By Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
Stung by the historic defeat in last year’s presidential election, the GOP has embarked upon a relaunch of its ideology. RNC chair Reince Priebus has approved a strategy paper (click to read) composed by Republican bigwigs Henry Barbour (Haley’s nephew) and Ari Fleischer that makes a remarkable discovery:
The Republican Party must be the champion of those who seek to climb the economic ladder of life. Low-income Americans are hard-working people who want to become hard-working middle-income Americans. Middle-income Americans want to become upper-middle-income, and so on. We need to help everyone make it in America.
Yep, the party who deifies the man who made lots of political hay denigrating mythical “welfare queens,” and whose successors famously referred to President Obama as the “Food Stamp President” has figured out that in this democracy votes still trump principles — even long-held despicable ones. Republicans, it seems, can read a demographic map and, due in large part to the anti-poverty positions they have rammed through Congress (sometimes with the help of Democratic presidents), the Nation is mostly poorer. In 2010, 15.1 percent of all persons lived in poverty. The poverty rate in 2010 was the highest poverty rate since 1993. That’s about 46 million Americans living below the poverty line.
Poverty in America charts remarkably close to the party in power — at least for some population groups. In the 1950s, overall poverty was an astonishing 22.4%. A steady decline through the 1960s was fostered by the much maligned, but factually effective, “War On Poverty” of the Kennedy, Johnson (and yes), the Nixon Administrations. Poverty bottomed out in 1973 with the rate standing at roughly 11%. During the ensuing decade, poverty remained more or less constant at between 11.1 to 12.6%. Then came the right-wing Reagan Revolution in 1980 where being poor was somehow seen as akin to being criminal. Reagan made that connection explicit for any GOP dolt too dull to spew the bile on their own, and the “War To Resume Poverty” was on. During the 80s, the US poverty rate climbed steadily back to 15.2% representing about 35 million Americans. Reagan was an unrelenting slasher of programs such as Aid To Families With Dependent Children (AFDC), and subsidized housing. But, Reagan was careful not to hurt programs for the elderly who formed a core of the Republicans’ voting base. In fact, the poverty rate for US citizens over 65-years-old actually steadily declined from its high point in the 1960s.
Came the 90s and the Clinton Administration. Poverty again made a sea change and began declining. Such factors as the growing economy had its effect, but Clinton was a proponent of Reagan’s policy of “workfare” and his historic reform of welfare undoubtedly hindered that process despite the overall poverty rate decline to 11.3% in 2000. Predictably the poverty rate has increased under succeeding Republican administrations to its 2010 level.
The effects of poverty haven’t hit across the board as many know. Here’s how the National Poverty Center explains the level of poverty for various socio-economic groups:
The poverty rate for all persons masks considerable variation between racial/ethnic subgroups. Poverty rates for blacks and Hispanics greatly exceed the national average. In 2010, 27.4 percent of blacks and 26.6 percent of Hispanics were poor, compared to 9.9 percent of non-Hispanic whites and 12.1 percent of Asians.
Poverty rates are highest for families headed by single women, particularly if they are black or Hispanic. In 2010, 31.6 percent of households headed by single women were poor, while 15.8 percent of households headed by single men and 6.2 percent of married-couple households lived in poverty.
There are also differences between native-born and foreign-born residents. In 2010, 19.9 percent of foreign-born residents lived in poverty, compared to 14.4 percent of residents born in the United States. Foreign-born, non-citizens had an even higher incidence of poverty, at a rate of 26.7 percent.
What the Republicans have discovered — with a cold slap across the face in 2012 election — is that these populations vote. As they become larger segments of the voting class, their impact is made known. How else to explain the plethora of GOP backed voter fraud laws requiring picture id? Republicans know full-well the group least likely to own a car and hence possess a readily obtainable picture id are the poor.
