Like, Totally

--Rick Scott at Naples homeless shelter
on Thanksgiving thinking,
"What are those things in her hair?"

You're a rotter, Mr. Grinch
You're the king of sinful sots
Your heart's a dead tomato
splotched with moldy purple spots
You're a three-decker sauerkraut
and toadstool sandwich with arsenic sauce!
--The Grinch Who Stole Christmas (1966)

"It is required of every man,"
the ghost returned,
"that the spirit within him should
walk abroad among his fellow-men"
--A Christmas Carol, Charles Dickens

"Me and my old school pals
had some mighty high times down here
And what happened to you
poor black folks, well it just ain't fair"
He took a look around, gave a little pep talk,
said "I'm with you" then he took a little walk
--How Can a Poor Man Stand
Such Times and Live?,
Blind Alfred Reed
__________________

If there's one thing Lisa cannot countenance, that is hypocrisy (OK, and lies, and willful ignorance, and cruelty . . .).

Florida's Governor "Pink Slip Rick" Scott is so utterly unctuous, so venomous to those most vulnerable in his state that it defies description. Posing for a photo op at a Naples shelter providing Thanksgiving meals, Scott said he "cared completely" about programs for the homeless, but his care is in the form of de-funding them so, presumably, they (the homeless) will go away (maybe to Missouri -- isn't that where they sent a lot of the Katrina refugees?)

Says Scott, “We've got to make this a place people can do well.” Apparently, there is no room in that plan for rehabilitation or giving someone one-down a leg up.

One Jacksonville homeless shelter official noted that Scott “zeroed out all homeless funding” — $7 million worth — in his budget proposal. That funding supported programs dedicated to homelessness prevention, housing initiatives, and programs that “re-house” people once they’re on the street. “Not only that, he took out the line items so it can never be funded again,” said the official.

To show how much he cares about the homeless, Scott went further by vetoing $12 million in funding that state legislature had passed to support homeless veterans. There are an estimated 17,000 homeless veterans in Florida — the second highest in the nation. Overall, a record 17.2 million Americans went hungry last year (Rick Scott says "I Care Completely" About Homelessness).

Earlier this year, Scott meanly proposed to eradicate Homeless Awareness Day and eliminate the $7 million funding for the Office of the Homeless which worked with housing coalitions around the state to innovate solutions for the state's estimated 58,000 homeless.

Meanwhile, 16.1% of Floridians suffer "food insufficiency", a nice way of saying they go to bed hungry, and there has been a surge in the numbers of children eligible for free school lunches. Florida was one of 11 states that had over a 25% increase in program participation over the last four years.

The NYT's reports, "Millions of American schoolchildren are receiving free or low-cost meals for the first time as their parents, many once solidly middle class, have lost jobs or homes during the economic crisis, qualifying their families for the decades-old safety-net program" (Lines Grow Long for Free School Meals, Thanks to Economy). It is a federal program, but I'm sure Mr. Scott, caring so completely in his own special way, would ax it if he could, in the name of making this a place "where people can do well."

The thing Scott misses is, the state needs to create a middle class to patronize the businesses he has so unspectacularly not drawn to the state. It should be in his state's interest to support those in need of the social safety net lest they go under completely.

To those staunch Objectivists: Your gated communities will not keep you safe from the abject desperation of your fellows.

[h/t to reader Deryle for the Thanksgiving piece.]

Grits Ain't Groceries, Redux

When rich speculators prosper
While farmers lose their land;
when government officials spend money
on weapons instead of cures;
when the upper class is extravagant and irresponsible
while the poor have nowhere to turn-
all this is robbery and chaos.
It is not in keeping with the Tao
--Tao Te Ching, Stephen Mitchell

There's nothing to hope for in politics,
I don't think
--Nick Hornby
_________________

Some spam mail brought my entry from two years ago to my attention (Grits Ain't Groceries). Predictably since then, the situation of "food insecurity" (= "hunger") in the U.S. has degenerated (even though I read the economy's going fairly swell, with a Dow over 10,000 again.)

"[T]he number of Americans who lack enough food [is at] the highest level since the government has been keeping track, according to a new federal report, which shows that nearly 50 million people -- including almost one child in four -- struggled last year to get enough to eat" (America's economic pain brings hunger pangs ). The Guardian UK notes that the statistics are probably more dire this year as the economy has degenerated (Number of Americans Going Hungry Increases.) Statistics like those make the Superpower sound like a Banana Republic.

Unless you're Al Gore or Rudolf Guiliani, you have probably noticed your grocery tab rising sharply over the past couple of years. Though the press attributes the steep rise in hunger to the unemployment rate, there is the concomitant problem of skyrocketing food costs.

In "Grits," milk was $3.50/gallon; it is now over $3.50 per half gallon -- double the cost. Other staples like eggs, coffee and meat have also risen precipitously. I remember grandma telling me 30 years ago, "Mark my words: You will see the price of a loaf of bread hit one dollar in your lifetime!" Now, it is at over 400% of her prognostication, and rising.

While an article on food stamp usage notes they help feed 36,000,000 Americans -- one in eight adults, one in four children, the personal allotment has not risen from an average of $110/month (Food Stamp Use Soars.) Can you imagine eating on $110 per month?

The NYT's Bob Herbert is one of the few columnist who routinely exposes how the sorry state of our economy affects its least fortunate members. From his Stacking the Deck Against Kids:

"We still have a hideously dysfunctional public education system, one that has mastered the art of manufacturing dropouts and functional illiterates. We have not even begun to turn that around.

"We still keep fighting tragic, futile, stupid wars, squandering lives and resources and creative energies that could be put to use right here at home, where the need for nation-building is beyond critical.

"The U.S. should be a paradise for young people. We need big changes in this country, approaches that are constructive, creative and fundamentally new, if we’re going to give those smiling kids I saw on Thanksgiving Day the kind of society they deserve"

There's not much else to say.