Ocassional Thoughts of an Independent Progressive Atheistic Humanist
There was an organized protest of Walmart employees timed for the largest shopping day known as Black Friday. Some cheap labor Republicans complained about the protests saying it was an attack on job creators by Unions. One of my conservative friends said that people should be thankful to have a job. When I hear that excuse for poor treatment of workers it makes me mad. Walmart is one of the worse offenders and if we didn’t have laws against sweat shops they would probably do that too.
The day after the election House Speaker John Boehner said he and the other Republicans would work with the President as long as he gave the GOP everything it wanted rather than the GOP compromising with the President. The general conversation in the belt-way media was about the ‘fiscal cliff’. The so-called cliff was created when the Republicans refused to co-operate with the Democrats and basically kicked the can down the road until after the election. The results of the election was clear. Any resolution to the ‘cliff’ will have to be based on the President’s plan, NOT the GOP’s plan.
If you agree with Jesse Kelly, the Republican nominee in Arizona’s 8th congressional district, that access to health care should be treated like being allowed to drive a car or own a cell phone then we are in some serious trouble in this country. Health care should be a right and not subject to the whims and bias of people who live in a bubble of their own existence.
Vanguard, on Current TV, is like 60 Minutes on steroids by focusing on one issue for the whole hour. After the Current TV special on the GOP Iowa debate held Saturday night, Vanguard showed a program titled “Two Americas” that compared and contrasted two families on either end of the income scale. One brief statement from the unemployed Dad parroted the views expressed by Ron Paul – that the social safety net should taken down and poor people supported by charity. His comments showed the disconnect I’ve seen before by poor Republicans who keep voting for cheap labor conservatives who steal from the 99% and give to the 1%.
The unemployed family of four moved to Houston, TX to get work after the Dad lost his $55,000 construction superintendent job. The Mom had just lost her $12 an hour job the previous month and the family was living on approximately $19,000 a year in unemployment – of course until it runs out. The other family of four had a Dad who is president and CEO of an energy trading company.
Just hearing the talking points makes me angry so forgive me if I sound angry. Someone will make a comment or bitch about “welfare queens” and about how these lazy poor people have wide-screen TVs and microwaves. If these comments come from friends and family, who should know better, it really drives me insane. Finally my hometown newspaper did me a solid and now I have some facts and figures to fight those biased FOX “news” talking points about poor people.
On Monday, August 22nd, the Findlay Ohio Courier had an article talking about the recent retirement of Judy Wauford, as director of the Hancock County Department of Job and Family Services (ODJFS). In Ohio, ODJFS handles the state and federal social safety net programs like unemployment, Medicaid, food stamps, and child support enforcement. The piece included some actual facts and data about the poor in Hancock county.