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Tuesday, Republican (obviously) Minnesota state Sen. Steve Drazkowski voted against a bill that would provide free breakfast and lunch for school students. That’s certainly his right, but he shamelessly flaunted his alternative asshole lifestyle when he offered his reasons on the floor of the state capitol.
“I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that is hungry,” Drazkowski said, in front of other people who could see and hear him. “I have yet to meet a person in Minnesota that says they don’t have access to enough food to eat.”
This is a little different from my not having met a leprechaun or an honest person who uses the expression “get my ducks in a row.” Hungry people do in fact exist. In Minnesota, 338,000 people endure hunger, and 121,140 of them are children. More than 13 percent of children in Minnesota live in “food insecure” homes. This means their households don’t have reliable access to enough food to keep everyone healthy. The free breakfast and lunch bill is about more than just people Drazkowski personally knows.
Here’s a clip of Drazkowski stuffing his dumb mouth with his foot. He’ll never go hungry again!
“Now, I should say that hunger is a relative term,” he added, grossly. “I had a cereal bar for breakfast. I guess I’m hungry now.”
Oh, he’s hilarious. However, according to the US Department of Agriculture, a “defining characteristic of very low food security is that — at times during the year — food intake of household members is reduced and their normal eating patterns are disrupted because the household lacks money and other resources for food.”
98 percent reported having worried their food would run out before they had money to buy more.
97 percent reported the food they bought just did not last, and they did not have money to get more.
94 percent reported they could not afford to eat balanced meals.
95 percent reported an adult had cut the size of meals or skipped meals because there was not enough money for food; 87 percent reported this had occurred in 3 or more months.
94 percent reported they had eaten less than they felt they should because there was not enough money for food.
67 percent reported they had been hungry but did not eat because they could not afford enough food.47 percent reported having lost weight because they did not have enough money for food.
32 percent reported an adult did not eat for a whole day because there was not enough money for food; 24 percent reported this had occurred in 3 or more months.
The Committee on National Statistics, in a panel convened by the USDA, described hunger as a “potential consequence of food insecurity that, because of prolonged, involuntary lack of food, results in discomfort, illness, weakness, or pain that goes beyond the usual uneasy sensation.” So, probably something more severe than having a cereal bar for breakfast. That’s not a starvation diet, either, as the average cereal bar can top out at 200 calories.
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Most importantly, when this asshole is hungry, he can simply eat more food. He doesn’t go to bed with a growling stomach like far too many children. As the bill’s author, Democratic-Farmer-Labor Sen. Heather Gustafson, explained, the roughly one in six children who are food insecure “don’t know when and where their next meal will be available, if they get one at all.”
Providing students access to nutritious meals is a necessary part of ensuring that all students, regardless of background, can thrive and succeed in school. An estimated 275,000 students in Minnesota receive free and reduced-price school meals, but Drazkowski seemingly thinks they’re all deadbeats. He denounced the bill as “pure socialism.”
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“This is about the government dictating to kids what they’re going to eat and how much they’re going to eat,” he said, as if he gives a damn if hungry kids eat at all.
The measure passed by a vote of 38 to 26, and Democratic Gov. Tim Walz is expected to sign it into law. Those three spirits who visited Drazkowski last Christmas Eve clearly bungled the job.
[NBC News]
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