Private charity has never been enough. Look back to "Potato" Pingree,

[jtuck004]

who during the Depression that began in 1894 plowed 430 acres of city land in Detroit, and allowed 1000 families to farm on it.

They harvested tens of thousands of pounds of potatoes, other vegetables, but most of all they got to work together to make their own lives better. They got outside, worked with their neighbors, learned a skill. Because of a government investment.

When the most vulnerable people need it, the government is there with resources like no other. Well, back then, anyway.

A little bit about what they did is here

wiki has a little more on Hazen "Potato" Pingree.

[exboyfil]

1. Any democrat proposing that welfare

work in this fashion now?

[jtuck004]

4. Maybe too busy sucking up to the billionaires to worry about hungry people.

Or they will send them food stamps. How pathetic. Keep 'em in the fields...

And the rethugs, busy sucking up to their own billionaires, think private charity is the answer, despite the fact that in 200+ years it has never delivered.

I hope Wisconson didn't teach everyone it's all about money, but I am betting that is what the message will be. It's too bad, because there are millions that would turn out if they thought someone was REALLY on their side, instead of just people who praise the god of business all day long - from both sides of the aisle.

Money can only replace human spirit when you don't feed the spirit. Then it is more powerful than any billionaire. We used to do that.

People no longer think government is something established for their welfare, because they no longer hear it. Oh wait, here's the job's act. Rehire a few thousand public employees, and give business more simply AWSOME tax breaks for hiring people.

Will they hire people with no demand for their products? Stay tuned.

And there is that tax credit for the suckers. I mean taxpayers. Oh wait - that last part - no job to file for.

Yet one more too small effort, a bill that ignores what government can do for what the business community can't.

[Scootaloo]

2. The entire point of government is to see the needs of its people are met

Otherwise, why have one?

Funny thing is, even right-wingers acknowledge this... And then claim that the only "need" is for lots and lots of police and soldiers. Tells you where their priorities lie.

[HiPointDem]

3. There were government-sponsored farming programs like that in many areas during the depression.

There is an neighborhood where i live that started as such a program. it was kind of swampy waste-land and was set up as a kind of internal homesteading scheme - supercheap land to build and farm on.

here's one:

A Brief History of Penderlea Homestead Farms, Inc.

Penderlea Homestead Farms, located in northwest Pender County, North Carolina, was the first of 152 homestead projects developed in 1934 under President Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal. The purpose of the homestead projects was to provide penniless tenant farmers, bankrupt farm owners, and unemployed ex-farmers during the Great Depression with a means of making a living. Providing for self-sufficient rural communities also eased the burden of over-crowded cities.

http://www.penderleahomesteadmuseum.org/facts.html

[jtuck004]

5. Thank you for that. n/t