Notes from a bitch…hunger is hunger…

I apologize for another lengthy absence, y’all! As many of you know, I am an activist who blogs and the recent primary in Missouri took me offline for a spell.

Let’s jump right on in!

GOP nominee Mitt Romney selected longtime DC insider Congressman Paul Ryan as his running mate. Many a feminist has already begun to explore what a Romney-Ryan presidency would mean for reproductive rights, so I’m not going to go there just now.

What I can’t stop thinking about is what else Congressman Ryan brings to the ticket.

Yep, I’m pondering his budget and economic policies…and food.

Because Congressman Ryan’s current budget proposal would slash food assistance by 11 percent.

I’m not on food assistance, but my older brother is. Bill is 42 and autistic. As his guardian I know that he benefits from social service programs and suffers due to cuts to social service programs. Like many disabled Americans, my brother and his caregivers struggle to turn $160 per month in food assistance into 30 days of nutritious meals.

The right is trying to frame proposed cuts to food assistance as tough love.  They’d like everyone to think that people on food assistance are lazy freeloaders who are addicted to government assistance and who would benefit from the lesson of hunger.

But let me assure you that millions of people in need of food assistance…folks like my brother, who hasn’t seen an increase in that assistance for over a decade…are not lazy freeloaders in need of a harsh lesson any more than the elderly are or single mothers are or people who fell on hard times or [insert real person rather than bigoted stereotype here] are.

Special needs kids grow up into adults with special needs.

And adults with special needs are among the millions Congressman Ryan wants to cut food assistance to by 11 percent.

Hunger isn’t a motivator any more than slashing food assistance by 11 percent is brilliant economic policy.

Hunger is hunger.

That’s a lesson far too many Americans have already learned.

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