September 17, 2003

the free lunch

Boy, this topic is really stirring shit in lots of places in blogdom. You just KNOW I have to add MY humble opinion.

The school lunch program has been a political boondoggle from the beginning. I am certain that (Sob, weep and lets bring on the heart-rending violins here as we hear a tale of the "Safety Net" saving your ass) a few people found the program to be a wonderful thing when money was tight. But that's not what the school lunch program was for. It's NEVER been about feeding needy children. That's just the cloaking device politicians and bureaucrats employ to hide what the program REALLY does.

The free lunch was a way to attract more federal money to the school. The more free lunches you gave away, the more money you received. The more kids eating free lunches, the more "poverty" you had, and you got even more money. Therefore, the schools had a vested interest in signing up as many kids to the program as they could. They RECRUITED kids for free lunches, whether the kids needed it or not.

I was bitching about the school lunch program 10 YEARS AGO at work when one of my senior operators said, "Hell, I think it's great. Both of my kids get free lunches."

This guy made over $40,000 a year at the time and his wife was a nurse, who probably earned as much as he did. I asked how the hell HIS KIDS qualified for free lunches.

"The school asked me if I wanted it. I said yeah. If they were offering it, I woulda been a damn fool to turn it down."

So all you people whining about Hard Times and how the lunch program SAVED YOU FROM STARVATION, and all you people hurling insults at single mothers who are "too lazy to feed their kids," just shut the fuck up. The school lunch program never saved a single child from starvation, and a lot of people who feed their kids better than you feed yours are bellied up to that federal money-trough and eating with a ladle, not a spoon.

You want to get pissed? Get pissed at the government that set up this foolishy wasteful program and NOW wants to expand it to cover breakfast, too. Yeah, these are the same folks who worry about Bush spending $87 billion in Iraq, but they see no problem with free lunch for EVERYONE in school. They would much rather PISS THAT MONEY AWAY ON INCREDIBLY WASTEFUL PROGRAMS HERE than use it to fight terror.

No child should go hungry in this country. But government has no business delivering manna to the people, either.

That's God's job, and I don't believe in him, so I don't believe in manna, either, from God OR the government.

Comments

The same thing applies to Special Education.

Two weeks into my youngest son's first year of school, they strongly suggested to me that I have him evaluated for ADHD and sign the forms to have an educational evaluation. Can't get one without the other. Thankfully I had some experience with what they do to foster children around here, so I immediately suspected the suggestion was motivated by government money.

I sat down at that meeting and told them I knew what they were up to and that they were barking up the wrong tree. I gave permission for the testing only after telling them that they wouldn't find a thing wrong with him AND that if they came after us again after I proved them wrong, I'd drag their asses into court. The doctor who evaluated him for the ADHD didn't find anything that couldn't be chalked up to typical 5 year old behavior and the shrink who did the educational testing found him functioning at above average all around.

Take note people. The school gets extra money from the government for every single service that they provide above and beyond the regular classroom activities and lunch. I'm all for teachers getting paid more and all that shit, but not when the institution that they work uses underhanded methods of getting extra money.

They saw a single parent with two young boys and figured I'd be an easy target. Not very fuckin likely.

Posted by: Chablis on September 17, 2003 05:40 PM

They did the same thing to my daughter. Tried to tell me she was ADHD and forced me to have her tested. Of course they had just the phsychologist to do it. Lucky for me and my daughter I know better than that. I found my own. She was normal in behavior and above normal in intelligence. It isn't just the money.....teachers have become very lazy. They don't like smart kids because you have to actually teach them. They'd rather drug them, so much quieter that way.

Posted by: bren on September 17, 2003 07:19 PM

I used to do Federal Single Audits of School Lunch Programs for a CPA firm, testing was a joke. Basically the parent just filled out a form stating their salary, and that was all the school district needed to put their kids in the program. Also had to test monthly school menus to see that the required food groups were offered weekly, fun stuff like that. HUD Sec. 8 programs were tougher, recent w-2's or paystubs were required to be on file for those getting the rent subsidies.

Some fairly well to do school districts had good sized lunch programs. Even if we had a finding, we just noted the specifics in the back of the audit, and next year would have to show that they were corrected. That was the penalty.

Posted by: jpd on September 17, 2003 07:58 PM

Yes, there are fewer kids educated in S.E. classrooms with more money being spent on those children, BUT you have to take into consideration the extensive needs of the children who are being educated. Here Special Needs covers everything including ADHD, ADD, OCD, CD, LD, MH. SED/SBH/ED, as well as in some areas it includes those children identified as TALENTED AND GIFTED…and that’s just to name a few. So ADHD itself gets no monetary attention here - what gets the attention is when the ADHD child needs to have an I.E.P (Individual Evaluation Plan) written up. The school district then gets additional government monies for those children who have an I.E.P.
Our school district does not recommend any testing for a child it doesn’t feel to be 100% necessary, because if the school recommends it, they have to pay for it.

Posted by: Paula on September 17, 2003 08:01 PM

Not just academics.
My son went to (high) school every day. Some days we gave him lunch money and some days we forgot to give him cash. It was not a question of whether we could afford it or not.
We discovered that he could go through the "free lunch" line with no questions asked, once we found out it was all about subsidies and the more students that went thru the " free / reduced price line, the more the school got from the Feds. Quite Frankly, I am really pleased we don't have to pay the local taxes to actually pay for this, but on the other hand, I do understand that this is NOT a vacuum, and we DO pay in the long run.

Posted by: Doon on September 17, 2003 08:43 PM

There's the bread. Can the circuses be far behind?

Posted by: Larry on September 17, 2003 10:49 PM

Larry,

I think the circus is the Democrat Party's presidential primary.

Posted by: Gene K on September 17, 2003 11:16 PM

LMAO, Gene. You're right. Here I thought it was "The Nine (now 10) Dwarves". Clark is the one who said this country was founded on the principle of progressive taxes. For more on him, see Donald Sensing's blog archives. He used to work for this sorry-ass excuse whose specialty is getting ahead at others' expense. There's no one more despised in the military than a cut-throat golden boy. His announcement included something like, "Duh, don't know much about domestic policy." This prick is a fuckin Rhodes Scholar! WTF did he study at Oxford? I'm not a GWB fan, but these alternatives are just too comical to merit serious consideration. Ditto for Algore and Hillbillary. Hillary might be the best of the lot since Lieberman has compromised himself so thoroughly. 'Nuff said.

Posted by: Larry on September 18, 2003 08:44 AM

Thanks again, Gene. You'll have me chuckling for a week. I just got a great vis of these clowns piling out of a V W bug. With Liebs as the perfect Emmett Kelly type. (Frown & tears paint for you young whippersnappers)

Posted by: Larry on September 18, 2003 08:52 AM

My kids went to schools that were 85 percent black and about 90 percent free lunch. Even in elementary school they used to complain that the free-lunch kids would get their free lunch and THEN spend $3 or $4 in the vending machines. And when my youngest son was in the 2nd grade he came home one day and asked: "Daddy, how come all the poor kids have HBO?" Because we're paying for their damn rent and lunches, was my response. No wonder my kids are conservatives now, God love 'em.

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