The DISH

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Vol. 12 Issue 45…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…November 8, 2009

The Business Plot

By John Burl Smith

The Business Plot was a conspiracy to overthrow President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Major General Smedley Butler exposed the attempted coup d'état in 1934. It involved some of the wealthiest businessmen in the United States (US). The twice decorated WWI veteran and former Commander of the Marine Corps testified before the McCormack-Dickstein Congressional Committee and laid out an amazing saga, detailing how the conspirators attempted to recruit him.

An outspoken critic and author of War Is A Racket, Gen. Butler, a true American patriot, opposed using US military power to support "Big Business." "The U.S. has routinely destroyed democracy throughout the globe while its leaders claimed to be spreading democracy. I spent 33 years in active military service as a high class muscle-man for Big Business, Wall Street and bankers. I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico, especially Tampico, safe for American oil interests in 1914, then made Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues. I helped rape half a dozen Central American republics for the benefits of Wall Street and did the same to Nicaragua for the international banking house of Brown Brothers in 1909-1912."

Buried beneath a wall of silence until American journalist John Buchanan dredged it up in July 2007, the story was picked up by the Guardian newspaper (UK). The BBC followed with a full documentary. A kaleidoscope of treason, "The Business Plot" is shrouded in secrecy and is a testament to how wealthy people in the US are held to a different standard of criminal justice.

The McCormack-Dickstein Congressional Committee hearings confirmed Gen. Butler’s story and swore initially it would question all parties involved. However, the Committee's final report was a whitewash. It called only Gerald MacGuire, a go-between, who possessed neither resources nor connections to organize such a plot. It covered up the involvement and protected the reputation of wealthy conspirators by not determining the source of the large sums MacGuire spent or said higher ups would provide. No prosecutions or further investigations followed.

There is an old maxim which says, "If you want to get to the bottom of a conspiracy, follow the money!" Preserving their wealth and power is the reason US businessmen plotted to overthrow FDR. First and foremost, businessmen like Henry Ford, John D. Rockefeller, John and Allen Dulles, Prescott Bush and George Herbert Walker admired Hitler and Mussolini. Although at the point of the gun, fascists used a strong hand protecting business. They were ruthless dealing with labor unions and social unrest, which is what these men wanted in the US.

Next, the Great Depression brought thousands of WWI veterans to Washington, D.C. on July 17, 1932. Led by a former sergeant, Walter W. Waters, they pitched tents around the city and demanded payment of bonuses granted them under the Adjusted Service Certificate Law of 1924. Gen. Butler encouraged them to fight Hoover as though he was the Kaiser to get what they deserved. Hoover refused to meet with them and ordered the US Cavalry to remove them and their campsites. A Republican, Gen. Butler threw his support to Roosevelt for president.

By the end of Roosevelt's "First 100 Days," America's richest businessmen were in a panic. They felt Roosevelt intended to conduct a massive redistribution of wealth from the rich to the poor. Gen. Butler's testimony described a plot only powerful men with money could design. First, they planned to create a fascist army, like Italy's Black Shirts and Germany's Brown Shirts, for Butler to lead. MacGuire claimed to have 500,000 war veterans from the American Legion and each man was a leader of 10 others, equaling 5 million men, if needed. A second fascist army was to be recruited from the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and financed with $700 million. Arms and equipment would be obtained from the Remington Arms Co. and supplied by the Du Pont family. They would model their forces after the Croix-de-Feu in France, one of several fascists groups MacGuire studied while touring Europe.

Backed up by such manpower, Wall Street plotters wanted Gen. Butler to deliver an ultimatum demanding either Roosevelt pretended to be incapacitated by polio and allow Butler to takeover or be forced out with the army of 500,000 war veterans from the American Legion.

Money was no object according to MacGuire. He provided a bank account with $100,000 and told Butler that his Wall Street backers had $300,000,000 if necessary. Principal conspirator and founding member of the American Liberty League, the primary source of funds for the plot, Robert Sterling Clark, a New York banker, told Butler he would spend $30 million. Other major backers were leaders of U.S. Steel, General Motors, Standard Oil, Chase National Bank, and Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company.

