By Amy Goldstein / Washington Post / November 17, 2009
The nation’s economic crisis has catapulted the number of Americans who lack enough food to the highest level since the government has been keeping track, according to a new federal report, which shows that nearly 50 million people — including almost one child in four — struggled last year to get enough to eat.
At a time when rising poverty, widespread unemployment and other effects of the recession have been well documented, the report released Monday by the U.S. Department of Agriculture provides the government’s first detailed portrait of the toll that the faltering economy has taken on Americans’ access to food.
The magnitude of the increase in food shortages — and, in some cases, outright hunger — identified in the report startled even the nation’s leading anti-poverty advocates, who have grown accustomed to longer lines lately at food banks and soup kitchens. The findings also intensify pressure on the White House to fulfill a pledge to stamp out childhood hunger made by President Obama, who called the report “unsettling.”
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What is so amazing is that all of this blame can be placed on the new administration. Not one shred of blame can be traced in any way to the 8 wonderful years of Dick Cheney and his young side kick Saudi George.