By Robert Dean
For Carter County Times
When people cheer for a government shutdown, they’re not “owning” politicians; they’re hurting working families. As of late October, the U.S. Department of Agriculture warned that 42 million Americans — roughly one in eight — could lose or see delays in SNAP benefits if the shutdown drags on. That means empty pantries for seniors, disabled workers, and low-income parents. The Associated Press reported that Head Start programs in 41 states and Puerto Rico are already bracing to cut off care for 65,000 kids if funding isn’t restored by November 1. These aren’t numbers off a liberal cheat sheet; they’re skipped meals and parents missing work because the preschool shut its doors.
You can’t call yourself pro-life and cheer for policies that starve kids. A moral country feeds the hungry and protects the young.
People still buy into the old “welfare queen” fairy tale — the woman who keeps pumping out kids and milking the system. That lie’s been around since Reagan, because it’s easy. Sure, a few take advantage. So what? I know working families who stay unmarried because a little grocery help keeps them afloat. Everyone deserves a roof and three meals a day. That shouldn’t be up for debate — not while our tax dollars keep digging graves for wars nobody wants.
The reality doesn’t match the myth. Census Bureau data show white Americans make up about 43 percent of welfare recipients, Black Americans 23 percent. And according to the USDA, fraud in SNAP is under 1.5 percent — less than what most corporations lose to bookkeeping errors. These aren’t freeloaders; they’re your neighbors who fix your truck, bag your groceries, and teach your kids. If the system caves on them, it’ll cave on you next.
And don’t let anyone kid you about health insurance. When premiums go up, working people bleed. A Reuters analysis put the average family plan at $27,000 a year — up 26 percent since 2020 — driven by higher drug prices, hospital mergers, and plain medical inflation, not by some imaginary mob of freeloaders. Free-market types love to gripe about waste, but the goal isn’t to scrap insurance. It’s to fix it before it eats the middle class alive.
When premiums spike, wages freeze, jobs vanish, and families slip closer to the edge — the same families you say you stand with. Don’t fall for the dog-and-pony show. Vote the clowns out.
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