Did it ever occur to this chick that homelessness, hunger and all these other problems are usually caused by the people who experience them? They are not the fault of government or the people who have a home, a job, food on the table, etc. because they worked to get those things. This country has plenty of opportunities for the good things in life -- more so than most countries and certainly more than wherever she came from. If people don't make the most of those opportunities, it's not the responsibility of those of us who did and do.
@Applewood Well,yes,and no. I have been homeless a few times,myself. I got out of the army with Agent Orange,but no disability rating on it because it wasn't officially recognized as Agent Orange,or service-related. As a result,I was only drawing $46 a month in disability payments,and BECAUSE of that 46 bucks a month,I didn't qualify for unemployment after 7 years in the army and ZERO civilian-related job skills. Also,this was in 1970,the VN war was still raging,and telling people I was a veteran,never mind a SF veteran of VN,automatically meant nobody was going to hire me. Psychotic baby-killer and junkie,don'tchaknow?
I actually had people refuse to hire me BECAUSE I had been a SF NCO. They came right out and told me they were afraid I was a psycho killer. It can easily get to the point where you just quit trying.
This probably made me aware of other people's positions than most. There were,and are,plenty of women abandoned with small children and zero options,for example. I even knew a guy in his 20's living in public housing and drawing welfare that LOOKED to be perfectly healthy,but had serious cancer problems and was in remission when I knew him. He still had plenty of problems with weakness and hospital appointments that pretty much kept him from getting a job. He also didn't have any family to help him out. Only child and both parents dead.
Sure,this sort of thing isn't epidemic,but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen.
There is also the "trap" of the welfare system itself. If,for whatever reason you are in the system for a few years,it's hard to break free for a number of reasons. One is it's hard to get a job when you fill out an employment application and have no job references for several years. If you are under 40 and SEEM to be healthy,prospective employers automatically think "prison". Even if it doesn't mean prison,it does mean "This goober has no work experience and I am going to have to train them",which means minimum wage job with no future.
Then,like it or not,there are the professional "baby mama's" that are retired in place because they are both ignorant and lazy,and welfare pays them a lot more than they could ever hope to earn from working menial part-time jobs. All they have to do is pop out another baby every few years,and they are rolling in the dough. This CAN be "cured" by forcing them to use birth control devices that are implanted and removable in the future ,and those who refuse lose their children to adoption services and are put out on the street immediately after refusal. For many,that is the only way to break the chain that ends up with daughter,mother,and grandmother,all living in the same public housing and all on welfare for life.
I am sure most of you probably personally know someone who needed these services at one time or another,due to no fault of their own. This is real life,and "stuff" happens/
