Poverty and Politics

I wanted to take a minute to examine this picture I have seen going around.  This is nothing against the person who posted it or of those for who this may be true.  It is an examination of how this argument is often used.

Something like this is often brought up in response to a conservative talking about reforming the program or cutting the budget.  The intent is often to paint anyone who is for reform of the program as mean spirited cruel bigoted individuals who want people to starve and making grandma choose between having electricity or eating dog food. This statement is just as bigoted as it claims the other side is.

This argument is also used to stamp down and mute out the truth about the massive fraud and abuse that IS in the program. Because someone points out that truth is not them calling every individual on food stamps names or stereotyping them.  It is people who wish to truly help the people who need help and don’t like that help being abused by those who do not need it.  We are not going to be able to help anybody if we keep going further into debt, in part, because the conditions are made to force people onto a program and then secondly that the program is not policed to prevent the fraud and abuse from occurring. 

Maybe it is not popular to stand up to this sort of message, but it is the truth.  What we need to do is set the conditions for people to get off of food stamps by having jobs.  By more people having jobs, we will have a larger tax base to help those who are still in need.  We need to balance the budget and pay off the debt.  If we keep borrowing we will go bankrupt and won’t be able to help anybody.   We need to stop giving away money we don’t have to people who don’t like us and use that to help our own.  We need to begin teaching biblical morality to our children so that people will be a little more responsible as adults and there won’t be such a high crime rate that keeps jobs away from the cities and poorer areas.

Those things are not bigoted statements or stereotyping.  They are reality.  Until people began grasping those realities and implementing them, we will go bankrupt and everyone will be stealing from their neighbor just to survive.  Instead we stereotype those people as being bigoted and accuse them of stereotyping the poor.  There is not much time left before this house of cards falls down and there will not be any assistance or opportunity for success for anyone.

Be Careful What You Wish For

In the book of first Samuel, we have a situation where Israel asks God for a king (roughly chapters 6-10).   Up until that point and time Israel lived with a very democratic system of governance.  They had their individual communities and tribes and elders all loosely knit together as a nation.  Each community had judges and governance was very participatory and required involvement on the part of the people.


Israel, as usual, was not happy with this system and wanted to be like other nations that had a king over them.  Why they were not happy, I don’t know.  Maybe it was just easier to have a king make all the decisions for everyone rather than everyone having to put forth an effort to govern themselves.  (sound familiar? Lol)   Anyway, they were willing to give up a certain part of their sovereignty, I suppose for a little security.  They had, after all, been at war and maybe they felt a strong centralized government would better serve them against the terrorists that kept invading.


In a blog I as reading, the anonymous author said this, “As well as a rejection of God, I see this choice as a rejection of community. In the systems of clans and judges there is room for debate, for consensus perhaps; but with that room comes messiness and effort. It is, I think, the harder route.


When you try to live in community, when no one person is ‘in charge’, then you have to be open to listening to others and to questioning yourself. You can’t just follow the rules, you have to engage with them, test them, even challenge them, or their interpretation. You have to be willing to change.


When someone is telling you what to do from on high you don’t need to wonder if it’s right or wrong, you don’t need to inquire into yourself; you’re just following orders.
In this, latter, model there is no personal responsibility. There is no group ownership of faith.”


When I look at our nation, I see a very similar path as what the Israeli’s had taken.  When we first started out, our model was of a small central government and each of the states being rather sovereign in and of themselves, governing themselves as they saw fit. It required effort, involvement, and that willingness to battle it out in the realm of ideas. 

Over time, we Americans wanted less and less involvement and we wanted more and more to be told what to do.  We also wanted more and more of what could be given to us rather than earning it.  Too, it was our desire that our  personal responsibilities in taking care of ourselves and our families, as well as our communities be dictated to us.


It then come to me as  no surprise that we find ourselves in a situation where we have a dictatorial government that wishes to control every aspect of our lives and no longer respects the sovereignty of the state, county, or municipality.  Those entities have been bought out and made dependent upon the federal government, and the people gladly handed off the responsibility so their own lives would be easier.


The people got what they asked for, but hadn’t thought out the consequences.  Now a number of people are beginning to regret the decisions they made, and are beginning to see the need to take back the power they gave up.  It will not be easy though. Those who hold such power are not prone to just handing it over.  I don’t recall too many times in history where a government just handed over their authority to the people without the people forcibly taking it.

Be careful what you wish for.  You just might get it.