America once fought a war against poverty now it wages a war on the poor -Must Read

[malaise]

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/apr/15/poor-peoples-campaign-systemic-poverty-a-sin
<snip>
In 2013, Callie Greer’s daughter Venus died in her arms after a battle with breast cancer. If caught early, the five-year survival rate for women diagnosed with breast cancer is close to 100%. But Venus’s cancer went undiagnosed for months because she couldn’t afford health insurance. She lived in Alabama, a state that refused to expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act. Venus’s death is not an isolated incident – more than 250,000 people like her die in the United States from poverty and related issues every year.

Access to healthcare is just one of the issues facing the 140 million people who live in poverty in the US today. Over the past two years, the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival has carried out a listening tour in dozens of states across this nation. We have met with tens of thousands of people from El Paso, Texas, to South Charleston, West Virginia, to Selma, Alabama, where we met Callie, gathering testimonies from poor people and listening to their demands for a better society.

While our nation once fought a war against poverty, now we wage a war on the poor. The richest 1% in our country own more wealth than the bottom 90% combined, tightening their grip on political power to shape labor, tax, healthcare and campaign finance policies that benefit the few at the expense of the many. A full 60% more Americans now live below the official poverty line than in 1968, and 43% of all American children live below the minimum income level considered necessary to meet basic family needs.

In the last eight years alone, 23 states have passed voter suppression laws – gutting the Voting Rights Act civil rights leaders helped secure more than a half century ago. This is the true hacking of our democracy, allowing people to win office who deny healthcare, living wages, cut necessary social programs and push policies that promote mass incarceration, hurt immigrants and devastate our environment.

These racist laws hurt not just people of color, but poor whites whose lives are upended by the politicians put in office by the violent extremism that is voter suppression.

[wendyb-NC]

1. Thank you, Malaise. This article says it all, a must read!

We must engage, speak out and vote.

[malaise]

4. Sharpton had a good interview with Joe Biden a few minutes ago

touching on a lot of this

[raccoon]

2. Off to Greatest with you! Nt

[druidity33]

3. K&R...

looking forward to hearing more about this...

Thanks for the headsup.

[Duppers]

5. It's always about money and greed.

Here's a sad thread on the reality of health care in this country:

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100210494763

[dalton99a]

9. +1. Rich people must have everything, and poor people must die.

[radliberal]

6. Ever since Reagan made it fashionable to spit on the poor.

They cloak themselves in Christianity but despise the teachings of Christ. VOTE THEM OUT!!!

[Achilleaze]

7. republican jezus loves the rich

pisses on the poor

[dalton99a]

8. Make them work for food

so they have less time to think about guillotines and such

[malaise]

10. Well given that the vast majority are his so called base

he and his goons will learn.

[mountain grammy]

11. I remember the war on poverty

It was a short war that began around 1960, was wounded twice in 1963, mortally wounded on April 4, 1968, and finally murdered for good in June 6, 1968, as the leaders were gunned down, one by one.

In November, 1968, America left the path to reform of an unequal and unjust society, and turned right to embrace ignorance and our corporate masters and we've been going further right ever since.

[SunSeeker]

15. Yup. The War on Poverty was an American anomaly.

America has a long history of hating the poor dating back to the Puritan colonists, who looked on poverty as a moral failing brought on by "laziness." That brief period in the 1960s when America appeared determined to end poverty was quickly squelched. Unachievable welfare work requirements are today's version of the old poorhouses, maintaining America's tradition of punishing the poor for their poverty.
http://www.history.com/news/in-the-19th-century-the-last-place-you-wanted-to-go-was-the-poorhouse

[mountain grammy]

19. Social Security and Medicare cut the poverty rate in half.

Old people made up half the poor. It took a while, and it took extending benefits to more classes of workers, the disabled and minor survivors, like Paul Ryan and me. This is a fact corporate America would like us to forget, and seems there's plenty of citizens dumb enough to fall in line.

In America, if a person takes up the cause of poverty, it seems the more popular support they get, the more endangered they become.

Human misery doesn't sell cookies.

[SunSeeker]

21. Yes indeed. nt

[PETRUS]

36. The "war on poverty" continued a bit longer than that.

Something to read: http://cepr.net/blogs/cepr-blog/what-was-is-the-war-on-poverty-anyway-and-does-it-matter-today

[mountain grammy]

37. Very good article..

structural economic reform is key, I believe. And, yes, Nixon wasn't all bad. The earned income credit is a good Republican idea, the rarest of the rare, and it's prevailed along with SSI.

Kick this to an OP.

[PETRUS]

39. Thanks.

I find a lot of useful information in the CEPR publications.

I was too young to have an opinion of Nixon during his presidency, although my gut feelings have always been unfavorable. But in many ways he was a lot better than what's come since then.

