Author Topic: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty  (Read 1132 times)

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Offline mystery-ak

  • Owner
  • Administrator
  • ******
  • Posts: 381,863
  • Gender: Female
  • Let's Go Brandon!
http://thehill.com/opinion/juan-williams/193174-opinion-gop-must-see-the-light-on-poverty

 By Juan Williams - 12/16/13 06:00 AM EST

Fifty years ago this month, President Johnson was closing in on his first State of the Union address. The famous speech, delivered in January 1964, kickstarted the War on Poverty.

The war was never won. During this holiday season, it is worth emphasizing that poverty is more than a “Ghost of Christmas Past.”

An incredibly loud, bipartisan chorus of social and political voices, from Pope Francis to Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and President Obama are all pointing to very real and current poverty, stirring troubling 21st century images of Charles Dickens’ story “A Christmas Carol.”

In that classic tale, Dickens wrote a fictional jeremiad on income inequality in mid-19th century Britain. The story called attention to high rates of child poverty and hellish working conditions at factories and mines at the cruel heart of Britain’s emerging industrial economy.

Dickens had planned to write a journalistic appeal for a decent welfare system for the “poor man’s child.” Instead he decided on a Christmas novel featuring a greedy businessman, Scrooge, ignoring people in need — especially poor children, most of all a disabled boy, Tiny Tim.

Today Congress is failing to act on a jobs bill while insisting on more cuts to food stamps and other anti-poverty programs, all to protect the rich against tax hikes. The ghosts of ‘Christmas Past’ and ‘Christmas Present’ are jangling loud chains.

These ghosts speak to disturbingly high poverty rates for today’s ‘Tiny Tim’ population — America’s children.

This Christmas, 22 percent of children in the United States live in poverty, according to the National Poverty Center at the University of Michigan. A third of children who are illegal immigrants live in poverty. Sadly, a very similar rate of poverty is seen among black children (38 percent) and Hispanic children (35 percent). Even among the nation’s most affluent racial group, whites, 12 percent of children live in poverty.

It is also estimated that 45 percent of the nation’s children are in low-income families. Earlier this month, President Obama said the current economy makes it near impossible for a poor child to get out of poverty, adding that this situation “should offend all of us — we are a better country than this.”

Time magazine’s Man of the Year, Pope Francis, cast this global economic era in chilling terms when he declared that today “unfettered capitalism,” amounts to a “new tyranny.”

Similarly, Congress’ failure to extend unemployment benefits and willingness to cut federal workers’ pension plans in the budget passed last week is sparking Christmas nightmares over rising income inequality in the post-recession economy.

Income inequality has been hard to ignore in the last month as the stock market hit historic highs while fast-food workers striked, calling for a rise in the minimum wage.

On Capitol Hill, the GOP caucuses in the House and Senate continue to ignore poverty. Instead, they complain America is becoming a “Food Stamp Nation,” with an expanding safety net of social programs they blame on “the entitlement president.”

During the 2012 presidential election campaign, Republican Mitt Romney was put onto the defensive after being caught on a covertly-filmed video speaking about the “47 percent” who see themselves as “victims…dependent on government.” This huge swath of the population, in Romney’s view, was comprised in large part of those who fail to “take personal responsibility.”

Republicans “want to care,” Bruce Bartlett, former domestic policy advisor to President Reagan recently told The Washington Post. “But they’re so imprisoned by their ideology that they can’t offer anything meaningful.”

In the same article, Bill Bennett, Reagan’s former education secretary, said of the GOP: “You can’t be the governing party unless you offer people a way out of poverty.”

Three leading Republicans are beginning to offer right-wing visions of “Christmas Yet to Come.” They are Ryan, Paul and Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus.

Priebus has acknowledged that the GOP is being hurt among voters by the perception that it does not care about the poor. He is increasing Republican political outreach to impoverished and minority voters with the promise of being a “champion” for people climbing the economic ladder.

Both Ryan and Paul have taken trips into poor, often minority, neighborhoods to help Republicans shed the “Scrooge” image.

Ryan has indicated he envisions a conservative plan to fight poverty with fewer social workers, less welfare payments and more school choice.

As a youth, Ryan relied on Social Security benefits after his father died when he was 16. The heart of his fight against modern poverty appears to be focused on poor children. In a 2012 speech as the GOP’s vice presidential nominee, he stressed that black and Hispanic children are close to 70 percent of the children in the nation’s worst schools.

Paul, meanwhile, told the Detroit Economic Club earlier this month that the answer to persistent poverty is “leaving more money in the hands of those who earn it,” with low tax zones for investors and workers in areas with high unemployment.

Republicans can read the exit polls. Those polls show that families with incomes less than $50,000 gave 60 percent of their votes to Democrats in 2012 while Americans with family income over $100,000 gave 54 percent of their votes to the GOP.

Getting started on a new War on Poverty is essential to any GOP dreams of becoming enlightened.

Like Scrooge on Christmas morning, the party needs to wake up and discover how lifting up the poor, especially children, can lead to a better future.
Proud Supporter of Tunnel to Towers
Support the USO
Democrat Party...the Party of Infanticide

“Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.”
-Matthew 6:34

Offline EC

  • Shanghaied Editor
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 23,804
  • Gender: Male
  • Cats rule. Dogs drool.
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #1 on: December 16, 2013, 02:41:14 pm »
Quote
Like Scrooge on Christmas morning, the party needs to wake up and discover how lifting up the poor, especially children, can lead to a better future.

The best way to combat poverty: Let people work and keep their money.

