Food Stamp Police: Opinion Piece

I came across an interesting article which reveals two republican lawmakers in Florida want to take away the ability of food stamp recipients to purchase junk food.  Isn’t the GOP the party of getting government out of everyone’s personal business?  Republicans have been attacking Michelle Obama for her healthy food options initiative in schools to decrease obesity in children. This smacks of hypocrisy.  Republicans accuse President Obama of engaging in “class warfare” because he espouses everyone doing their part in bettering the economy by paying their fair share in taxes.  There is definitely some class warfare going on, and it is an outright attack on the poor.  Poverty is an issue mostly avoided by both political parties, but when it is brought up, it is usually to accuse the poor of dragging down the economy.  I watched an interview with presidential hopeful, Mitt Romney, this morning, where he stated that he was not concerned about helping the extremely poor citizens of this country.  I am sure you can go to www.cnn.com and see the clip from this morning’s show with Soledad O’Brien.  How shameful and downright frightening that you have someone who wants to president but has issues with helping the poor.  If you claim to be concerned about the economy and getting people back to work, this includes the poor!  Most poor people do not want to rely on government assistance, they would rather be working. How about having an attitude of compassion and understanding?  How about realizing that to really make this country as great as it has the potential to be, you must have a passion to decrease poverty?  A country is only as great as its ability to care for the poor.  Our president has been called the “food stamp president” which I find to be a racist comment.  The deep recession caused many people to have to get government assistance, many for the first time in their lives.  Somehow derogatory remarks against poor people have  become acceptable political talking points.  Stereotypes of people receiving government benefits are being perpetuated once again.  When government assistance is mentioned in the media, there is always an attempt to paint a recipient as mostly unmarried black women with a house full of illegitimate children.  Sound familiar?  If you are old enough to have lived through the Reagan years, you remember the analogy of the “welfare queen” that he used.  A welfare queen was said to be a black woman who had kids to get more public aid so she can drive luxury cars while she goes grocery shopping with her food stamps.  Bigotry in all forms is dangerous.  Stop making poor people the scapegoat of this bad economy.  It wasn’t poor folks who got us into this mess.  As a matter of fact, it was due to the greed of Wall Street.  Let’s get our facts straight about who and what was responsible for the economic collapse.  It is no wonder that many people feel Mitt Romney is completely out of touch with most Americans. How can he possibly relate when he is worth over a quarter of a billion dollars?  How can he expect to become president when he makes such tasteless remarks?   Shameful.

http://news.yahoo.com/theyre-food-stamps-not-junk-food-stamps-193200244.html;_ylt=Am7VCdsRf3dqe3Xp5HB2_k2oGL8C;_ylu=X3oDMTRvZnFlNzFrBGNjb2RlA2dtcHRvcDEwMDBwb29sd2lraXVwcmVzdARtaXQDTmV3cyBmb3IgeW91BHBrZwM5MzI3MDliNC04ZGM1LTNiZWItODFlMi05MjNjZmNhMTNkMDIEcG9zAzkEc2VjA25ld3NfZm9yX3lvdQR2ZXIDYjViNjU1MzAtNGQwYi0xMWUxLWJiYzctYjNlY2JlNjRmMTEx;_ylg=X3oDMTM5aWJzaGltBGludGwDdXMEbGFuZwNlbi11cwRwc3RhaWQDYzY4YzZhYTMtNWJhZS0zMGZkLWEyMWQtMzRhOWE5ZDc2YjkzBHBzdGNhdANlbnRlcnRhaW5tZW50fHR2BHB0A3N0b3J5cGFnZQR0ZXN0Aw–;_ylv=3