Most astoundingly, the Bush family was a major backer of the coup. Prescott Bush, a founding partner of Brown Brothers Harriman & Co., (1931) was the Wall Street front for several Nazi companies and U.S. financial interests of Fritz Thyssen. Thyssen was an early financial backer of the Nazi party. Bush was a director and shareholder, along with George Herbert Walker, his father-in-law, in the Union Banking Corporation (UBC) which also ran a complicated financial web that supported Hitler until 1942. UBC's assets were confiscated that year by the government, after Pres. Roosevelt signed the Trading with the Enemy Act.

The following is a list of some of the fascist coup leaders: Irenee Du Pont, founder of the American Liberty League, which executed the plot; Grayson Murphy, Director of Goodyear, Bethlehem Steel and a group of J.P. Morgan banks; William Doyle, former state commander of the American Legion and a central plotter of the coup; John Davis, former Democratic presidential candidate and a senior attorney for J.P. Morgan; Al Smith, bitter political foe of Roosevelt, former governor of New York and a co-director of the American Liberty League; and John J. Raskob, officer and a former chairman of the Democratic Party. Raskob later became a "Knight of Malta," a Roman Catholic Religious Order with a high percentage of CIA spies, including CIA Directors William Casey, William Colby and John McCone.

Years later, retired US Rep. John W. McCormack, former Speaker of the House and Chairman of The McCormack-Dickstein Congressional Committee said, "If the late Major General Smedley Butler of the U.S. Marine Corps had not been a stubborn devotee of democracy, Americans today could conceivably be living under an American Mussolini, Hitler, or Franco."

Nevertheless, America did not escape the 2000 coup d'état, which was facilitated by the US Supreme Court, that successfully put George Walker Bush in the White House. Moreover, Barack Obama was expected to undertake some FDR type programs to redistribute wealth from the rich to the poor but just the opposite occurred. Could it be the country underwent a coup d'état and Mr. Obama is merely a figurehead, as Roosevelt would have been had Major General Smedley Butler not been there? (Sources: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Business_Plot, http://kavips.wordpress.com, http://carnival-of-anarchy.blogspot.com and http://coat.ncf.ca/our_magazine/links/53/Plot1.html)

Venue for an Artist

Second Bill of Rights, (1944)

By President Franklin D. Roosevelt

It is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content, no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some fraction of our people--whether it be one-third or one-fifth or one-tenth--is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.

This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights--among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty.

As our nation has grown in size and stature, however--as our industrial economy expanded--these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.

We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. "Necessitous men are not free men." People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all--regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

The right of every family to a decent home;

The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

America's own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens.

About Me: An ailing President Roosevelt delivered this January 11, 1944 message to the US Congress by radio. During the last portion dealing with the Second Bill of Rights, he asked news cameras to come in and begin filming for later broadcast. This footage was believed lost until it was uncovered in 2008 in South Carolina by Michael Moore while researching for the film Capitalism: A Love Story. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org)

Politics Y2K9

The Pendulum Effect

By Mumia Abu-Jamal

A lot of psychological, emotional, social and economic energy goes into this political business.

Billions of dollars fill campaign coffers, and friendships, not to mention marriages, are severely tried by conflicting allegiances to competing parties.

But, if you look at this thing close enough -- or long enough -- a funny thing emerges -- it's what I call 'the pendulum effect.'

It's the tendency of politics to shift from one position to and opposite one. This is seen most acutely when a politician switches parties between elections.

But it's also seen when parties switch their positions over time.

Back during the U.S. Civil War days (and for quite a while afterwards) the Democratic Party was the white supremacist, nativist, and indeed, openly racist party. They carried public banners with the word "nigger" emblazoned on them, and the Ku Klux Klan was, in many ways, the party's militia.

In those days, the Republicans were the beneficiaries of the small, but loyal, Black vote; and they counted among their number the remarkable Black abolitionist leader, Frederick Douglass.

A century (and a civil rights movement) later, and the party's positions have switched diametrically. This is also a pattern that developed after the so called 'Southern strategy', when the GOP launched into an all out campaign to exploit white fears and hatreds roiled by the movement.

