Miami Mean

Dear Friends,

I was struck by a report that I heard last night that a Miami City Commissioner had proposed making it a crime to feed the homeless without jumping through incredible hoops.  This morning I looked up the proposed ordinance (here).  The cover for this mean spirited action is food safety, but the fact is that it is yet another attack on the poor - those other people.  Miami City Commissioner Marc Sarnoff does not want homeless people around because it is bad for business.  So rather than working on eliminating homelessness he just wants the homeless to go somewhere else.  If they can not eat in Miami, then they will leave and as far as Marc Sarnoff is concerned the problem is solved. 

Here is an article about this ordinance and another one in Orlando that was just upheld by 11th Circuit Court of Appeals.  That ordinance applied to mass feeding.  The Miami ordinance applies to any feeding.  The ordinance seems way overly broad.  It says, "A person...providing food, without charge, to homeless individuals or other persons...on public or private property, may do so provided..." the person does so at a place on public property designated by the city or with the written approval of the private landowner if the person is registered with the city and if the person has taken the food safety course and if the food has been prepared and stored, etc.  What struck me was that if I lived in Miami and had some friends over for dinner and I did not charge them for the food, I would most certainly be in violation of this ordinance since I would not have met most if not all of the requirements.  Worse yet, if I am walking down the street and I give a homeless person a candy bar I just bought at the grocery store, I would be violating the ordinance.

It is this kind of meanness that is inherent in many of the positions taken by the Republicans these days.  If you do not have some type of universal health coverage or a strong government safety net, then there will be people that will not get health care, and they will suffer and die unnecessarily.  In fact that is happening today.  So when the Republicans say no to providing health care to the poor, they are really saying let them suffer and die.  It is time for all of us to call out the Republicans for the reality of their positions.

If you do not pass extended unemployment benefits, then families including the children in those families will suffer.  They certainly will not get the appropriate preventive medical treatment, they will not get  proper nutrition, and they will suffer now and in the future.  When the Republicans and Senator Ben Nelson filibuster the extension of unemployment benefits and then go on vacation, they are destroying real human beings who deserve much better treatment from their government and community.  President Obama needs to press for passage with an urgency that reflects the fact that we are destroying our fellow human beings.

The list of ways that our government is letting down the people of this country and the world goes on and on.  We can afford tax cuts for the rich, we can afford tax and other subsidies for big oil, and we can afford two immoral and unwinnable wars, but we cannot afford to give the basics of food, shelter, medical care and education to all the people of this the richest country in the world.

It is not just Commissioner Marc Sarnoff or Miami that are mean spirited, right now it seems to be the wave of the future of our country.  We need to change that.  We need President Obama to talk about this mean spirited trend, the way that he talked about racism.  In a post about torture, I referred to a quote that there can be no torture with empathy.  This country needs a heavy dose of empathy, because if we are empathetic we would never permit our fellow humans to be treated the way they are.

Thanks for reading and please comment,
The Unabashed Liberal