"Put Me In Charge"

How dare Mr.Evans use common sense or hold people accountable for their own decisions. Doesn't he know that everything is Bushes and Harpers fault.

Just a reminder that there are freeloaders on both ends of the $75 billion food stamp program - of course the entitlement zombies who abuse the system, but also corporate welfare cronies who encourage government to keep the lush program in place. I read where over 90% of SNAP money goes to the 3 top US retailers and 6 largest processed food manufacturers - who ALL, incidentally, show up in the top 20 corporate doners to the DNC.

That's how the commies did it in the FsU and east Germany.

My buddy Andy had one of the best ideas I ever heard for welfare recipients.

In order for a recipient to be eligible for a welfare cheque, he/she would be required to report to a hall for eight a.m. They would have to sit in a chair from 8 to 10, then they'd get a 10 minute break. From 10:10 to noon, they'd be back in the chair. One hour lunch period, then back in the chair until 5 p.m. with a 10 min. break mid-afternoon. Repeat process 5 days a week as long as they want welfare.

So, you'd have to get up in the morning, no TV, no 'puter, no drug-dealing, no taking a taxi to the beer store at 10 a.m.

How do you ever expect to get these people to vote for you if you make free stuff tough to get and keep?

The objective is to buy their votes, not make them vote for someone else.

Regards. . . Barry

I have fond memories of the time I spent living in military barracks. And in Canada at least (though maybe not in the US, as I have spent some time in barracks down there), they are not what they were like during WW11.

While there is no shortage of ideas on solutions, the goal at the end of the day, for those fit to work, should be to make a job at MacDonalds preferable to welfare.

Personally, I would like to see them (particularly the welfare Queens) farmed-out to Hutterite colonies.

I'd settle for welfare recipients not voting. That alone would be a tectonic shift in modern life.

Between that and ending public sector unions, half the work of cleaning up our over-governance problem would be done.

Just imagine the number of jobs that would come from those two little changes. It'd be like Christmas!

The best part of the article is denying the vote to welfare recipients. This is easily doable in the US as prisoners there don't have the right to vote in presidential and other elections. This one step alone would be enough to destroy the dumbocrats.

However, with so many RINO's around, don't look to them to come up with something that makes this much sense. Getting people on welfare to work is also a good idea but then one would have unions complaining that they're being undercut by "slave labor". Probably the best thing is to make those on welfare do the jobs that Americans won't do. It would have to be a job that would be hard to mess up although making a connection between how well one performs at ones job and whether one gets to eat that night would do a lot towards making these individuals understand the concept of responsibility.

I'd require all government cheques to be picked up at a post office with I.D.. I think half the people on government programs don't even live in this country.

Gatesville man surprised letter to the editor is an Internet phenomenon

A Central Texas man whose pointed prose about government assistance programs made him an Internet folk hero says he is surprised but delighted his words continue to reverberate in cyberspace.

Alfred W. Evans of Gatesville said he expected his “put me in charge” letter to the editor printed in the Tribune-Herald on Nov. 18, 2010, to resonate with others fed up with welfare abuse. But he never expected it to be emailed across the country, much less become such a phenomenon people would add in their own passages, make up a new identity for the author and even satirize it.

Perhaps the most unexpected development, Evans said, was when be began receiving money in the mail from people wanting him to run for office.

http://www.wacotrib.com/news/gatesville-man-surprised-letter-to-the-editor-is-an-internet/article_9d71fc0d-fc4a-58ac-a6e2-3bab28612253.html?mode=print

As a Libertarian I'm somewhat perplexed by some comments in this thread.

There's a difference between the truly unfortunate and those who are indolent by personal choice. We can't paint them all with same brush - that would be the easy way out. Already tried and found wanting. I don't mind looking after the needy 10% at all. But I am against the "takers" riding the wagon while I'm in the harness pulling it.

Sorry but thet whole post is pissing in the wind. If the people don't kkep their houses clean, are you going to let them freeze? If they get tats and do drugs will you refuse to treat them for cancer? If they trade their rice and beans for ho hos will you let them stave? The answer to those questions would be no. That applies whether you are asking politicians or your regular citizen.

Why not make paying income tax the reward for a vote. For example pay $1,000 a year in income tax you get a vote, $2,000 for a couple. This could easily be extended. Pay $10,000 a year in tax get 2 votes.

@john s: "Pissing in the wind".... correct but too soft. A sound condemnation is in order. This guy is simply saying "We know what will bring you around to our way and if it doesn't, we'll beat you again until it does." There are no "jobs" for these people. Automation and changes in industry and agriculture have made them unnecessary and obsolete. Without welfare there will be anarchy and revolution. The only good point made was about birth control. That in fact is the heart and soul of the welfare machine.

Welfare is a classic demonstration of corruption by Government.
The need is local, the old system of local charities giving help to the needy worked well.
Local funds,local accountability, censor of freeloaders by locals.
Now government departments exist to cater to their clients.
The need is still local but the money is despatched from a far, through many "helping hands" with no accountability and all with a vested interest in more cliental .
There is no one in government with any interest in keeping taxpayers off of welfare rolls.Nor in protecting public funds.
The canadian federal system penalizes welfare recipients who dare to get a job.
The number one punishment, the cut off of all benefits before they get even one pay check.

Related:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2469954/Boss-offered-job-vacancies-brands-unemployed-lazy-applies-roles.html

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2470005/On-Benefits-Proud-mother-Heather-Frost-questioned-filmed-paying-stolen-goods.html

Even making an allowance for Daily Mail spin, it's all pretty amazing.

I hate entitlements as much as the next guy, but these solutions are naive,simplistic, misdirected and outright dangerous. His no job no vote solution ranks right up there in the annals of stupid and is petty and vindictive. Instead of attacking the poor, why not the enablers in government who make it all possible. The poor much like anyone else will gauge a system. If it is available people will take advantage of it. This behaviour is unlike one that a corporation would make when it makes decisions that will reduce its tax liabilities payable to the people (ie Government). Sending billions to the Cayman Islands or Bermuda and calling it a direct investment in that country is obviously tax avoidance as there is nothing on these islands to invest in. These billions by the way that are sent oversees from Canadian companies to avoid paying Canadian tax amount to 4 times more then the cost of welfare. Welfare costs in Canada amount to roughly 24 to 30 billion, direct investment by Canadian corporations in shitty little islands that produce nothing amounted to 127 billion in 2011. Put me in charge and I will ensure the stupid emanating from some on the right never sees the light of day to embarrass the rest of us.

I'd vote you you.

No mention yet of the cost to hire the hundreds of thousands of additional government employees that this wild fantasy would require? Or are we all big government conservatives here?

There's probably a place for government regulation in welfare. I'd say the policy should be to make it hard to get and impossible to live on.