I said, “Of course,” though I almost wanted to warn her against trusting any writer – even me – to that degree. The meeting consisted of maybe a dozen-and- a-half social services professionals, including case workers, probation officers, job trainers, and the like. They all carried file folders full of papers, and they were serious. Earnest, but not quite grim. The meeting started, and after McKenzie introduced me, the women talked in turn. They consulted their folders and reported on the progress of one lady or another. This one had completed phase one of her job training, that one had earned a GED, and so forth. Then, when it came her turn, one young staffer looked straight at me. “You know what the real problem is?” Well... When McKenzie had introduced me, she had mentioned the name of the magazine I was writing for. It was the Weekly Standard. Conservative, but prudentially so. Sober, intellectual, and respectable. But even before the age of Donald Trump, the bonds of civility were being strained and rank partisanship was more and more the music of the spheres. I sort of expected to be told that I, or maybe we – Bill Kristol and I – were the problem. I hunkered down and said, “Ah, no. I don’t think I do.” “Well,” she said, stern and formidable, “We are enabling these people.”
From there, it went like I described it in the Standard: “Really? How?” “We make it too easy for them.” “There are so many programs. So much assistance. This is a good place to be an addict and a single mom.” She was almost guileless in her enthusiasm, and with her many years of addiction-counseling experience, you wondered The woman is not exactly angry and this is not the usual political rant against welfare mothers and paternalistic government. I’m the one who is supposed to be giving that familiar speech. This woman works for the paternalistic government, after all, and her clients are welfare mothers. Her words are spoken out of a deep frustration. And it is shared, around the table, as women nod and detail the various programs by their acronyms – WIC, EBT, etc. That was a “scales falling from eyes” moment for me. So much concern and pity lavished on these people. So much hard work put in by the Cheryl McKenzies and the Matt Proutys. All to save these people from themselves. The unfairness of it all strained my admittedly poor sense of Christian charity. Prouty watching the neighborhood where he lived with his parents, children, and siblings sink how she could not have given into cynicism, or even nihilism.
American Consequences 53
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