Tasting Hunger Up Close and Personal

As the public in general, and Republicans in particular, laud the presidency of Ronald Reagan as someone who made them feel good to be an American, few recall the Gipper's insensitivity to poverty.

Reagan conjured up mythical welfare queens, who through ingenuity and chicanery created multiple aliases, addresses and Social Security cards, allowing them to live lavish lifestyles at taxpayers' expense. Reagan had no tangible proof that such persons existed, but the hyperbolic political yarn was well received on the campaign trail.

Rep. Barbara Lee, D-Oakland, offers a contrarian's perspective to Reagan's fairy tale, not through conjecture, myth and hyperbole, but through the experience of putting herself in other people's shoes.

Lee, with several members of Congress, took the Food Stamp Challenge, which asked public officials to eat for a week on the average allotment given to a food stamp recipient. Each participant was rationed $21 for groceries for a week.

Anti-hunger groups, calling attention to the federal farm bill which includes reauthorization of the food stamp program, created the Food Stamp Challenge.

Lee quickly realized that it is expensive to eat healthy -- it was certainly beyond her $21 budget to add fresh produce to her diet. Surviving for a week on $21 worth of groceries creates a linkage between poverty and chronic health problems such as diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease.

I've been eating grits and a lot of carbs, because they fill you up, Lee said. You really become aware of the choices people have to make, which are unhealthy choices.

I realize what Lee and her colleagues did for a week does not compare to the bombastic give them what they deserve speeches frequently heard on the floor of the House and Senate. It also may cut against the imagery of lazy individuals shrewdly taking advantage of the country's largesse. But it is a glimpse into the reality millions of Americans experience when trapped in a merciless cycle of poverty.

According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, some 2.4 million people died in the U.S. in 2000, most from heart disease, cancer and strokes.

Smoking was responsible for about 435,000 deaths in 2000, while bad diet and physical inactivity accounted for about 365,000. That ratio is likely to change because less Americans are smoking and more are becoming obese.

Hypertension, once a condition usually seen in older adults, has increased among children. According to the majority of leading researchers, the cause is poor diet. This trend is not limited to those who live below the poverty line.

With more people working outside of the home, more families on the go choose foods high in calories, fat, sodium and cholesterol -- thus you have more obese children who are candidates for diabetes and hypertension. Moreover, if this is a problem for Americans across the spectrum, imagine the impact on low-income families who eat unhealthy in order to survive?

The Food Stamp Challenge forces lawmakers to consider whether they can live with the votes they cast. What a concept. I wish such practices went beyond food stamps.

Too bad there wasn't, let's say, an Iraq War Challenge. I would settle for members of Congress going to Iraq protected no differently than the lowest-ranking infantry soldier. How about a Post-Katrina Challenge, whereby members of Congress and state legislators from Louisiana spend a week in the 9th Ward?

There is something enlightening when one dares to engage in the reality of others -- no think-tank study or Congressional committee hearing can replace that. Thus, the Food Stamp Challenge allows those who participated to see firsthand what the most vulnerable in our society experience, those who must live with the repercussions of lawmakers' votes.

Byron Williams is an Oakland pastor and syndicated columnist.
E-mail him at byron@byronspeaks.com or leave a message at (510) 208-6417.