Raise the Hammer

A Smith, again you refuse to answer the most basic of questions. Is it because you are ashamed of your answer?

Certainly current policies regarding forcing the mentally impaired to get help add to the homeless problem, but it is not the only factor. That aside there are others not mentally ill who have frozen to death or died in other ways. At present it is very difficult for some in our society to get by and taking away welfare would make it all but impossible for them. Just trying to show you how far from reality you are when you say "Keep in mind that the poverty I am talking about is something that does not exist today (at least in Canada), but true life threatening poverty." At least I think you were trying to say that, that kind of poverty does not exist in Canada today.

Your whole cause and effect from the thirties is a little out of whack. The massive government spending on the WWII coupled with circumstances forcing people to believe in the whole economic system again is what ended the great depression. When people felt they had to take the money out of their mattress and spend it or put it into war bonds, that brought about the end. The return of massive number of troops from years abroad getting married buying homes having children and spending, spending, spending really fueled the economy. And what were they spending you ask. It started with their salaries from the armed forces.

Like today's recession the thirties was about lack of confidence once the confidence returns the recession ends. Today's recession will end when people start regaining their confidence and start spending. A while back the states mailed out a lot of cheques hoping that people would spend it and kickstart the economy. The reason it didn't work was too many of them used it to pay the visa bill or something similar.

I think government spending needs to be curtailed not maintained, especially at provincial and federal levels. Our municipalities are still trying to cope with the downloading from years back. Our health care system is a mess yet the province refuses to look at a 2 tier system or some kind of user fees. having a MRI centre available for anybody who has the money to pay for it helps everybody. OHIP doesn't have to pay and that leaves more money for everybody else. On top of that it means there's one less appointment for the rest of the system to deal with. Everybody wins. Just one idea but there's lots of things that can be done.

I am very much for smaller governments yet I do not believe we should let people starve. The two are not mutually exclusive.

So will you ever answer my question? Or are you just going to keep spouting gobbley gook and hope nobody notices?

In the end do we let the unfortunate starve?