[majormajor]

Yep. There's a deeply embedded mentality even amongst most social liberals in the US that poverty and moral/personal failure must go together, and thus we need to tell poor people how they're allowed to spend what little we're willing to give them. See also "but what if I give them some money and they use it to buy booze?" Heck, if I was homeless I know I'd want a drink.

But then on the flip side, we'll also spin the blame around on whoever else is available too. So maybe it's just that it's easier to blame than to fix. "Big business" got Brazil hooked on junk food -- not like good ol' America, where we got hooked on junk food back when it was still small business!