Predictably, the Republicans paint a rosy picture of this sad demographic in the strategy paper:
The nation’s demographic changes add to the urgency of recognizing how precarious [Republicans’] position has become. America is changing demographically, and unless Republicans are able to grow our appeal … the changes tilt the playing field even more in the Democratic direction.
Republican pollster Kristen Soltis Anderson takes the issue head-on: “One of the biggest brand challenges for the GOP is to credibly demonstrate they are a party for everyone, not just the rich.” Take that Gov. Romney and your 47% quip. Here’ s the exiting polling from the 2012 election by income level. Note the disparity:
The old GOP canard about low-income folks not voting has finally been exposed for what it was. One of the reasons the Republicans were so astonished at their loss at the polls was their belief the American people would punish Obama for the bad economy. Central to that tenet was that low-income groups were most affected by the bank-driven recession and would throw the bums out. That political calculation was turned on its head as poor whites joined poor ethnic voters to elect Obama.
Thus the GOP stands at a cross-road between their extreme right-wing, every-man-for-himself ideology and recognizing political reality. Wrought by policies they espoused, the poor have roared back to take away what the Right deems most important of all — an unfettered, perpetual deed to the White House. Some in the GOP haven’t gotten the message yet, like firebrand Paul Ryan. Ryan recently announced his plan to slash $1.4 Million from Medicaid. A paltry amount by Washington standards but hugely important from a symbolic point of view. To add some insult, the staunchly religious Ryan (who claims the budget is closely in line with his Catholic upbringing) proposed 3.3 trillion dollars in budget cuts over a ten-year span with a full 66% of that amount coming from programs specifically designed to aid the poor, all the while reducing taxes on the wealthiest Americans. In addition his plan –passed by the House this week but rejected by the Senate — would severely limit eligibility for most other programs. You can read about the specifics of the plan in the Huff Post article here.
All in all, the GOP has quite the conundrum. Accede to the most radical elements of its party and watch its political power ebb, or embrace the view of more moderate elements and accept a “Big Tent” strategy. The decision hinges mightily on the feelings of the poor — a circumstance that could not be more irritating for the party who helped create them.
Source: Salon; Huff Post; National Poverty Center, and throughout
~Mark Esposito, Guest Blogger
walter e. williams/2012/10/17/poverty_nonsense
Here’s a recent statement frequently suggested by leftist academics, think tank researchers and policymakers: “People were not just struggling because of their personal deficiencies. There were structural factors at play. People weren’t poor because they made bad decisions. They were poor because our society creates poverty.” Who made that statement and where it was made is not important at all, but its corrosive effects on the minds of black people, particularly black youths, are devastating.
There’s nothing intellectually challenging or unusual about poverty. For most of mankind’s existence, his most optimistic scenario was to be able to eke out enough to subsist for another day. Poverty has been mankind’s standard fare and remains so for most of mankind. What is unusual and challenging to explain is affluence — namely, how a tiny percentage of people, mostly in the West, for only a tiny part of mankind’s existence, managed to escape the fate that befell their fellow men.
To say that “our society creates poverty” is breathtakingly ignorant. In 1776, the U.S. was among the world’s poorest nations. In less than two centuries, we became the world’s richest nation by a long shot. Americans who today are deemed poor by Census Bureau definitions have more material goods than middle-class people as recently as 60 years ago. Dr. Robert Rector and Rachel Sheffield give us insights in “Understanding Poverty in the United States: Surprising Facts About America’s Poor” (9/13/2011). Eighty percent of poor households have air conditioning. Nearly three-fourths have a car or truck, and 31 percent have two or more. Two-thirds have cable or satellite TV. Half have one or more computers. Forty-two percent own their homes. The average poor American has more living space than the typical non-poor person in Sweden, France or the U.K. Ninety-six percent of poor parents stated that their children were never hungry during the year because they couldn’t afford food. How do these facts square with the statement that “our society creates poverty”? To the contrary, our society has done the best with poverty.
http://townhall.com/columnists/walterewilliams/2012/10/17/poverty_nonsense/page/full/
By THOMAS SOWELL
Last Updated: 12:30 AM, August 2, 2011
Posted: 12:16 AM, August 2, 2011
Thomas Sowell
‘Poverty” should be a leading contender for the title of Most Misleading Word Used in Politics.
