Manchin’s fear of an “Entitlement Society”
Roe v. Wade appears to be on its last legs. The current, radical, Supreme Court sits poised to riddle Roe with
Texas-sized exceptions or to overturn it all together. Ever since Roe was handed down on January 22, 1973,
the press has been full of, and our national politics traumatized by, charges and counter-charges concerning
the “right to life.” What is at stake in this current Supreme Court term is whether a woman has a right to
control her own body in consultation with her private physician, or whether women will lose that right and
be forced to act as baby machines because external political forces are allowed to impose their narrow view
of morality on the rest of us.
Unfortunately, however, even that tragic confrontation isn’t the “real” right to life issue. The October
5th execution of Earnest L. Johnson, a man so mentally retarded he could not possibly possess the adequate
intelligence to understand the nature of his act, such that even Pope Francis attempted to intervene in his
execution, was unconstitutional under US law as well as international law. Where was his “Right to Life”?
And yet, even that political “crime” fails to examine the deeper issues that any conversation about the “right
to life” ought to address.
Last week Senator Joe Manchin, a “Blue Dog Democrat” if ever there was one (and a guy who continues
to make millions every year off the coal industry!), suggested that he would only allow one of three programs
intended to help the poor amongst us deal with childcare and the financial burdens of raising a family. Why?
Because Manchin believes in a Puritan Work Ethic that says, “if you want to eat you have to work.” And,
adds a corollary, that the harder you work in a conventional way, the more you are allowed to eat (i.e., the
greater percentage of total wealth you are allowed to accumulate).
It makes no sense that now, at a time where robotization is eliminating massive numbers of jobs (look at
what is about to happen to the long-haul trucking business as companies purchase autonomously driven 18
wheelers), we are worried about how hard a person works. The French have already gone to an official 35-
hour workweek so they can accommodate more employees in the workforce. That is a very smart idea—but
doesn’t go far enough. And that’s precisely what Manchin is afraid of.
Manchin was castigated in a recent New York Times editorial for railing against what he calls “an entitlement
society,” which quoted him making the embarrassing statement, “I don’t believe that we should turn our
society into an entitlement society.” What does he mean by that? Could he possibly be so cruel that he feels
no societal collective responsibility for America’s 1.38 million homeless children? Aren’t they entitled to
live in an adequate “home”, so they might have a chance at a full life? Does Manchin mean that everyone
should struggle and work hard or otherwise be left in the gutter in a Dickensonian return to the desperate
conditions of the David Copperfield “workhouse”? What kind of a society is that?
Do we really want more unsheltered people on our streets when the evidence is overwhelming that it only
costs half as much to provide free housing as it does to handle people who live rough on the street? Who
doesn’t want to save fifty percent of what we are spending and get a more humane result? Everyone except