I keep hearing about family values, welfare, entitled people that are too lazy to work so they live this high life off the government and abuse everyone’s hard earned tax dollars. This is also being sized up in the current political atmosphere to state that if you are one of these Americans that you are less than everyone else and should not have the freedoms afforded to all of us hard working Americans. Politician’s rant and base their entire platform on the sacred American family and how they are so pro-family. Really?! Is that truly the case?  Are they really pro-family?  Are we as a country showing the rest of the world that we are pro-family?

What is so pro-family about the fact that elderly and disabled men and women in this country have to choose between living together and getting married? Does anyone that has the public’s ear really know anything about what it is like to be poor, disadvantaged, disabled, uneducated, sick, mentally ill or afraid you will become sick, poor or vulnerable person in America? Do we want to be a country that wants to be known as saving the injured, sick masses in other countries but curse the same kind of people in our own country?  If something doesn’t happen soon we will have to start asking the 3rd world countries to offer us assistance for our poor and disenfranchised population because our own self-righteous government will not do it for them.

As long as Politician’s can scare people with words like socialism, welfare state, and abortion (because we all know that the only reason a woman would want health care is to get an abortion…), that is what it comes down to –  rhetoric and scare tactics. It makes me ashamed.

I have worked with my family in Christian ministry since I was a little child. As an adult I have dedicated my career to the cause of the disenfranchised, vulnerable populations In my local county, I see with my own eyes daily the poverty, and destitution of mental illness, the plight of our children, and the helplessness of elderly. Through the years the ability I have to offer services to these people has been seriously impaired. I know that if the current trend continues we will have to face another social issue. ..the cost of burying the sick, forgotten mentally ill clients left to rot on our streets because there is no place for them to go and no one to guide them through the bureaucratic paperwork to receive assistance, such as it is.

I would like to see someone go out and try to get all the services that the Right Wing says we are providing for people. In my state there is no welfare. Single parents can receive some money for their children (if they don’t get child support) food stamps and health insurance. That’s it. If you are a childless adult, forget it. The GOP are talking about things they have no true idea of. When was the last time they tried to make it on $585 a month? By the way, this is the going rate for social security disability if you haven’t worked enough hours to qualify for regular disability.

Most people are afraid of getting work because they take away part of your check as you earn money. So we basically say “if you don’t work you are lazy,” but if they try to work and make too much (on part time jobs that offer no benefits)  then they lose their Medicaid insurance and part of their SSI check, making it impossible to even live (especially as many have disabilities and cannot survive without their Medicaid). Talk about blaming the victim! I agree we need reform, but not in the way most people mean.

We need to drop some of these restrictions so people will have a fair chance of really getting ahead. I’m sick of white, self-serving, fiscal conservatives that say they are “Christian” telling us how the poor man feels and how they are trying to live the high life on the government. You don’t know what you are talking about. Would you want to walk in my shoes for a few days? You could then see, if you’re not to blinded, the true situation.

I started this by talking about family values.  I thought a family value was to care for a family member when they are sick, alone, hungry…what happened to that? I also mentioned that if we are so big on a marriage between “a man and a woman” then why do we punish people receiving SSI for getting married? That’s right, if you get married they cut your huge allotment of $685 per person because you get married.

Why not have some real Christian values – compassion, empathy, a tender heart, love, longsuffering, patience, gentleness, meekness? The national and local candidates that emphasizes these Christian and family values will have my vote.

“Rantings of a Mad Woman” is a new column written for CDA anonymously. Mad Woman is a Charismatic Evangelical Christian baby-boomer, white, educated woman who is also a social worker of 15 years and county director of a large social services company. She is also a pastor, pastor’s daughter and pastor’s wife who tells it like she sees it. Facebook.com/rantingsofamadwoman – @Ranting_Woman