After Olbermann swipe, Davis defends stance on food program
Davis
State Rep. Cynthia Davis’ quip that hungry Missouri youngsters could work at McDonald’s — where, she says, employees eat free during their break — led her to a spot on talk show host Keith Olbermann’s “Worst Person in the World” segment.
Today, the O’Fallon, Mo. Republican sent out a statement, defending her opposition to a program that provides food to disadvantaged youth.
It reads, in part:
When government takes over a family function, like feeding children on a daily basis, we take a group of people who are capable and treat them like they are incapacitated. Some have a low view of parents, presuming most of them are inept and proposing governmental intervention as the only solution.
I believe most parents are good and want the blessing and privilege of feeding their children. When families are sharing a meal around the kitchen table, much more is happening. Mealtime is the primary time for shaping values and strengthening bonds. All of this is missing or diluted when it happens outside the family. Look into your own heart and ask, “What made a difference in my life as a child?” Was it standing in a line for a cafeteria style meal at school or was it sitting around the kitchen table with others in your family?
All the children being fed in this program have parents or guardians who are already functioning in a nurturing roll. They have not been judged to be neglectful or abusive in any way. Government should not take the care of their children from them. The right way to help is to treat the root cause, not the symptom. We must support the parents in providing for their children, not circumvent them.
Davis’ statement does not mention Olbermann. Instead, it appears targeted at the Post-Dispatch editorial board, which wrote a piece critical of the lawmaker after the McDonald’s comment appeared in a newsletter to voters.
“My weekly Capitol Report is a way for me to have two-way communications with my constituents,” Davis wrote in today’s response, “and not a national manifesto for you to mock, distort, and to be quoted out of context.”
Doesn’t Ms. Davis realize that most of these meals are served during the day when the children of the working poor are at work. These meals are served in schools and churches that provide activities for children during the day while their parents are working and being responsible parents.
I really hope Ms Davis resign as the Committee Chairwoman for the SPECIAL STANDING COMMITTEE ON CHILDREN AND FAMILIES, as her mocking and heartless comments about hungry children in our state are truly appalling. MO is ranked 7th for children suffering from hunger. It is because of attitudes like hers that our state is viewed as a bunch of heartless hillbillies. I am a resident of the 19th District and she has embarrassed me and many other residents, and I hope the rest of the state doesn’t think that all the people that live in O’Fallon are bunch heartless people, that don’t care about the children living with poverty. I think she owes all of the hungry children in our state and the citizen’s of O Fallon a public apology.
I have also come to the conclusion that she is in fact not Pro-Life, but merely Pro-Birth, because she clearly doesn’t care about the life of these children after they are born.
She have made some inflammatory statements before this i.e. that men can’t be “natural nurturers” because the are not able to breast feed or give birth which she tried to deny saying until there was a audio clip of her saying this to a KOMU intern, or statements comparing birth in a hospital to rape during the debate on the midwife bill, but I think this one really takes the cake. Marie Antoinette hade more compassion than she does she at least wanted to let them eat cake. When she herself was caught using campaign funds to buy a truck and to her real estate tax bill, misused the city garbage collection for her business, or allowed her 5 yr old to wonder down Hwy K on Easter Sunday.
Cynthia forgets how she takes multiple plates of food from committee and lobbyist dinners to feed her hungry children when she is in Jefferson City. She has been observed at receptions wrapping and stuffing food in her oversized handbag. Maybe that’s what other hungry children should have their poor working parents do—just steal food to bring home to them.
I think before she decides what is a waste of tax payer’s money is; she needs to hand over the biggest tax waste in this state, her $36,000 salary for a part time job as a MO legislator that she hasn’t earned.