Left, Right, or Wrong?

Archive for the ‘unemployment’ Category

I was genuinely shocked to be alerted to a story about how a conservative National Review columnist thinks that our populace – as a whole – should guilt trip people on food stamps into feeling guilty for feeding their children. Yes, you read it right, guilt trip them – stigmitize them – for scraping by during a time when the country is recovering from it’s worst recession since the Great Depression. Not to mention that it is generally considered a jobless recovery.

It’s heartening to me to know that these ‘compassionate conservatives’ are looking out for us so diligently. What I want everyone to consider is – where would we be if such conservative pundits along side their GOP congressmen, got their way? What if all social programs were eliminated? What if there were no food stamps or social security or medicare or welfare of any kind?

Actually, we did live like this for a while – between 1929 and 1939. When the Great Depression hit our country, there were little or no programs under Hoover (a Republican) to help the jobless who became destitute. Under Roosevelt, work programs, government assistance to the jobless poor (1 in 4 people in our country) saved many families from complete destruction.

But conservatives think that we should stigmatize poverty and joblessness. They think that everyone is a welfare cheat – skimming the system. This is dangerous propaganda. But what is even more dangerous is when Democrats or independents go along with their conservative brethren.

There will always be a small percentage of people that take advantage of any system. But to postulate that all welfare or food stamp recipients are scamming the system is foolish and idiotic. And that is exactly what John. J. Miller did in his article in the National Review.