A Republican suggested to C-SPAN that food assistance for poor people was like feeding bears on the side of the road.
During a Thursday call-in segment with right-wing pundit Armstrong Williams, a Georgia Republican caller named Gary recalled his vacations to the Smoky Mountains.
"When I was young, we always took the vacation up to Smoky Mountains, and we would all pile in the station wagon and go," he said. "And back then, they would allow you to feed the bears right on the side of the road."
"And it went on for years and years," he continued. "Well, when they stopped that, all the bears just stood out on the side of the road and starved to death because they didn't know how to feed theirself [sic]."
He compared the bears to a Chinese proverb about teaching a man to fish.
"You know, if you got a man that's going to teach you how to fish and you've got a man that's going to give you a fish and you come back to him tomorrow for that fish, which man you want to be with?" he said.
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"You know, I want to say to him and I think his point is well taken," Williams replied;. "The best, I mean, Department of Health, Education and Welfare I had growing up was my mother and my father."