There's another factor that we see every election: a politician runs one way, and governs another.

Perhaps the best exemplar of this trend was former U.S. President George W. Bush, who ran a moderate, non-nation building, and 'humble' foreign policy campaign, and quite another presidency.

If politicians believe in anything, it's not conservatism, liberalism nor even democracy: it's power.

Intuit's Vibe

Should Some Teenagers Die in Prison?

By Liliana Segura

So here's a dubious distinction: the United States is the only country that metes out punishments of life without parole to kids under the age of 18. But two Florida cases scheduled to go before the court next month could change that. Both cases involve teenagers who were convicted of crimes other than murder.

One of the cases involves Joe Sullivan, who 20 years ago became the youngest person to be sentenced to life without parole in this country.

In 1989, a reportedly mentally disabled Sullivan, who was 13 at the time, and two older teenagers broke into the West Pensacola home of 72-year-old Lena Bruner, stealing some jewelry and cash. Bruner wasn't home at the time of the burglary, but later that night, one of the teenagers returned to the house and brutally beat and raped her.

The older teenagers confessed to the burglary, pinning the rape on Sullivan. He denied it but was indicted and tried as an adult. (The two other boys did time in juvenile prison and were then freed.) The facts of the case were grotesque. And strange. Bruner never saw her attacker -- she was blindfolded during the assault -- and forensic evidence collected from the victim was not presented at trial. (This evidence was destroyed before it could be tested for DNA.)

Bruner identified Sullivan according to his voice in a courtroom exercise rehearsed with the prosecutors. Racism infused the trial; according to Equal Justice Works, "during trial, the prosecutor and witnesses made repeated, unnecessary reference to the fact that Joe is African American and the victim is white; one witness repeatedly said the perpetrator of the assault was a 'colored boy' or 'a dark colored boy.'"

Despite the holes in the case, Sullivan was found guilty and declared by the judge in his case to be "beyond help." He became the youngest person in the country to be sentenced to die in prison for a crime other than murder. At 14, he was sent to an adult prison, where he was repeatedly sexually assaulted.

Sullivan now is 33 years old. Stricken with multiple sclerosis, he is confined to a wheelchair. He still insists he did not commit the rape, but the question of innocence is not for the court to decide.

Instead, the justices will consider whether a sentence of life imprisonment for juveniles is cruel-and-unusual punishment. It's a highly anticipated case for those who recall the landmark decision in Roper v. Simmons four years ago, which struck down the death penalty for juvenile defendants on Eighth Amendment grounds.

"The essential feature of a death sentence or a life-without-parole sentence is that it imposes a terminal, unchangeable, once-and-for-all judgment upon the whole life of a human being and declares that human being forever unfit to be a part of civil society," Equal Justice attorney Bryan Stevenson argued in court filings on behalf of Sullivan.

"Roper understood and explained why such a judgment cannot rationally be passed on children below a certain age. They are unfinished products, human works-in-progress. They stand at a peculiarly vulnerable moment in their lives.

Their potential for growth and change is enormous. Almost all of them will outgrow criminal behavior, and it is practically impossible to detect the few who will not. To date they are the products of an environment over which they had no real control -- passengers through narrow pathways in a world they never made." Indeed, Sullivan grew up in a home where he was "regularly subjected to physical and sexual abuse," according to his lawyers.

Like the death penalty, sentences of life without parole have proved to be sharply slanted when it comes to race. According to a study released by the Sentencing Project -- which has filed an amicus brief in Sullivan's case -- in 22 states, more than 50 percent of the prisoners serving LWOP are African American. In Maryland, Alabama and Virginia, the percentage is more than 80 percent.

A slew of other groups have filed amicus briefs on behalf of Joe Sullivan, including Amnesty International, the American Psychological Association, the American Bar Association and a group of former juvenile offenders, including Ishmael Beah, a former child soldier from Sierra Leone, who in 2007 published the internationally best-selling memoir, A Long Way Gone.

