NASA WE HAVE A PROBLEM!

NASA WE HAVE A PROBLEM!

(Huffington Post, Al Jazeera America)

(The Weekly Standard, Frazer Chronicle)

 

I’m sitting here in my warm house, secure in the fact that at least for the foreseeable future my wife and I won’t be bothered or threatened with unpaid bills, or where our next meal will be coming from. Our medical bills, life giving prescriptions and my cable T.V. are in no danger of being denied or turned off. Life at least for now is running along on a pretty even keel, and for that I am thankful.

 

However in our country, in our cities, inner cities, neighborhoods, villages, and in the hills and dales we are experiencing problems with people’s basic needs and status in their lives. Jobs are tight, money is, well…..hard to find, whether you’re looking for a job or you just want to rip somebody off. Pretty much, good luck on either search.

 

Did you ever wonder why people at food pantries or those folks who use food stamps at your local market are fat, look completely out of shape, are haggard, and have a forlorn look, an almost vacant stare? Do you, like me wonder why these people have three or four kids, who look unkempt, and always seem to be out of control, running hither and dither?

 

These types of people (a mixture at least here in Green Bay, Wisconsin), really know no exacting race or ethnic group of people. I’m sure in inner cities around the country; the demographics would dictate a majority of peoples of color, brown and black. However here in Green Bay the majority of recipients are white people, so the argument about lazy blacks or Hispanics, or Asians can’t be raised as an argument.

 

I’ve written about this malady in our country in the past, and if you’ve been paying attention, you know that I feel that there are a certain number of people, a small minority, that are going to need help from the womb to the grave…..it’s their plight in life, and really a disheartening, debilitating condition that just maybe, given the right direction, many of these people could be helped up to a better position, and a more productive life. Many of these people don’t want a hand out; they want a hand-up.

 

NASA DOESN’T HAVE A PROBLEM…..WE DO

The National Aeronautics Space Administration who always seems to be groping for taxpayer dollars is in a relatively safe place, like me and mine, they get by rather well…..thank you. I just used the heading today because I thought it sounded neat, and it was kind of a metaphor…..(although NASA doesn’t have trouble getting money, poor people do.)

 

The United States Department of Agriculture oversees the United States food stamp program, technically known as SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. The program is operated by state governments under the oversight of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Anybody can apply for SNAP, but you and others in your household must have meet minimum standards, and either must have, or will apply for a Social Security number and be either a U.S. citizen U.S. national or have status as a qualified alien.

 

There are a whole host of qualifying questions, conditions and residency issues that need to be addressed, meaning that there is a wide range of chances to fleece the program through all sorts of dubious activity. Conservatives scream about big government not functioning in a relevant fashion…..and at least in the case of SNAP, it simply isn’t true, the program structure itself is the problem, not the fed. If everybody dealt fairly and honestly, there would be no problem, trust by the fed never, ever works.

 

At the beginning of this year, the U.S. Department of Agriculture released new statistics regarding the SNAP program, and close to 48,000,000 people were listed as recipients and users of the program. Of course it didn’t break down which types of people used the program, like illegal aliens, college students, cheaters and those who were ineligible but still received help because they were ignorant to the eligibility, or more to the point ineligibility.

 

I’ll be damned if I’m going to get into why American citizens should be eligible for SNAP, it’s a tired argument and one that has been argued here before. All I’ll say is that Republicans seem to be like law enforcement, all perpetrators are guilty until they prove themselves innocent.

 

What I mean by that is that some people need assistance, just like the Pentagon, or the returning hero’s from the ravages of war…..or the National Aeronautics Space Administration. I simply do not care who wants, or needs, if some simple rules, and criteria are laid out, and are passed…..bam, assistance happens right now.

 

ISN’T IT FUNNY

Did you ever notice that whenever a public school runs into a bonding issue problem, no matter what the money is needed for…..if it’s not passed, there is a threat by school administrators to cut music, cut sports, and much of extracurricular…..the issue is held over the taxpayer every single time.

 

The Federal Government is quite the same as our local school systems, they threaten to cut off programs that our necessary for our people to at least maintain a semblance of a normal lifestyle. It’s flat-assed wrong, and by the short hairs of a Garthunk, we need to stop the action henceforth.

 

I can write or talk about this issue flippantly because the issues of homelessness or needing public assistance don’t really touch me…..at the present time. But for whatever reason conservatives seem to think that poor people have some sort of scheme concocted to rob their coffers dry…..and it’s simply not true.

 

Being born into poverty is not a choice, it’s simple a roll of life’s dice, and many, many people born into poverty do not escape this weighty condition…..it’s a fact of their lives. Want to hear a zinger about folks who are on the public dole…..try this one on for size, Texas lead the U.S. with 4,038,440 recipients drawing on SNAP programs.

 

Can’t believe it, well it’s true, on average, in 2012; Texas had one in every six Texans getting food stamp help. Washington D.C. which I believe is the site of our Federal Government’s workshop, with an estimated 617,996 population had 141,147 SNAP participants, roughly 23% of those living in D.C. of course no politicians or lobbyists allowed.

 

TALK ABOUT GOING TO BED WITHOUT SUPPER

A House bill aims to cut SNAP by some $4 billion dollars, or about 5% of the program, the vote was taken this past Thursday, September 19. Exactly what does this mean to American’s, well try one in every seven men, women, and children in the country. If the bill is passed it will strike a blow to the hungry and undernourished in our country.

 

Look whenever somebody goes to bed hungry in the United States of American…..arguably the greatest country in the history of countries on the face of the earth…..ever, it should be an embarrassment to each and every man, women, child, and lawmaker. There’s no reason for it to happen, we just need to prioritize our goals, wants, needs, and how we deal with not only our people, but the world at large.

 

Let’s just look at a few facts and figures that are unequivocally true; if there are just 10,000,000 people who need food stamps, if there are only 2,000,000 homeless, and if there are only 5,000,000 malnutrition kids, and there are only 5,000,000 people in need of medical treatment…..but do not have health insurance…..and we, as a nation don’t do anything to help…..we would be wrong spirited as a culture.

 

Now if you take the above figures and multiply them to maybe where sadly they are here today in the United States…..you then begin to see the folly of our elected legislatures that keep running out these insidious suggestions for fixing problems.

 

I don’t know about you, but I’m exhausted about the rhetoric coming out of Washington and the quick fixes that really aren’t. I’m gonna take a nap…..I’m out.

 

HAVE A NICE DAY!