Tom Colicchio,
head judge of TV’s “Top Chef,” notes that “if Congress manages to cut $20 to
$40 billion” from food stamps, “there’s no way charity can make that up. All
the fund-raisers in the world are not going to get back to that number. Are we
O.K. with people starving in the streets?”
He is
a board member of Food Policy Action, a group to “support healthy diets, reduce
hunger at home and abroad, improve food access and affordability,” among other
goals, that now rates members of Congress on how they vote on such issues.
Not surprisingly,
members of the Tea Party fill the ranks of those who agree with Marie
Antoinette before the French Revolution that, if people have no bread, “Let 'em
eat cake.” If voters are paying attention, they may want to sharpen guillotines for the
November 2014 balloting.
Nobody’s
perfect, but Ohio Rep. Steve Stivers managed to score zero on averting starvation, while Missouri Sen.
Roy Blunt and Kansas Congressman Mike Pompeo were in single digits.
Not
only are Americans going hungry in the richest country history has ever
known but cheap nutrition among the poorest is contributing to bad health for the
future, with rising numbers of elementary school children suffering from high
blood pressure, high cholesterol, type 2 diabetes, even gallstones.
So we
have the spectacle of feckless politicians devouring the welfare of future generations in every
way possible. Only the Obamas are lobbying for their health.
Can
we really stomach that?
2 comments:
"If voters are paying attention, they may want to sharpen guillotines for the November 2014 balloting."
You are spot on. However, I think it is too late to reverse the pendulum already in motion for 2014.
American will probably see an R house and senate. Then slam dunk Hillary presidency in 2016.
Since former CIA Director George Tenet infamously misused the term, 'slam dunk,' perhaps we should wield it with a more healthy skepticism and leave nothing to chance. As Montaigne would say in his "essais:" What do I know?
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