I know this photo was put in an open thread some time this week with the description, New Welfare Queens.
Well, it's not dying right now, it's the new meme that made it's way from the Los Angeles Times with this headline, "Michelle Obama serves food to D.C. poor and homeless, but..." The but of course is the man with the cell phone taking the First Lady's photo.
It doesn't detract from the first lady's generous gesture or the real needs she seeks to highlight to ask two bothersome journalistic questions about these news photos:
If this unidentified meal recipient is too poor to buy his own food, how does he afford a cellphone?
And if he is homeless, where do they send the cellphone bills?
And now it's of course another bogus right wing talking point from a blog post at the LA Times with a simple question like this. The comments at the LA Times say it all and the bulk of them are understanding of the circumstances, people who have pay as you go cell phones that cost them no more than five or ten dollars a month is like a life line to the real world and the possibility of finding a job. It's a lot less than feeding themselves for a month and paying rent.
I see this as willful ignorance on the part of the right to spread the ill advised meme that those who don't have anything should never have anything. That when you fall on hard times it means you deserve to stay down. And that hand up that we all need from time to time has no part of the "ownership" society.
It's the continuing idea that those on top deserve to stay there and that if they are put upon by those who don't have as much, they might as well go on strike (I wrote a diary about this but Hunter did a much better job on the front page today with much praise). And as much as we'd like that, they won't, the upper eschalons of society won't be able to put down their golden spoon, whether they were born with it or simply lodged it up their own ass, they refuse to let go of the good times.
So how do they hope to keep going, to threaten those on the bottom, who have the least that they will keep them down if someone dare question what they have. But don't you dare show up to a soup kitchen with a cell phone, you might actually have a chance in your hand to move up and a chance for something better despite the best efforts of others to hold you back.
Of course it's not that sinister, it's just like piling bricks to build a wall and that every little story such as this one is meant to build a brick wall of lies, which at one point becomes almost impossible to topple. There's just too many of them, how could they all be lies? Of course it's that easy, it's the only thing the Republicans have in their hand right now.
See how they build with their bricks, below just some of the comments from conservatives...
Conservative blogger Michelle Malkin was one of those who joined the resulting scrum, writing that the photo "ruin[ed] what was supposed to be a sob story photo op of the compassionate Mrs. O catering to the downtrodden." She, in turn, linked to another blogger, Kathy Shaidle. Shaidle -- who is, to put it politely, not a particularly nice person -- wrote:
Today's "poor" are the rich Jesus warned you about: fat, slovenly, wasteful of their money and other people's...
He spends all his (our) money on cellphones and, most likely, tattoos and drugs and booze and other crap, and has no money left for a home and food. And why should he bother? We pay for his shelter and food anyhow...
What's really funny in that news story by the way is what they're serving at the soup kitchen: risotto with brocolli. Obviously some rich white liberal did the cooking that day, feeling all proud of herself, and what thanks did she get? Some lowclass loser going, "You expect me to eat this weird crap?!"
It just comes down to pure selfishness and greed and that's about it. It's my money, how dare you spend it in any other way than how I say you should? But of course, it's my money too and I would rather have this young man have a cell phone rather than a flat screen or a Cadillac.
We know this entitlement, the entitlement of the rich who believe they should shape policy, priorities and regulations that suit only their bank account's welfare but how dare you, how dare you spend MY money to give yourself a leg up.
It's mind boggling I know and it's cruel. It's like trying to reason with the four year old who won't share his favorite toy, there is just no talking him down until he's had his red faced, kicking about tantrum. But for Conservatives they happen on CNBC and Fox News on a daily basis and they dare to call it NEWS.
I've been referring to this phenomenon as an extension of "Intelligent Design" and that those who wind up on top did so like a magic hand of God came and gave them the divine touch, they were destined to be on top and the rest of us are here to serve only their needs.
We know the truth, we know there was a teacher or a mentor or somebody that inspired them to do more and be more. And I don't knock their hard work to get where they are but at the same time, success takes a bit of luck as well. It doesn't happen in a vacuum though.
So that's my rant tonight, as I try to grasp why Conservatives are so hell bent on dying with it all and not living with the real world where shit happens and we all sometimes have bad thing happen to us, even good people have the world push them into the mud. And even the evil wind up with their golden microphone and their million dollar contracts, it's just not as simple as the world of Ayn Rand.