(The image above is from the website of moveforhunger.org.)In spite of record prices on Wall Street and record profits for giant corporations, these are not good times for most Americans. Millions of people remain unemployed, poverty rolls are growing, the median income is falling, and the middle class is shrinking. But perhaps the worst problem is hunger. A record number of people find it increasingly difficult to feed themselves and their families, and have had to swallow their pride and accept help from the SNAP program (commonly called food stamps).
The United States is still the richest country in the world, and none of its citizens should have to worry about hunger. The fact that hunger is growing in this country reflects a moral failure of our leadership (and our citizens, because they elect those leaders). The primary blame for this immoral failure in leadership rests with the Republicans in Congress, who demanded a $20 billion cut in food stamps and got a $4 billion cut (and then gave that money to rich agribusiness interests). But Democrats are not blameless, because they gave in and agreed to the immoral cuts in food stamps.
The lack of caring for the hungry by Republicans is illustrated by where the problem is the biggest -- and sadly that is in the states controlled by Republicans (the so-called "red states"). The Gallup Poll has just released a new survey on hunger in America (done between January 2nd and December 29th of 2013 by surveying a nationwide sample of 178,067 adults). The huge sample gives the survey a margin of error of only about 1 point.
They asked respondents if there was any time in the last year when they didn't have enough money to buy food for their family, and the results should shock and shame every person in this rich country. I list below the states with the highest percentage of people struggling to afford food and the states with the lowest percentage. The number in parentheses is the actual number of people that percentage translates into.
HIGHEST PERCENTAGE STRUGGLING TO AFFORD FOOD
Mississippi...............25.1% (750,792)
West Virginia...............23.0% (426,490)
Louisiana...............23.0% (1,063,858)
Alabama...............22.9% (1,106,922)
Arkansas...............22.5% (665,858)
North Carolina...............22.2% (2,186,269)
Kentucky...............21.8% (958,174)
Georgia...............21.5% (2,148,315)
Oklahoma...............21.2% (816,320)
Arizona...............21.1% (1,398,217)
Texas...............21.0% (5,554,120)
LOWEST PERCENTAGE STRUGGLING TO AFFORD FOOD
Alaska...............11.0% (80,864)
New Hampshire...............11.3% (149,550)
Minnesota...............11.6% (628,764)
Iowa...............12.3% (380,121)
North Dakota...............12.9% (93,317)
Nebraska...............14.5% (270,935)
South Dakota...............14.6% (123,352)
Wisconsin...............15.1% (867,149)
Massachusetts...............15.2% (1,017,309)
Illinois...............15.2% (1,958,084)
None of these states, whether they have a high or low percentage of hungry people, have numbers they can be proud of. A nation as rich as the United States should be able to adequately feed its own population. But the most egregious of these states are the Republican-dominated red states. That's because the Republicans follow the same failed "trickle-down" theory on both the state and national level -- a theory that says whatever is good for the rich and the corporations is good for all Americans. Of course, that isn't true and it is demonstrated by the disaster that theory has made of the American economy.
Note that Texas, the state Republicans have ruled for 20 years and which national Republican say is an "economic miracle", ranks 11th in the percentage of people who struggle to afford food for their families -- a whopping 5,554,120 hungry people. This really shouldn't surprise us. Texas leads the nation in the number of people and percentage of people who are working at or below the poverty level minimum wage. Texas may be an "economic miracle" for the rich and the corporations, but it is an economic disaster for a huge and growing number of Texans.
I don't wish to let the Democrats completely off the hook, but they at least are willing to make some feeble attempts to help hungry, poor, and unemployed Americans. Not so with the Republicans, who continue their "pamper the rich and ignore everyone else" policies on both the state and national level. They must be voted out of power in November.