Each of us may have his own idea of what poverty means — especially those of us who grew up in poverty. But the whole future of the welfare state depends on how poverty is defined. “The poor” are the human shields behind whom advocates of ever bigger spending for ever bigger government advance.
If poverty meant what most people think of as poverty — people “ill-clad, ill-housed, and ill-nourished,” in Franklin Roosevelt’s phrase — there would not be nearly enough people in poverty today to justify the vastly expanded powers and runaway spending of the federal government.
Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation has for years examined what “the poor” actually have. Nearly three-quarters of households in poverty own a motor vehicle, and nearly one-third own more than one motor vehicle. And the average poor American has more living space than the general population of London, Paris and other cities in Europe.
The real triumph of words over reality, however, is in expensive government programs for “the elderly,” including Medicare. The image often invoked is the person who is both ill and elderly, and who has to choose between food and medications.
But the most fundamental reality is that the average wealth of the elderly is some multiple of the average wealth owned by people in the other age brackets. Why should the average taxpayer be subsidizing people who have much more wealth than they do?
Yes, the elderly are more likely to have more medical problems and larger medical expenses. But old age is not some unforeseeable misfortune. It is inevitable for those who don’t die young.
It’s one thing to keep people from suffering from unforeseeable things beyond their control. But it’s something else to subsidize their necessities so that they can spend their money on other things.
People who say they want a government program because “I don’t want to be a burden to my children” apparently think it is all right to be a burden to other people’s children.
Among the runaway spending behind our current national debt problems is the extravagant luxury of buying political rhetoric.
http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/our_runaway_rhetoric_ui4tKNGimMzHWU1foyI7VP
January 10, 2006
Curing Poverty or Using Poverty?
By Thomas Sowell
“China is lifting a million people a month out of poverty.”
It is just one statement in an interesting new book titled “The Undercover Economist” by Tim Harford. But it has huge implications.
I haven’t checked out the statistics but they sound reasonable. If so, this is something worth everyone’s attention.
People on the political left make a lot of noise about poverty and advocate all sorts of programs and policies to reduce it but they show incredibly little interest in how poverty has actually been reduced, whether in China or anywhere else.
You can bet the rent money that the left will show little or no interest in how Chinese by the millions are rising out of poverty every year. The left showed far more interest in China back when it was run by Mao in far left fashion — and when millions of Chinese were starving.
Those of us who are not on the left ought to take a closer look at today’s Chinese rising out of poverty.
First of all, what does it even mean to say that “China is lifting a million people a month out of poverty”? Where would the Chinese government get the money to do that?
The only people the Chinese government can tax are mainly the people in China. A country can’t lift itself up by its own bootstraps that way. Nor has there ever been enough foreign aid to lift a million people a month out of poverty.
If the Chinese government hasn’t done it, then who has? The Chinese people. They did not rise out of poverty by receiving largess from anybody.
The only thing that can cure poverty is wealth. The Chinese acquired wealth the old-fashioned way: They created it.
After the death of Mao, government controls over the market began to be relaxed — first tentatively, in selected places and for selected industries. Then, as those places and those industries began to prosper dramatically, similar relaxations of government control took place elsewhere, with similar results.
Even foreigners were allowed to come in and invest in China and sell their goods in China. But this was not just a transfer of wealth.
Foreigners did not come in to help the Chinese but to help themselves. The only way they could benefit, and the Chinese benefit at the same time, was if more total wealth was created. That is what happened but the political left has virtually no interest in the creation of wealth, in China or anywhere else, despite all of their proclaimed concern for “the poor.”
