
amanda
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Exactly. It’s embarrassing that people would go and defend this. I support food stamps. This is a good welfare program. But it shouldn’t be used to encourage people to poison themselves.
SNAP shouldn’t be a government kickback to soda companies. It’s immoral and corrupt.
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