Reply #62: I know that, and I've always been sympathetic to individual needs. What got me going this time....

[Hekate]

... as you can probably tell, was reading that "oh we are so discriminated against" line just once too often. Usually here at DU it is combined with a screed about how no one should ever have children at all unless they are 100% sure they can "afford" them because it's no one else's business what they need. Logically, that means only the wealthy should breed at all, but mostly it's an opportunity to knock those of us that did. Mostly my earlier post was an attempt to counter that and the echoes of all the other times it's come up here.

All the federal "tax relief" that I ever got as a single working mother was so much hot air. Day-care ate up an enormous hunk of my blushingly modest take-home pay, yet at tax time when a friend urged me to take advantage of the fact that I could put those expenses on my tax return, I used up several hours doing the research and calculations for what I recall being about $50 to my credit. And so forth and so on.

The thing is, public policy decisions get made for what is presumed to be the public good. Sort of like "Women and children first into the lifeboat" instead of "Every man for himself." That doesn't mean "every man's" life is not valuable; to me it says we should plan ahead and build more lifeboats. We don't have much of a lifeboat in this country, it sometimes seems, but that's no reason to toss the ones who managed to get half a seat overboard just so everyone can drown in equality.

I've always been of the mind to expand all the social services for everyone; it's why I'm a Democrat. Families with children aren't the only ones in need, and I know it. But it shouldn't be treated like a zero-sum game by any of us.

Sorry if this is disjointed -- I have to run.

Hekate