Why Do We Allow Fellow Americans To Sleep On The Streets??

You know what I don't understand?  I don't understand why, in the United States, we have people living in the streets and going hungry?  I don't understand why homeless shelters and food pantries struggle to survive.  In this country, with all our resources, why do facilities that serve the downtrodden operate on shoestring budgets?  This is a nation that has spent over $10 billion PER MONTH to wage a meaningless war in Iraq for the past ten years, but we can't subsidize places for our friends and neighbors to get back on their feet?  We fancy ourselves this guiding light of morality, but we allow fellow human beings to sleep under bridges, in doorways, in bus depots, and under stairwells.  How can we justify this?  How in a nation that has so much can we allow this to go on?

Here is another thing that just grates on me....................  Have you, dear readers, ever stopped to think about how much food is wasted in this country?  I don't just mean what you and I buy from the market, allow to spoil, and then discard, although that also is disgraceful in and of itself.  I am referring to what restaurants and supermarkets discard. 

Here is a prime example.  Logansport, Indiana is a town of approximately 26,000 residents.  Last year, the food pantry in town distributed 11,500 bag of food.  While there are a select group of restaurants and stores, Little Cesar's being among them, that do donate a great deal of food to the pantry and the local shelter, the vast majority do not.  Have any of you ever seen how much perfectly edible food gets thrown away by your local McDonald's and supermarket?  Why can't this food be given to the less fortunate?  Why do we have people eating out of dumpsters behind McDonald's instead of having this food donated to the homeless shelter or even to a school?  Do they have some liability concern?  Can laws not be written to protect and even reward them for giving food away instead of tossing it in the bin?

Stop and think about this, folks.  How immoral and tragic is it that our dumpsters, garbage disposals, and pets eat better than three quarters of the human beings on this planet?  How horrible is it that the homeless struggle to find enough to eat, and their shelters struggle to fill their shelves and refrigerators while restaurants and markets throw tons of food away like so much garbage day after day and year over year?  I find this to be utterly disgraceful, and I find it unconscionable.

Peace and love, my brothers and sisters.