"Children who commit crimes lack the moral and psychological underpinnings of adults," he said, "but they're also more resilient, so it is very possible to change. And it is only through rehabilitating such children and youth that we are able to learn how to prevent a similar situation from happening to others." Roper v. Simmons was a 5-4 decision. Two of the dissenters - justices Sandra Day O'Connor and William Rehnquist -- have since been replaced by Roberts and Alito. Now-retired Justice David Souter joined the majority. Will Sotomayor [who replaced him] follow his lead? (Source: www.alternet.org/story/143197/)

Hood Notes

US Wages and Salaries Rise at Record-Low Levels

By Andre Damon

Employment costs in the US rose at the lowest annual amount in at least 27 years, according to data released Friday by the Labor Department. Stagnant wages and salaries are the outcome of government policies designed to lower the living standards of workers.

Over the past 12 months, the Labor Department's Employment Cost Index rose by 1.5 percent, marking the lowest wage and salary growth since these figures started to be collected in 1982.

Meanwhile, compensation costs for the three-month period ending in September increased by 0.4 percent, among the lowest level since quarterly records began in 2001. This figure was unchanged from the previous quarter, and up slightly from the 0.3 percent growth in the first quarter of the year.

In the 12-month period before September 2008, employment costs rose by 2.6 percent. These figures were led by falling government wages, which shrank by 0.1 percent in the third quarter, while benefits rose by a smaller-than average 0.3 percent. Compensation costs in private industry rose by 0.5 percent, with benefits rising 0.3 percent.

The decline in government wages is a direct result of policies initiated by states and cities in response to their budget crises. Local governments have laid off thousands of teachers, city workers, and bus drivers in response to their budget shortfalls. Those workers who remain have been forced to take furloughs and pay cuts.

In Detroit, Michigan, for instance, both city workers and teachers have been told to take a 10 percent pay cut. These cuts are the direct outcome of the Obama administration's policies, which have left states to fend for themselves amid falling tax revenues. The administration has made it clear that states must balance their budgets through spending cuts. Many states are required to have a balanced budget, and nearly all have resorted to wage and salary cuts, together with layoffs, to meet their obligations.

Consumer spending, meanwhile, fell significantly in September, according to figures released Friday by the Commerce Department. Spending fell by 0.5 percent last month, negating a good chunk of the 1 percent gain in the previous month. Disposable income for households also fell by 0.1 percent in September, in the fourth consecutive monthly decline.

The fall in consumer spending, the largest since December, is in part the result of the end of the government's cash-for-clunkers program on August 24. Economists have said that this program, among others, accounts for much of the increase in third-quarter consumer spending and GDP.

Lori Helwig, an economist at Merrill Lynch, told MarketWatch that she expects consumer spending to grow 0.5 percent in the last quarter of the year, down significantly from the 3.4 percent growth in the third quarter.

The Commerce Department said Thursday that the US economy grew at a rate of 3.5 percent in the third quarter of the year, after falling consecutively for three quarters. However, as numerous commentators have pointed out, this so-called recovery is unsustainable.

The Financial Times wrote on Thursday, "Household disposable incomes actually fell during the quarter, by 3.4 percent, but consumer spending rose, also by 3.4 percent. This is not a pattern that can be sustained for long." The uptick in spending was largely financed by the government's cash-for-clunkers program, along with homebuyer tax credits, which will expire later this year.

A picture of the real state of things emerges from these figures. Real wages in the US are declining, while consumer spending can only be maintained, at least in the short term, by government stimulus programs.

Meanwhile, the real living conditions for regular people are becoming more and more intolerable. Wages for non-managerial workers have fallen by 1.4 percent so far this year, according to an article in USA Today, and are on track for even further declines. The official unemployment rate has reached 9.8 percent, and when one takes into account discouraged workers and people who are underemployed, it is at 17 percent.

While the Obama administration has spent trillions to bail out the banks and financial speculators, it has done next to nothing to address the massive employment crisis.

The White House released a report on Friday cynically claiming that its stimulus program had "saved or created" 640,239 jobs, based on data from a non-governmental monitoring board. This is based largely on inflated estimates of how many additional jobs might have been destroyed--in addition to the far higher figure that have in fact been destroyed.

