[quote]doogie wrote:
This is one of those things that fucks with me on a personal level.
My 6 year old son’s two best friends are an illegal immigrant and a Katrina evacuee. I don’t know a whole lot about the Katrina kid’s family situation, just that there are a lot of them crammed into their apartment. I have conversations with them when dropping off/picking up kids at the bus stop and when our kids are outside playing. They seem like good people, and I’ve never probed into the details of what their exact situation is.
Then last week my son climbed up on my lap after Katrina kid left, hugged me, and said he feels sorry for Katrina kid. I asked why and he said, “Because his dad died in the hurricane.” Shit.
Then a day or two later, the Katrina kid (who comes over and plays Gamecube with my son daily) knocked on the door. When I opened it, he handed me a Gamecube game and said he wanted to give it to my son because his Gamecube was gone. I told him to keep it and bring it with him when he comes over to play.
Then yesterday while I was cooking dinner, my son came in and said that Katrina kid wanted to sell the game for $2. My son was so excited.
Shit. First I asked him if he was sure it was OK with Katrina kid’s mom that he sold the game and my son assured me it was. Shit. Then I asked him if he thought that $2 was fair and it took a couple of beats, but then he looked like I had slapped him. My son is TIGHT with his money. I was stupid with mine, and I’ve made a very serious effort to explain the importance of being smart with your money to him. I could see him being ripped apart by his love of the other kid and his love of the unbeatable deal of a $2 game.
After a couple of moments he said, “Hold on” and went to his room. He came back with $12 and said, “That’s how much it cost at the game store.”
I don’t know what I’m trying to convey with this story, other than that it is easy to be libertarian in theory. When the little Katrina kid who talks like Mush Mouth from the Cosby cartoon is looking at you, it’s a whole different thing.[/quote]
The point is that you feel bad. That’s human.
It is a shame the government fucks up the funding, that money goes to line people’s pockets, and this little kid is trying to sell his game for $2 after his dad dies in a hurricane that could have not been so bad had the government listened in the first place. god, if he exists, has a sense of irony.