Kudos to those who donate

To the seniors, the children and the working poor: What a friend we have in Dr. Mariannette Miller-Meeks.

How unfortunate and embarrassing for the state of Iowa that Miller-Meeks, former director of the Iowa Department of Public Health, dropped a statistic about the “No. 1 food item bought with food stamps in Iowa is Mountain Dew,” something she said she found online.

To make matters worse, this was before an international crowd of academics, journalists and non-profit types at the World Food Prize Hunger Week symposium.

Nationally, there are the predictable positions of the Democrats and Republicans in the Senate. I was surprised that even though the Senate voted to cut $4 billion from the program over 10 years, Sen. Chuck Grassley said reducing “food stamps while reopening loopholes for the multimillion-dollar farming entities” didn't make sense.

Kudos to the church groups, the postal service, the Salvation Army, the Boy Scouts and the numerous groups and organizations that give donations of food and money to those less fortunate.

Dorothy Fifield

Cedar Rapids