It’s no secret that Gov. Paul LePage is trying to eliminate general assistance, MaineCare, energy-saving programs, mental health programs and other socially responsible programs he calls welfare. In a way, I’m with him. I, too, would like to see a lot fewer programs to help the vulnerable survive.
The one difference is that I would like to see a lot fewer vulnerable people. And I don’t mean sweep the poor and vulnerable under the rug as LePage would like to do. I mean: Let’s stop creating poor and vulnerable people.
The best way to eliminate poverty and destitution is to do away with corporate greed. To deny that corporate greed exists is to deny that water is wet. Just look around you. Profits for banks and corporations have never been higher, and the numbers of the poor and vulnerable have risen accordingly.
Talk about redistribution of wealth. We have been redistributing the wealth for a long time, now: from the bottom to the top. It perhaps takes thousands of single moms with three or four kids to receive the same amount of assistance as received by tax breaks and subsidies gained by just one corporation.
Yes, I could agree with LePage to cut programs, as soon as we eliminate corporate greed. But, hey! Once we cut out corporate greed altogether, we just might find we will no longer have need of social services for the poor. We just might find that we have eliminated 90 percent of poverty.
Peter P. Sirois, Madison
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