There will be people that don't want to work. Don't feed them. Look out for their kids, they did nothing wrong. Look out for the ones who really can't work. That is just human kindness. But the able bodied? Sod that. They can work or starve.
The universe doesn't hate you. Unless your name is Tsutomu Yamaguchi

Avatar courtesy of Oceander

I've got a website now: Smoke and Ink

Offline Bigun

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 51,331
  • Gender: Male
  • Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God
    • The FairTax Plan
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #2 on: December 16, 2013, 02:44:48 pm »
The best way to combat poverty: Let people work and keep their money.

There will be people that don't want to work. Don't feed them. Look out for their kids, they did nothing wrong. Look out for the ones who really can't work. That is just human kindness. But the able bodied? Sod that. They can work or starve.

AMEN Bro! And what NEEDS doing can be left the Churches in the communities involved and NOT the federal government!
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline EC

  • Shanghaied Editor
  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 23,804
  • Gender: Male
  • Cats rule. Dogs drool.
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #3 on: December 16, 2013, 02:57:18 pm »
AMEN Bro! And what NEEDS doing can be left the Churches in the communities involved and NOT the federal government!

Might reduce your illegal problem, too. After all, the illegals are doing the jobs Americans won't do. If Americans must do, the illegals get forced out.
The universe doesn't hate you. Unless your name is Tsutomu Yamaguchi

Avatar courtesy of Oceander

I've got a website now: Smoke and Ink

Offline andy58-in-nh

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 9,740
  • Gender: Male
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #4 on: December 16, 2013, 03:10:29 pm »
50 years and 6 trillion dollars later, the War on Poverty is over.

Poverty Won.

Liberals still believe the problem is that the Federal government has not spent enough money.

The problem to which they refuse to admit is that all of that spending removed money from the hands of people who might otherwise have created lasting opportunity, and instead encouraged dependency, destroyed families, and ravaged neighborhoods and in some cases, entire cities.
"The most terrifying force of death, comes from the hands of Men who wanted to be left Alone. They try, so very hard, to mind their own business and provide for themselves and those they love. They resist every impulse to fight back, knowing the forced and permanent change of life that will come from it. They know, that the moment they fight back, their lives as they have lived them, are over. -Alexander Solzhenitsyn

Offline Bigun

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 51,331
  • Gender: Male
  • Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God
    • The FairTax Plan
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #5 on: December 16, 2013, 03:15:14 pm »
50 years and 6 trillion dollars later, the War on Poverty is over.

Poverty Won.

Liberals still believe the problem is that the Federal government has not spent enough money.

The problem to which they refuse to admit is that all of that spending removed money from the hands of people who might otherwise have created lasting opportunity, and instead encouraged dependency, destroyed families, and ravaged neighborhoods and in some cases, entire cities.

They knew and know EXACTLY what they are doing, it is EXACTLY what they want, and they want even more of it!

No enemy could ever devise a better method for destruction!
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline Bigun

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 51,331
  • Gender: Male
  • Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God
    • The FairTax Plan
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #6 on: December 16, 2013, 03:16:17 pm »
Might reduce your illegal problem, too. After all, the illegals are doing the jobs Americans won't do. If Americans must do, the illegals get forced out.

Absolutely!!!

 :beer:
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline GourmetDan

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7,277
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #7 on: December 16, 2013, 03:19:52 pm »
Quote

Fifty years ago this month, President Johnson was closing in on his first State of the Union address. The famous speech, delivered in January 1964, kickstarted the War on Poverty.

The war was never won.


Depends on how you define 'winning'...

"I'll have those N******* voting Democrat for the next 200 years"- Lyndon B. Johnson to two governors on Air Force One per Ronald Kessler's "Inside The White House"



"The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the heart of the fool to the left." - Ecclesiastes 10:2

"The sole purpose of the Republican Party is to serve as an ineffective alternative to the Democrat Party." - GourmetDan

Offline Luis Gonzalez

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7,621
  • Gender: Male
    • Boiling Frogs
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #8 on: December 16, 2013, 03:20:06 pm »
Democrats are challenging Republicans to fix Obamacare. Juan Williams wants Republicans to buy into the left's failed plan to better the poor.

These guys never own up to their failures.
"Those are my principles, and if you don't like them... well, i have others." - Groucho Marx

Offline Bigun

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 51,331
  • Gender: Male
  • Resistance to Tyrants is Obedience to God
    • The FairTax Plan
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #9 on: December 16, 2013, 03:28:43 pm »
Depends on how you define 'winning'...

"I'll have those N******* voting Democrat for the next 200 years"- Lyndon B. Johnson to two governors on Air Force One per Ronald Kessler's "Inside The White House"

If Richard Nixon had really wanted to be a crook he would have gone to Lyndon Johnson and paid him for lessons!

The "Great Society" programs, in reality, were and are nothing but a publicly financed vote buying program for Democrats!
 
« Last Edit: December 16, 2013, 03:31:36 pm by Bigun »
"I wish it need not have happened in my time," said Frodo.

"So do I," said Gandalf, "and so do all who live to see such times. But that is not for them to decide. All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us."
- J. R. R. Tolkien

Offline GourmetDan

  • Hero Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 7,277
Re: Juan Williams: Republicans must see the light on combatting poverty
« Reply #10 on: December 16, 2013, 03:37:08 pm »

The "Great Society" programs, in reality, were and are nothing but a publicly financed vote buying program for Democrats!


Been that way at least since "bread and circuses"...


"The heart of the wise inclines to the right, but the heart of the fool to the left." - Ecclesiastes 10:2

"The sole purpose of the Republican Party is to serve as an ineffective alternative to the Democrat Party." - GourmetDan