The Party of No Ideas has finally come up with one: eradicate child hunger by sending your children to work at McDonalds, because they give a free meal to their workers.
This is the response of a Missouri State Representative to a summer lunch program to help Missourians who are struggling with the economic downturn.
State Rep. Cynthia Davis (R-O’Fallon) chimes in on how wasteful it is to feed hungry children during the summer, when they don't have a school lunch program to offer one good meal per day.
In her recent newsletter Cynthia Davis has the following words of wisdom to parents of hungry children:
Why have meals at home with your loved ones if you can go to the government soup kitchen and get one for free? This could have the effect of breaking apart more families.
Anyone under 18 can be eligible? Can’t they get a job during the summer by the time they are 16? Hunger can be a positive motivator. What is wrong with the idea of getting a job so you can get better meals?
Tip: If you work for McDonald’s, they will feed you for free during your break.
Families may economize by choosing to not waste hard earned dollars on potato chips, ice cream, or Twinkies. Perhaps some families will buy more beans and chicken and less sweets.
They are using a "crisis" to create an expansion of a government program. Parents naturally love their children and enjoy caring for their children just as much as ever during an economic downturn...Laid off parents could adapt by preparing more home cooked meals rather than going out to eat.
If you can stomach reading her full newsletter, there's lots of gruesome, heartless dreck contained within.
St. Louis Today features a story about State Rep. Davis, as well as the following sad statistics about child hunger in Missouri:
Ms. Davis chairs the House Special Standing Committee on Children and Families. In that position, she might be expected to have insight into child hunger in our state.
She might know, for instance, that about one in five Missouri children lives with hunger. That ties us with Louisiana for the nation’s seventh-highest rate, according to a report released last month by the hunger-relief charity Feeding America.
Or that the recession has pushed the number of poor Missouri kids who qualify for free or reduced-price school lunches by 8.3 percent this year, well above the national average.
Apparently not.
You can write State Representative Davis at cynthia.davis@house.mo.gov
UPDATE: Thanks, everyone, for the rec list. And thanks to everyone who filled in some biographical information on Ms. Davis as well as insight into her district.
If you can, try to counter her selfishness and lack of compassion by a donation to your local food bank.

Summertime, and the livin' is easy for State Rep. Davis