Obama on Poverty, Part I

On 5/12/15 President Obama participated in a panel on poverty at Georgetown University. The entire discussion can be read at the web site of the White House, Office of the Press Secretary, for those interested. Obama's comments tell us much about his ideology.

Early on Obama refers to a "...growing awareness of inequality in our society..." Inequality will always be a far bigger issue for the left than liberty, which is often a non-issue.

Obama: "First of all, I think we can all stipulate that the best antipoverty program is a job..." So stipulated! Now, Mr. Obama, when will you acknowledge what so many business leaders have been telling you - that your never-ending taxes and regulations deter businesses from hiring and creating more jobs. Your policies have resulted in the lowest employment rate in 40 years, along with one of the slowest economic recoveries.

Obama: "...over the past 40 years, the share of income going to the bottom 90% has shrunk from about 65% down to about 53%. It's a big shift. It's a big transfer..." Assuming the President is correct with his numbers, I have a question. How many of the bottom 90% have cell phones, computers, big screen TVs, and other such luxuries that one would not ordinarily equate with poverty?

Obama: "We don't dispute that the free market is the greatest producer of wealth in history - it has lifted billions of people out of poverty...but...concentrations of wealth can lead to some being left behind." Let's focus on the first part of that comment. It bears repeating: "the free market is the greatest producer of wealth in history." So, I must ask why you, Mr. President, and the left generally, adhere to so many socialist ideas. The "free market" is based on capitalism - not socialism. So see comment above about Obama's policies impeding job growth - and the free market.

Obama: "Those who are doing better and better...are withdrawing from sort of the commons - kids start going to private schools, kids start working out at private clubs instead of the public park. An anti-government ideology then disinvests from those common goods and those things that draw us together." Whew. There's a lot there. Private schools? Don't Democrats oppose school vouchers that would allow even poor families to send their kids to private schools? Don't the President's kids go to Sidwell Friends School, one of the truly elite private schools in the country? Any time you want an example of elitist - and hypocritical - statements of policy, just listen to what the Dems and their friends in Hollywood say, versus what they actually do.

After discussing the need for access to decent books and computers, Obama said this: "You look at state budgets, you look at city budgets, and you look at federal budgets, and we don't make those same common investments that we used to." Agreed. But maybe if we stopped rewarding teachers and other public employees with pensions that the government cannot afford, then we could finance those other things that Obama says we used to finance. But local governments and state legislatures and governors have consistently rewarded public employee unions in exchange for their electoral support, until some Republican governors came along and have tried to put the brakes on that nonsense.