Since wealth is the only thing that can cure poverty, you might think that the left would be as obsessed with the creation of wealth as they are with the redistribution of wealth. But you would be wrong.
When it comes to lifting people out of poverty, redistribution of income and wealth has a much poorer and more spotty track record than the creation of wealth. In some places, such as Zimbabwe today, attempts at a redistribution of wealth have turned out to be a redistribution of poverty.
While the creation of wealth may be more effective for enabling millions of people to rise out of poverty, it provides no special role for the political left, no puffed up importance, no moral superiority, no power for them to wield over others. Redistribution is clearly better for the left.
Leftist emphasis on “the poor” proceeds as if the poor were some separate group. But, in most Western countries, at least, millions of people who are “poor” at one period of their lives are “rich” at another period of their lives — as these terms are conventionally defined.
How can that be? People tend to become more productive — create more wealth — over time, with more experience and an accumulation of skills and training.
That is reflected in incomes that are two or three times higher in later years than at the beginning of a career. But that too is of little or no interest to the political left.
Things that work for millions of people offer little to the left, and ultimately the left is about the left, not about the people they claim to want to lift out of poverty.
Poverty has continued to climb under Democratic administration according to this post.
If people can stop being party line political puppets, and use their God given brain (yes I still use the word God) to think, it all cannot be blamed on the Republicans.
Democrats have been the majority in congress and the President was also a democrat for the last five years, during which poverty has increased significantly , and the National debt phenomenally. Nothing got better.
I raised 17 children (all adopted) and I have an Idea how to budget. You can not use credit to get further and further in debt, expecting your children to clean up the financial mess you made.
You must pick priorities and eliminate unnecessary expenditures.
I always drove used cars I could afford, ( no Cadillacs or Lincolns ), Wheels are for transportation, not for profiling.
Some of my kids attended college by working their way through. The taxpayers didn’t pay for it.
These kids were mine, even though I didn’t father them, I worked 2 and sometimes 3 jobs to support them while I paid taxes that helped to support families whose fathers created “welfare queens” and left them to make more kids with another woman. I never bailed out on my kids so the government ( or should I say the taxpayers ) could support them.
They all grew up to be productive citizens, not live on welfare. Maybe they learned from the example I set.
“Welfare Queens” do exist. I personally knew several who by by pure desire to do so, kept having kids to live off the public dole. One actually told she had no desire to get a job. When she needed more money, she would have another kid. She was happy not working for a living. (five different fathers, 6 kids and counting. None of the fathers were supporting their offspring). This is is one huge reason there is so much poverty.
I believe poverty is not all being caused by the politicians, but some by the poor themselves and the ease with which some work the system in some cases.
The National Debt, which our children will be paying is a totally different thing. It has climbed by one third in the last 5 years blamed. That cannot be blamed on the Republicans.
lottakatz 1, March 24, 2013 at 10:58 am
Dredd, Actually it has been tried to a good extent and long and often enough that it can be seen not to work but be seen to be greatly destructive. But that’s not good enough for the true believers, it hasn’t been tried in its purest form, if only we could do that… True believers never let reality get in the way of their faith. That’s just the congregation though; the pastor and the guest pastor and the functionaries that get a cut know it’s a scam, and sit in the back room after the service dividing up the love offerings and making jokes about the faithful.
(Didja’ ever see the movie “Marjo”)
=========================================
No, haven’t seen Marjo … is it on Netflicks?
Will try to see it soon.
Let the Republican strategists say what they want, Fox rallies the troops.
While decrying the poor because they “don’t pay taxes” the rank and file Republican will continue trying to “starve the beast” by slashing government spending (i.e., money the government spends in the economy) and slashing taxes (for the wealthy).
So the people who don’t want to pay taxes and think we need to starve the beast denigrate the poor for not paying taxes, as though paying income tax is the only way to contribute to society.
