Jose Luis Montes De Oca Teodoro, Jopey Draper, Bruce Polite, Peter Wah, Duane Mark Anderson, John Joseph Summer, Maria Cook, Estaban Avail, Hoa Pham, Jonathan James Neilson, Diana Lynn Perea, John Carl Riggins, Sara Rose Tevlin, Patricia Ann Harper, Donald Whitfield, Johnny Ruper, Francisco German Moreno, Lavon Jones, David Tgom, Corneilus Vanderviers, Lindi Dileonardo, Allen Richard Stahl, Chris Ramon Juarez, David Pratt, Chris Long, Nicholas Bartell, Robert Ovedo, Efrem Vela, Robert Cisneros, Elva Garcia Navio, Manuel ROdriguez, Margaret Fay, Stanley V. Brockman, Thomas Farmer, Charles Parton, James Collier, Lee Garcia, Alan Ray Alsop, William Martinez, Rachel Richards, Franjo Plese, Deborah Corrine Leonard, Francisco Contreas, Charles Krinard, Efraim Ramirez, Kyle Baron Barnes, Kimberlie McLaughlin, Yolanda Thomas, Constance Hayes, David Sneddon, Donald Whitfield, Timothy Lee Holcomb, David Nicholson, Clovis Bessard, Rodolfo Cale Gonzalez, Hector Pencer, Phillip Lawes, Bruce William Dunn, Stacy Lee Drayton, Lindi Lawrence, Julie Herrera, Ian Brown, Ruth Carley, Emmanuel Gibson, Andrew Payne Mazilli, Sydney Barrett, Quey Xuan Ho, Quativia Johnson, Loveanisha Johnson, Samuel Criado, Ted Quesada
You walked by them as they sat there on the sidewalk, pretending you did not see them. In the wealthiest area (the Silicon Valley) of the wealthiest nation on the planet, they were the invisible people that nobody wants to acknowledge exist. Some were crazy, some were addicted to drugs and alcohol, some simply didn't have a job and were doing their best to try to figure some way to get out of the gutter, but two things all those people -- the youngest 27 years old, the oldest 66 years old -- have in common is this: a) They were homeless, and b)they're all dead, found on the streets, sleeping the big sleep, remembered only by a few social workers and do-gooders who refuse to admit that the richest area of the richest nation of the planet simply doesn't give a shit about anything that doesn't have a picture of a dead President on it.
And so it goes in the United States of Delusion, where we pretend that we are a kind and charitable people. The 71 people above salute you. Or would, if they weren't all dead.
-- Badtux the non-snarky Penguin
This isn't the "War on Poverty" I had in mind.
ReplyDeletei know how little love you have for sherrif joe (and the folks at the New Times are agitating for a recall) but the dude made me proud not very long ago. he held a press conference where he took the minutemens and other border militia motherfuckers to task for vandalizing our water stations. he showed pictures of folks who have died of thirst and exposure, then laid there in the desert while the scavengers did their work in the natural order. it was chilling and brutal. he said that regardless of what people feel, an agonizing death by thirst and exposure should not be the penalty for wanting a better life.
ReplyDeletehe's still a dick. still corrupt as any other small time badged thug. but he got that one thing right.
I just don't get it why some people think a horrible death is the appropriate punishment for the crime of simple trespass. Around these parts, trespassers get told to leave, and if they don't leave, the cops haul them off to jail, they get released on their own recognizance the next morning with a summons to see a judge in a certain period of time, and the judge eventually hands down a fine and a stern lecture about respecting the wishes of property owners. What kind of... animal... thinks that a horrible death is the proper punishment for that situation?
ReplyDeleteOh, but don't you understand? They were just too lazy to work. They probably froze to death waiting for government handouts or something.
ReplyDelete/snark mode off
PS: I bet some of those homeless people were veterans. Expect to see some Iraq war veterans joining them in ten years' time.