The Sin of Starvation. By Eric Smith

When people, for whatever rhyme or reason, are unable to acquire food to eat; when they become hungry & malnourished, their immune systems weaken, thus making them weaker and more susceptible to disease and as a result of this they inevitably become sick and they die; if not from starvation itself, then from the inevitable illnesses arising out of being malnourished. These are the facts; they are beyond dispute and not open for debate and therefore to willfully deprive people of their ability to eat as the Republican Party is doing now with its slashing of food assistance to the poor and the most needy; is not only committing a moral crime in the fact that the Republicans are actually killing people; they are also violating both our nation's Declaration of Independence and its Constitution which states that we are all "endowed with certain unalienable rights; among which are life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness."

When one is denied the ability to eat they are denied all three for there can be no "life, Liberty, and pursuit of happiness" when one is forced to go through life hungry. This country throws away more food in a day than many nations in the world produces to feed their citizens over the course of a year. To deny the hungry food to eat is no different than denying a person in an emergency room life saving care because of an inability to pay. If we ever started doing this; if children died because they were turned away from a hospital's ER because their parents or guardians couldn't pay the hospital bill on the spot, these same Republicans who are so gleefully denying food assistance to the most needy among us, would be among those who raised the loudest of protests over the cruelty of such a practice.

Yet what they are doing now in cutting food assistance to the most needy among us is no different and is in many ways it is far worse for to perish from hunger is to die a most slow and painful death; especially if one is a child. Now if America did not and/or was incapable of producing enough food to ensure several times over that every last one of its 300 million plus citizens could be properly nourished, then the policies they pursue in cutting food assistance while no less cruel, could conceivably be slightly justified as a cost saving measure.

Yet that is not the case. On farms all across the land unused grain is rotting, unsold livestock is being being butchered & sold to feed other livestock and hungry people in other nations. Restaurants make the rats & other vermin fat off the food they daily discard while in many of those very same back alleys where the rodents feast, men, women, and children, sleep and go hungry for lack of a roof over their heads and their inability to buy that very food which the nearby vermin feast on for free.

This is the Republican Reality; this is the Republican Party's version of an ideal America, and it is a sick, twisted version indeed; one that is totally undeserving of a nation of savages, let alone that of the greatest, most prosperous nation in the history of the world. A child can't learn if its hungry and a man and woman can't work to their full potential if they are malnourished; that is true of any living thing.

It is therefore in our vested national interests to ensure that every last one of our citizens is afforded the chance to eat; to take in proper nourishment regardless of economic status or race. This is what we must do or we must stop pretending being what we are not; a nation that cares, that believes in the sanctity of human life, for our acts of charity abroad mean absolutely nothing if we do not first act charitably on behalf of those who are most needy here at home. Feed Americans first Republicans for your fellow Americans are your first priority as they are the priority of us all.

Think less of Ukraine, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Timbuktu for a minute and more of your fellow Americans in need. Share some of your compassion with the poor, oppressed, and downtrodden in New York, Chicago, Baltimore, and Detroit to name but a few. Stop doing the right things for people abroad for all the wrong reasons and start doing the right thing for the right reasons for your fellow citizens here at home. A nation that is well nourished and well fed is a nation that is truly strong and so when people support policies that starve their fellow citizens; especially for partisan purposes; they are not being patriotic; they are acting as terrorists for deliberately starving someone is an act of terrorism against that person for to force that person to endure hunger is to force them to face terror, endure suffering, and face the terrible prospect of a long and painful death.

This is your reality Republicans. This is what you are now doing to your fellow citizens and yet you still have the gall to call yourselves patriotic Americans who are compassionate? Sorry, but your words are worthless at this point. If you think that denying food to the hungry is acceptable in any way shape or form then you are not patriotic, you are not truly American, and you are certainly not compassionate. That's just the way it is and that's just the way you are and there's not a damn thing you can say at this point that will change that.