"Show me the money....I mean Poor!

This is a quote from the Crookston Daily Times Editorial section by N. Ostgaard under an article headed: "Growing hunger poses a problem for Minnesota, nation" in it she said: "Unlike government programs, food shelves depend totally on donations from corporations and individuals, grants and volunteer workers to keep them running."

OK let's get this on the table right now. I'm pretty much a Democrat AND I'm a Christian (if you're telling me those 2 things can't exist in the same vessel..let's save that discussion for another time) I feel a great responsibility to take care of those who either can't, OR have fallen on tough times. HOWEVER I disagree with the previous comment. First of all I've only been to 3 food shelves in the area so I don't have a wide exposure to this, BUT at all three there have been stacked to the ceiling boxes of GOVERNMENT cheese and other commodities so I don't understand the comment. WHAT I DO UNDERSTAND is that many of the foreign kids that I have hosted for a year of school have gone and spent a day "volunteering" at a food shelf and finally I stopped having them do it for just ONE reason. They would come back and tell stories of family after family that came and got free food, and they helped them carry the food to their vehicles. They were telling me about sports cars, new sports cars, and nice SUV's...about stereos that they only were able to DREAM about having and yet here were these people getting free food. At the same time I'm in the grocery store with my kids showing them how to save money by buying generic rather than name brand and watch for sale items of things that we normally use. Top that off with my questioning of them asking them if any of these people were smokers and it was almost 100%. HMMMM. So do I think we should stop these programs. NO NO a thousand times NO, BUT I do think we have to find ways to provide for the needy without supporting the lazy. AND IT SEEMS that if someone is capable of coming up with 5 or more dollars a day to smoke (150/month $1,800.00/year) , they don't need my help to eat. But no one wants to take on such issues because it seems not politically correct. When did it become NOT PC to try to stop corruption? Why do we not try to make these programs better rather than ignoring them because we're afraid of what others might think? It's time to speak out. I still have faith in our legislators, we're just NOT TELLING them what we want!