This is an irrational hatred of the poor that is a cultural issue. It’s a bias propagated by the urban, financial interest that is as old as the country itself.
Article IV of the Articles of Confederation begins:
“The better to secure and perpetuate mutual friendship and intercourse among the people of the different states in this union, the free inhabitants of each of these states, paupers, vagabonds and fugitives from Justice excepted, shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of free citizens in the several states.”
Note, “paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice” are “excepted” from the “privileges and immunities of free citizens.”
Not only to blacks and women not count, but hippies and the poor are classed with criminals.
Dredd, Actually it has been tried to a good extent and long and often enough that it can be seen not to work but be seen to be greatly destructive. But that’s not good enough for the true believers, it hasn’t been tried in its purest form, if only we could do that… True believers never let reality get in the way of their faith. That’s just the congregation though; the pastor and the guest pastor and the functionaries that get a cut know it’s a scam, and sit in the back room after the service dividing up the love offerings and making jokes about the faithful.
(Didja’ ever see the movie “Marjo”)
lottakatz 1, March 24, 2013 at 10:08 am
They actually have 3 choices, change the message (lie), disenfranchise enough voters in key states to change the outcome of elections, or change their policy positions. From what I’v seen and read about their plans choices 1 and 2 would be what I would bet on, #3 not so much.
…
I do get the impression that the new brand name will be GOP = the “Growth and Opportunity Party”. I’d put money on that, it’s repeated several times.
I’m torn between “So?” and “Meh” as a response to it.
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The House Budget Committee, chaired by Paul Ryan, the Ayn Rand aficionado, will operate under the same guise as before, hoping that the public does not notice:
That Ayn Rand ideology is mixed with a certain evangelical doctrine of theology:
(Ayn Rand: Patron Saint of The Plutocracy). The plutocrats who have this philosophy also happen to have the economic power over this nation.
They haven’t found an effective way to use it because most of the people are against them.
I do not expect them to cave in.
Some RepubliCons have new concepts and new ideas. Promise that Hispanic voter a pie in the sky and a tax break during lunch break. Promise that poor white trash guy living out in the stix a better life with a charter school without forced busing. Promise that gay guy he can divorce his wife and marry his gay guy. Promises, promises,…… a party reborn. The Party of Lincoln. Yeah, the Lincoln Continental with wire wheels and whitewalls.
I appreciate this Mark…. I was listening to NPR the other day…. There was something similar …. They were going state by states and he margins lost and how much or little in some cases the vote that would be needed to pick up that state…. Rebranding the image….. Maybe they are figuring out that by can do it like Obama… Tell the people what they want to hear and still do it the way they want….. Without all of the rhetorical flame throwing,…
BTW, Excellent posting Mark. I got all twitchy reading the DOC and though I intended to, I forgot to include that in my comment.
They actually have 3 choices, change the message (lie), disenfranchise enough voters in key states to change the outcome of elections, or change their policy positions. From what I’v seen and read about their plans choices 1 and 2 would be what I would bet on, #3 not so much.
The statement quoted from Haley Barbour and Ari Fleischer doesn’t indicate a change of method or philosophy about how assist the poor, working poor or non-poor working class, it is just a statement that people want better and more opportunities for jobs and advancement.
I followed the link and read the entire doc. I’m not impressed since the recommendations are all essentially rhetorical except for urging comprehensive immigration reform. The document points up specific problems like the alienation of young voters due to different attitudes regarding social issues (gay rights) and advocates outreach to foster more inclusiveness but then concludes with a statement that just because one disagrees on 20% of policy questions that shouldn’t preclude support for the other 80%. That does not say ‘change the policy to attract voters’. It doesn’t touch on women’s health/privacy issues at all.
