To the editor:

I was embarrassed that you decided to print the remarks of Dave Spangler in the Feb. 3 On The Street column. Mr. Spangler answered the question “How should the city address the proposed budget cuts” by remarking that “They need to adopt (the policy) ‘If you don’t work, you don’t eat.'” In case he missed it, this attitude is a big part of the social economic system that put our economy in the ditch we find ourselves in.

I might suggest that Mr. Spangler look to Lawrence’s sister city, Eutin, Germany, for an example. Turns out the German government adopted a very generous system of social welfare a long time ago. Not only do Germans enjoy excellent working conditions and near-universal health care coverage, but they, unlike Mr. Spangler, do not find cruelty attractive and have made a decision Americans cannot seem to make: the decision that each of us deserves to eat every day.

The German government made these decisions, in part, to make their country less, not more, susceptible to socialism. Please check out some other options before you condemn your fellow citizens to starvation. There are those for whom work is not possible and they deserve special consideration. But basic human decency demands that we make sure we all can eat every day.

Jon Hudson,
Lawrence