Homeless, Welfare and Our Obligation to Provide, How Much is Fair?

By Jack

I was listening to Armstrong and Getty on 650 KSTE today. It was interesting to hear them talking about my exact position on why we have this overpopulation of homeless in California. Getty said, “The word is out, California is like this (homeless) honey pot and this is where you need to be. The other states are telling them (homeless) we don’t care where you go, but you can’t stay here!” Referring to states that literally run off their undesirables with a free ticket to CA.

What I’ve seen showing up daily in little Chico looks exactly like the same kind of hardcore bums you can see anytime in the big cities like Chicago or New York. They are a loose combination of heroin addicts, burnouts, runaways, the mentally ill,  drunks,  criminals of all sorts, ex-cons and people just too lazy to work.  They have all found that that a lifestyle of being on the road, free to go wherever, take whatever, accept charity and hangout, fits them just fine!

It was nice to see this talk show hosts validating my longtime personal opinion. The greater majority of homeless I see overrunning Bidwell Park and Civic Center park are their because of really bad reasons, some noted above. However, from the discussions I have had online and from face to face talks with self appointed advocates for homeless (aka liberals), they’re operating under a totally difference perspective.

I know I’ve said this before, but its worth saying again. The libs have this delusion that these so-called homeless are generally just every-day sort of folks. There but for the grace of God go I kind of situation. They think they are people who in many cases have been laid off work and/or ran out of unemployment money, often through no fault of their own. Now these poor souls are forced by a heartless society, run by cruel republicans, to live on the streets. They tell us, this could be your mother sleeping on that park bench – shame on you for not caring about her! It’s coercion by guilt and labelling once again.

They think, or at least they say… the solution is simple. The homeless just need of helping-hand to get them back on their feet, back into being that productive person they always were or for others into an “out patient” treatment program for the mentally ill. For the later have sympathy, unless it was self inflicted brain damage. So they tell us, “You give them a basic income, a decent place to stay and free healthcare and the problem pretty much solves itself.” Oh, and they believe overall this is cheaper too. Well, common sense and my personal experience tells me that’s BS. It’s not that simple and it’s not cheap either.

The first problem to solving the homeless epidemic here is to deal with the delusional liberals, those that want us to pony up whatever it takes, to provide for the poor homeless. Once we get those dopes educated and dealing with reality, then maybe we can start working on real solutions that involve the nation as a whole. And not just Chico, not just sanctuary San Francisco or even sprawling Lost Angeles, this is a coast to coast problem.

The evidence is overwhelming, California, Oregon and Washington have become a dumping grounds for the homeless by the rest of the states and that’s not fair. We should be able to provide for our portion based on the demographics, but beyond that the aid stops. We should have no obligation to provide welfare for more than 10% of the CA population. Beyond that the buck stops, because we can’t afford it. This establishes rational limits to our charity. Limits mean we are obliged to prioritize (as in triage) our charity resources based on many, many factors, and providing for helpless and endangered children being chief among the priorities! Low on the list would be the “I won’t work” bums polluting little Chico Creek and leaving trash and stolen bike parts all over town.

Does that number of 10% sound too high or not enough to you? Would you be surprised if I told you that right now California offers more free stuff (socialism) than most European countries? We are indeed the welfare capitol of the nation. And we spend, spend, spend on caring for these derelicts. This is why 30% of the nations welfare cases are now residing in CA, yet we have only 12% of the nations citizens!

The Armstrong and Getty show closed the homeless commentary by noting the mass exodus of decent taxpaying Californians for better run states.