On The Other Hand: The Balance of Beauty, Ugly, and Utility

On The Other Hand: The Balance of Beauty, Ugly, and Utility

World Hunger - Solution or Problem?

Did I hear it right yesterday – that Bush is suggesting that we spend $750 million of taxpayer money to help the hungry in the world? I don’t have any details – just heard the headline.

This sure sounds good – makes a good soundbite – but is it possible that we really want to do this?

Let me understand the lay of the land with regard to what we do as a nation to impact food supply around the world:

• The government takes my tax money, and subsidizes farmers to not grow food, in order to try and keep food prices higher.
• The government keeps food prices higher by controlling trade with higher prices as a goal, taking yet more of my money.
• The government takes my tax money, and subsidizes the use of food crops to create ethanol. This uses the tax money I give to them to subsidize something that I don’t believe in, with the result being higher food prices that I must pay at the store.
• I haven’t even gotten into the subsidies that they pay to the big agricultural firms and the big oil firms, all combining to continue the cycle of high prices that they have created.
• I haven’t even gotten into the moral implications of our habits and practices in this country with regard to how we produce and consume food.

I could go on, but from a purely fiscally conservative perspective, it would appear that the government uses a lot of MY money that they take from me in the form of taxes, and they use this money to ASSURE that food prices remain high, and that food availability around the world remains low. Then they want to act as though this is a problem that they want to solve, and of course, their solution to the problem is to take yet more of my tax money and throw it at the problem.

This is absurdity. What takes it from absurdity to the realm of moral crime is that they will most likely assure that most of this tax money of yours and mine that they say that they want to use to solve this problem will most likely go right into the pockets of the big agricultural firms to assure that the problem continues, rather than into programs and policies that might actually encourage independence on the part of poor regions of the world.

Can someone find a more clear example of moral bankruptcy?