Recently, my campaign was contacted about the problem of “Hunger in Maryland”, citing “over 800,000 Marylanders, or more than 1 in 10 households, live in poverty and struggle against hunger.” (www.mdhungersolutions.org) As a former Peace Corps volunteer in central America, I learn a bit about the problems of poverty and hunger from my first hand experience. However, hearing about such a problem in Maryland and the United States is particularly distressing. How can this be in a land with so much greater blessings of abundance, freedom and opportunity for success and well-being for all?
As an innovator in the field of scientific education, I have studied this problem with some interest. At bottom, the cause of poverty and hunger in society is a failure of character development and education of youth.
In Maryland, government especially has a hand in this failure, by its dysfunctional system of “public education”, which is more about indoctrination of youth to dependency on others than fostering progress and learning towards personal responsibility, self-reliance and practical life skills. This failure is especially visible in recent times by the alarming increase of drug addiction, mental health issues, and broken home life. The failure has been made even worse by the actions of government related to the covid pandemic. During the past two years, we have seen the negative influence of government mask and vaccine mandates, social distancing, and cruel interruptions of normal social and economic life for all.
As director of a local in-home tutoring program, focusing mostly on services to foster care children, I am especially aware of the harm of broken homes and the lack of normal care of children through responsible parental guidance. While government must step in to rescue children from circumstances of grave physical harm, the long-term solution must take a more positive, pro-active direction to restore and support the conditions for a healthy, normal life in society. For example, support the healthy function of a free market economy where jobs are plentiful, and parents are given greater freedom and direct responsibility for the education of their children.
Sadly, the current direction of the General Assembly has been absent in taking such measure. In fact, the direction has been to work in the opposition direction of higher taxes and more oppressive policies based on censorship, monopoly, and centralized control of normal social life, which is especially harmful in the critical field of public education.
The message of my campaign is to help eradicate poverty and hunger in Maryland by working to restore a vibrant free market education and economy of choice, competition and opportunity for all. In this way, all citizens can freely participate and benefit from the great blessing of freedom that is the foundation and heritage of our state and nation.
Very well stated.