The number of workers the federal government has actually employed in new projects is miniscule--estimated at 30,000 by the administration itself in a report released earlier this month. In some states, the impact of federal programs has been negligible--including about 400 in Michigan, which has the highest unemployment rate in the country at 15.2 percent.

In reviewing these figures, the Associated Press found significant reporting errors, with certain new positions being counted as many as five times. The analysis showed that, based on the government's records, the figure should have been 25,000, not 30,000.

Similar overestimations were quickly discovered in the figures released on Friday. For example, the Salt Lake Tribune reported that the White House claimed that 6,598 jobs were saved or created in Utah. "But discrepancies were easy to find," the newspaper noted. "Some entities seemed to create their own criteria, while others double counted employees over multiple contracts. The most common error appeared to be counting temporary or part-time work as a full-time job."

Since the recession began in December 2007, 7.6 million jobs have been eliminated from the economy, and 3 million since Obama's stimulus program was approved. Even if one were to accept the government's estimates, a stimulus program that would address the unemployment crisis would need to be at least ten times the size of the one that has been passed. Instead, the Obama administration has rejected any further stimulus measures.

In fact, mass unemployment has been part of a deliberate policy, allowing for corporations to exploit workers' fears over the poor labor market. The financial and corporate elite has used the economic crisis it created to carry out a massive redistribution of wealth. The bank bailouts will be paid for through attacks on the working class--including austerity measures, cuts in social programs and a continual attack on wages and benefits. (Source: http://www.wsws.org/)

Disgruntled wants to know: In late October, a group of as many as twenty people watched and laughed, took photos and videotaped the brutal gang rape of a 15-year-old girl at a Richmond, California high school following a homecoming dance. None came to her aid. When police arrived on the scene, because another teen that heard about the rape called 911, the crime was still in progress. The victim was unconscious. Some of the suspected rapists have been arrested. While this gang rape took place, on the other side of the country, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court tossed out thousands of juvenile court cases that were "tainted" by an alleged kickback scheme involving a former Luzerne County judge. It is alleged that from 2003 through mid-2008 then-Judge Mark A. Ciavarella and former Judge Michael T. Conahan collected a total of $2.6 million from a for-profit detention center developer. The judges basically helped keep the juvenile detention facilities full and operational by dispensing harsh sentences to even first time offenders for non-violent offenses, helping the developer secure state contracts, and suppressing audits and closing down competitors. More than six thousand young people were affected. These incidents are different, but each says something about the state of our society. In one instance, young people brutalize, watch and cheer without lifting a finger to aid a victim, and in the other, men dispense justice with an eye toward personal profit and in the process possibly ruin the lives of thousands of young people. What do these incidences say about us as a society?

Disgruntled feels: Depression! While Wall Street and the Obama Administration tout a jobless recovery, Main Street is in the throes of a depression. The government announced on Friday that the employment rate has risen to 10.2 percent. (The real unemployment rate is significantly higher at 17.5 percent.) The depression being experienced on Main Street is about more than economics or the lack of employment; it is a depression in the social and psychological sense of hopelessness about the future direction of the country. With so much of the manufacturing base overseas, service jobs outsourced and predicted unlikely to return, workers are experiencing fewer opportunities for employment as a long-run proposition and that can be depressing. Such depression takes a toll on the national psyche. Property crimes go up, because some people will turn to crime to secure the necessities of life. Suicides, homicides and domestic abuse escalate in such times of hopelessness. So, we cannot merely say the unemployment rate went up a few percentage points and capture the true suffering of families and individuals in communities across the country that have no prospects of employment any time soon. For them, this is a depression. And, nothing the government has said about the employment situation, including the extension of unemployment benefits, is likely to ameliorate or relieve the pressure of securing economic welfare without the income from gainful employment.

