As for Calvin, you’re neglecting to say one thing about going out and begging for $52K per year: you won’t do it. Don’t pretend that people that find themselves depending on the kindness of others don’t do so at a tremendous cost. Besides living on the streets, often addicted to drugs and alcohol, people in that situation have also given up their fundamental human dignity. If your dignity is for sale at $52K per year, you might actually be surprised at how many opportunities there are to sell it.

Also, if I can assume from your post that you are clearly not the type of person who gives money to the homeless, I don’t see what business it is of yours who the rest of us decide to give ours to. As someone who’s never had the misfortune of having to ask friends, family, or even worse, strangers, for help feeding my family, I’ve also felt a tremendous sense of responsibility, self-accountability, and even pride. I’ll give a President credit or blame for having a broad stroke impact on the country, but nobody gets credit or blame for my personal situation but me, period.

It does seem like you’d be interested in seeing a solution for these people, which I appreciate. All that I ask is that people that read this remember that for every person they see camping by a creek, there is a Margaret that never expected to end up there. For every child you see sitting by the side of the road, there is most likely a parent that cries themselves to sleep at night. If you want to harp on a society that gives too willingly to people that are sometimes all to ready to take, please take it a little easier on the folks that might still have a little too much pride to take a handout from a shelter.

If you lost your job tomorrow and couldn’t find another in enough time, would you tell your kids you’re going on a camping adventure, or tell them you’re no longer able to afford to even have children and go to a homeless shelter? My guess is that the problem isn’t bringing yourself to tell your kids the truth, but rather telling it to yourself.

Don’t check out Margaret. We need you here. This country is going to turn the corner on the grit and gristle of the true American spirit. There will always be people that need to feel like they’re better than someone else, which means that we need the people who’re better than they are all the more.