Homeless to---Public Office?

“Ladies and gentlemen, my name is Larry and today as I stand before you I am homeless. I have not eaten today so if you could please spare a penny, quarter, or dollar or even something to eat I would greatly appreciate it,” says the homeless man on the train making his way up and down the aisle. In New York City we experience this many times a day; sometimes every time we ride the train. Now it’s true that before the unfortunate events that led to these people being homeless, most were successful, happy, contributing citizens of society, however, something in their life turned for the worst and caused them to have virtually nothing except their very existence. Sometimes the homeless are given opportunities to work and taken off the street and some are taken off the street and put into the running for public office? No, that can’t be right. Oh but it is!
In Arizona this is exactly what is happening. Three drifters, Benjamin Pearcy, Thomas Meadows and Anthony Goshorn are all candidates recruited by Steve May, the Republican operative who signed these people up to be apart of the Green Party. According to G.O.P Recruits Street People to Run on Green Ticket in Arizona, a New York Times article by Marc Lacey, this is an attack on the Democratic Party. The idea is that if this Green Party is in existence then the Democrats would get less votes; therefore will give Republicans a better chance on winning state votes. But why the concern, Arizona is typically a red state anyway; but republicans want to keep it that way.
Democrats are outraged, as you can imagine. These drifters, who range in ages from twenty to fifty-three, have a bigger and better chance on getting written into the ballots for November and winning primaries and it has Democrats nervous. And why is this a bad idea? They have no prior experience, no idea on how to manage anything in their lives but most importantly, they have no education. Sure they may have “street smarts” but how will that help in the fields they are trying to delve into? Maybe if they witnessed someone getting mugged in an alley that would be useful, not as the overseer of utilities, for example, in Arizona.
The bottom line is that we should not be exploiting people like this to simply reduce the possibility of Democratic votes. I think Arizona needs a reality check and a better plan to clean up their streets, which does not include putting them to serve in government.
For more information on this issue in Arizona please visit:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/07/us/politics/07candidates.html?_r=1&ref=todayspaper