Disgruntled says: The evidence is overwhelming! Former President George W. Bush and Vice-President Dick Cheney broke any number of national and international laws. Bush-Cheney outed a CIA agent, spied on Americans without proper warrants, tortured suspects, lied to Congress and started two imperial wars based on bogus reasons. Yet, Bush-Cheney served two terms in office and Congress never considered impeachment, even though their crimes were far more serious, deadlier and costlier than former President Bill Clinton's lies about a personal indiscretion. Even more ominous, this country has incarcerated children and adults for far less serious offenses for years and in some cases for life. It is evident that the wealthy and powerful among us are above the law. Just as Bush-Cheney will not be held accountable for breaking the law, the US House of Representatives speedily pushed through a resolution condemning the Goldstone report, which showed Israel and Hamas committed war crimes in the lead-up to and during Israel's invasion of Gaza. The House measure, which passed by a vote of 344 to 36, called the Goldstone report "irredeemably biased and unworthy of further consideration or legitimacy." It urged the Obama Administration to "strongly and unequivocally oppose" any discussion of it at the UN. In other words, it must not be spoken about, because Israel, like the powerful and wealthy people that run this country, is above the laws that govern mere mortals. There is no 'rule of law.'

Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes Phone Calls

Email www.huffingtonpost.com ...AZ GOP Committeman: Ask "Brown People" About Crime in Tucson...An Arizona Republican National Committeeman called a Tucson conservative talk radio program last week and advised an Arizona Democratic County Chairperson that if he wanted to learn about crime in Tucson he should "ask the brown people." Bruce Ash called the Jon Justice show to discuss Proposition 200, an unfunded proposition on the Arizona ballot which would mandate a hiring ratio of 2.4 police officers per 1,000 residents. But for the first few minutes of his on-air time Ash was focused on belittling Jeff Rogers, Pima County Democratic Party Chair. Ash said Rogers "sits in his little house in midtown, with his kids who go to school, with his little job...in his little neighborhood," and then, in a startling assertion, accused Rogers of being "blind to all the crime" because Rogers didn't live in a Hispanic neighborhood: "It may not be happening in his neighborhood but you ask any of the brown people who live on the South side, or the West side, or the South Central side of Tucson." Statistics tracking crime and neighborhoods kept by the Tucson Police Department do not support Ash's suggestion that crime is higher in Hispanic neighborhoods.

Email http://jurist.law.pitt.edu...UN rights investigator warns US drone attacks may violate international law...By Amelia Mathias...UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions Philip Alston said Tuesday that the use of unmanned warplanes by the US to carry out attacks in Pakistan and Afghanistan may be illegal. Alston criticized the US policy in a report to the UN General Assembly's human rights committee and then elaborated at a press conference... "My concern is that these drones, these predators, are being operated in a framework which may well violate international humanitarian law and international human rights law. The onus is really on the government of the United States to reveal more about the ways in which it makes sure that arbitrary executions, extrajudicial executions, are not in fact being carried out through the use of these weapons. The response of the US is simply untenable, and that is that the Human Rights Council and the General Assembly by definition have no role in relation to killings that take place in relations to an armed conflict. that would remove the great majority of issues that come before these bodies right now." Alston's report was presented as part of a larger demand that no state be free from accountability. The US government responded that its position is that such attacks are carried out in a war zone where the UN has no role. The controversial attacks have killed about 600 people in northwestern Pakistan since August 2008, including around 400 militants. US Senator John Kerry said this week that the attacks would continue, claiming that they have been successful in combating al Qaeda and have resulted in minimal collateral damage.

Email http://www.archpediatrics.com ...Food Stamps Will Feed Half Of US Kids, Study Says...By Lindsey Tanner...Food stamps are a Department of Agriculture program for low-income individuals and families, covering most foods although not prepared hot foods or alcohol. For a family of four to be eligible, their annual take-home pay can't exceed about $22,000. According to a USDA report released last month, 28.4 million Americans received food stamps in an average month in 2008, and about half were younger than age 18. The average monthly benefit per household totaled $222. Rank and Cornell University sociologist Thomas Hirschl studied data from a nationally representative survey of 4,800 American households interviewed annually from 1968 through 1997 by the University of Michigan. About 18,000 adults and children were involved. Overall, about 49 percent of all children were on food stamps at some point by the age of 20, the analysis found. That includes 90 percent of black children and 37 percent of whites. The analysis didn't include other ethnic groups. The time span included typical economic ups and downs, including the early 1980s recession. That means similar portions of children now and in the future will live in families receiving food stamps, although ongoing economic turmoil may increase the numbers, Rank said.