jenny erikson
Jenny EriksonUnless the politicians in Washington can come up with a budget for the fiscal year we’re currently halfway through, the government will shut down all non-essential services. The funding dries up Friday at midnight, which means that some 800,000 federal workers will be furloughed and also that Yellowstone Park will close temporarily.

The problem with creating a budget is that Republicans and Democrats can’t agree on how much money to spend and what items to spend it on. There are just so many ways to spend other people’s money that sometimes it’s hard to decide whether to fund menopausal yoga classes or blatantly biased media outlets.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi pointed out the key difference between the ideologies of the right and the left: Liberals care about their fellow citizens, and Conservatives don’t give a crap about starving seniors. OK, maybe I paraphrased a teensy bit. Here’s what she actually said:

In one of the bills before us, six million seniors are deprived of meals -- homebound seniors are deprived of meals. People ask us to find our common ground, the middle ground. Is middle ground three million seniors not receiving meals? I don’t think so. We’ve got to take this conversation from a debate about numbers and dollar figures and finding middle ground there, to the higher ground of national values. I don’t think the American people want any one of those six million people to lose their meals.

Ouch! If the party of Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan are stopping old people from eating, then I might have to turn in my GOP card. No wonder the Democrats can’t compromise with Republicans -- how can you compromise with people that want to deprive homebound seniors of their meals? Although, I am a bit confused as to how hiring people to stop neighbors, family members, churches, private charities, and others from delivering meals to old people is going to help balance the budget.

Republicans are not depriving seniors of their meals by cutting government-sponsored food deliveries from the budget. Republicans have faith in our communities, and believe that families and neighbors will take care of each other. The real question is why does Nancy Pelosi think so little of Americans that we’d let people starve to death? That must be what she thinks, if the only solution to senior citizen starvation is welfare.

I’m insulted by Ms. Pelosi’s imperceptive understanding of the generous spirit embodied by Americans across this great nation. 

To feed a senior, you can make a donation to Meals on Wheels.