The overwhelming portion of the document is how to build a greater voter pool and run better campaigns. In that regard it’s way more specific than on any people oriented policy questions. Their recommendations can be summed up (IMO) with #’s 7 and 8 which boil down to for #7, talking with no mention of regulation for corporate wrongdoing or harm to working people and for #8, talking to potential voters to explain why their policies are better. Doesn’t say anything about changing policies, just message better.
7. We have to blow the whistle at corporate malfeasance and attack corporate welfare. We should speak out when a company liquidates itself and its executives receive bonuses but rank-and-file workers are left unemployed. We should speak out when CEOs receive tens of millions of dollars in retirement packages but middle-class workers have not had a meaningful raise in years.
8. If we believe our policies are the best ones to improve the lives of the American people,all the American people, our candidates and office holders need to do a better job talking in normal, people-oriented terms and we need to go to communities where Republicans do not normally go to listen and make our case. We need to campaign among Hispanic, Black, Asian, and gay Americans and demonstrate that we care about them, too.
I do get the impression that the new brand name will be GOP = the “Growth and Opportunity Party”. I’d put money on that, it’s repeated several times.
I’m torn between “So?” and “Meh” as a response to it.
In days of old when Knights were bold..
And rubbers werent invented…
They tied a sock around the …….
And RepubliCons were prevented.
Ike: Lame with no brain. Nixon: smart but quick with the fart and first with the crime. Southern Strategy adopted. Ford: Who? Ronnie Raygun: senile when he went in and senile when he went out. Southern Strategy perfected. Bush from KennyBunkFort: scion of a Prescott who held Nazi money in the Var. Bushine from Midland: second generation of scion who held Nazi money in the Var and third generation legacy sonny boy Floyd of the Yalee. Southern Strategy personified. Mittster Romney: gypsie and scion of car thief. Rubio: voice of the future– as in days of future past. Ayn Rand Paul: pee holder personified.
Good post, Mark. I don’t think the Texas republicans are getting the message. They are being particularly cruel to poor women and medicaid recipients during this legislative session.
G.O.P.: Grungy Old Pharts. And this aint no fartin dog talkin. Notice how we dogs drop the letter “g” in our written speech if the “g” falls on the end. No room for the g spot. Nothing Grand about being a RepubliCon. Con maybe. Ex Con, often. Take Dickhead Cheney who wears a cowboy hat but cant ride a horse or rope a cow. Phoney, phoney, Western baloney. New Guy down in the sunshine state has a poor recollection of when the parents had to “flee” Castro and come to Miami. The year 1956 was a bit early so he had to fudge it up a little. The opthamologist from Kentucky who can talk on the floor of the Senate for 13 hours without peeing on it is all the news that is fit to print. Newty is too fruity and too old. Maybe another rising star will emerge– some senile actor from California maybe.
According to the current architect of the Republican economic policy he looks to a Russian immigrant:
(New Yorker, emphasis added). Ayn Rand from a well to do family was an immigrant from Russia who settled in Hollywood.
The Romney campaign probably does not remember that Romney’s father, who became a governor, had been on welfare:
Give me your tired, poor, …. uh, uh,….disenchanted voter.
The republiclowns are like any bully. It’s always easier to attack the poor and the defenseless, the least able to fight back (e.g. Gingrich calling it “failure of citizenship” rather than a failure of schools). And just like any bully, they’re shocked when someone stands up to them. They have only changed their tune because they lost.
It wouldn’t surprise me if – had the republiclowns won – they cut off all welfare without discussion and offered bus tickets to Canada and Mexico. In the 1990s, the rightwing premier of Alberta (a Canadian province, in case anyone is geographically challenged) did exactly that. He cut the poor off welfare and gave them bus tickets, shipping them off to other provinces as a way to “solve the problem” of poverty, rather than investing in any job training programs.
Give me your hungry, your tired your poor I’ll piss on ’em
That’s what the Statue of Bigotry says
Your poor huddled masses, let’s club ’em to death
And get it over with and just dump ’em on the boulevard
– Lou Reed, “Dirty Boulevard”