Kentucky lawmaker opens mouth about poverty

For those who don't want the Kentucky Senate to permanently disband, this story doesn't exactly help their cause.

State Sen. Paul Hornback (R-Shelbyville) is a member of the Northern Kentucky Legislative Caucus even though he lives nowhere near northern Kentucky. Senate leaders haven't appointed even one Democratic senator from northern Kentucky to that caucus. Now Hornback has launched a war against the federal Community Service Block Grant program - which has assisted hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians just in the past year at finding jobs and other needs.

Hornback demanded that Kentucky send back the federal dollars it receives from this program. He called poverty a choice. "You can't eliminate the causes of poverty. That, a lot of times, is not something that any of us force on anybody. It's a path they choose and a lot of time they're very happy with it," Hornback sniffed. He continued, "You watch those TV programs, on 60 Minutes, a lot of those things about the homeless. That's a path they choose, to want to do those things and there's reasons for that."

What?

Think of how idiotic that statement sounds. "Hey, I really enjoy not having 3 square meals a day. So I think I'll choose to be poor." Seriously, that's the world according to Paul Hornback. This statement also displays Hornback's fascism. A defining characteristic of fascism is victim-blaming.

We can expect this from the Kentucky Senate - which is gerrymandered under a map that violates the "one person, one vote" standard. That chamber has been on the forefront of ramping up the stupid. What America needs is stronger antifascism legislation to clean up this and other legislative bodies.

Without a serious effort to eschew fascists from public office, civil war is only becoming more inevitable. But the ball is in lawmakers' court. It's their choice.

(Source: http://www.nkytribune.com/2015/01/in-committee-meeting-sen-hornback-suggests-giving-back-federal-poverty-money-some-people-are-happy-poor)