[malaise]

41. Thanks for that link

[PETRUS]

46. Sure thing!

[G_j]

12. yes, a must read!

and should be read by every American. Truth!

[smirkymonkey]

13. I am so tired of the cruelty of today's republican party. I truly believe they are trying to

cull the herd by the actions they are taking. They don't care about people, especially the poor and minorities. They make me absolutely sick and we need to vote them out in November!

[KPN]

22. Yep. My oldest son for years has been saying

it's about thinning the herd. At first, I thought he was just being dramatic. But today I've come to believe that those pulling the levers (the Kochs, Mercer, Murdoch, et al in the USA) are not at all concerned if "thinning the herd" actually is a consequence (intended or not?) of their scheming. I'm quite sure they have disdain at least for the poor. Relatively, anyone who is not a millionaire is poor in their world (the millionaires are their middle class). Culling the herd is a convenient solution for the threat with the highest risk potential for them ultimately: populism aimed against them.

An interesting link about billionaires behind Trump:

https://www.nationofchange.org/2017/05/20/populism-1-billionaires-behind-trump-brexit/

[KPN]

23. K&R. Thanks for posting.

This is what it is all about. This is the ball we need to keep our eyes on.

[Upthevibe]

26. Me too, smirkymonkey...

I'm sick of it.. And in the name of Christianity and Jesus... I was raised a Christian and it WAS NOT like this.

[area51]

43. Agreed that they're trying to cull the herd.

It's why we don't have health care as a basic human right.

[dchill]

61. Why is this not murder?

Premeditated, in fact.

[Amimnoch]

14. What really slays me is how many of the poor/working poor ARE Republicon.

My own extended family living in Louisiana and Virginia as textbook examples. The poorest members of my family have been and still do identify as Republican, many of them staunch Hump supporters.

Many of them have this really strange twisted conviction that somehow, inexplicably, Democratic Party led social programs have caused their condition. They will somehow, magically, be rich if the tRumpublicon party had its way.

More than a few of them continue to EXIST on Democratic Party led social welfare programs such as welfare, social security, food stamps, free health clinics etc..

Even as they take in a Social Security disability check, they complain about “people who abuse the system” never even stopping for a second to think that cuts to the system HURTS THEM!!!!

It drives me mad!

[Upthevibe]

27. I know!

WTF... On CSPAN there was a great panel at one of the Festival of Books who spoke about this issue. I wish I DVR'd it...

[olegramps]

29. This is result of a well financed propaganda campaign being broadcast 24/7.

The ability to mine the hatred and prejudices of those who can be easily convinced that minorities are the cause of their all their woes has been masterly exploited by the extreme right wing. It went into fully attack mode following Nixon when Reagan took up the Southern Strategy with his "welfare queens driving Cadillacs" remarks. The Republican Party has chosen the path of fascism to gain power and has doggedly pursued this course for over forty years. What is happening is nothing new, just a culmination of their policies.

Their campaign to identify all Democrats as immoral, unpatriotic heathens has been even more successful then they could have imagined. It will take a generation to convince these useful idiots that they have been exploited. Meanwhile millions of innocent people will suffer, many of whom are the instruments of their own destruction. You have to admire the Republicans. They have never wavered from their goal by allowing any compassion to compromise their determination. Compassion is for the weak.

They have masterfully conned the righteous right that they represent their theocratic ideals, along with convincing many of the working class that unions were their enemy enlisting them in so-called "right to work laws" that impoverished them. They have accomplished a major feat in successfully dividing the nation into two camps effectively totally destroying the basic concept upon which the nation was founded. E pluribus Unum - Out of many one. The Federalist Papers tell of how the Founding Father were well aware that divisions would always exist but strove to find a principle that would serve to hold the nation to a guiding principle of unity based on the acceptance of different opinions. The Republicans have forsaken this concept to cast anyone who opposes their agenda as enemies and not real Americans. Nothing could be further from the truth of the matter, but the die is cast. They are determined to achieve total capitulation. Any question of their policies are not logically debated or allowed to be questioned, but rather summerly condemn as lies without any merit. Some could say that the Democrats are as determined as the Republicans and share equally in the responsibility for this situation. This is nothing more than false equivalency and proven to be wholly inaccurate. Radio broadcasting is dominated by the ultraconservatives by a ratio of 2500 hours to 250 of progressive broadcast. Good Luck Citizens.

[H2O Man]

16. Recommended.

George Foreman, a success story of LBJ's "War on Poverty," has noted that caring about poor people went out of style in 1980. I agree, though I suspect that it began going out of style more than a decade earlier. When Dr. King was organizing his Poor Peoples Campaign, the implications of a just society was rejected by those in power.

[DFW]

17. The line taken stright from "The Newsroom"

at 6:47

[KPN]

24. Booyah! "The first step in solving any problem

is recognizing there is one. America is not the greatest country in the world anymore."

[Upthevibe]

30. IMHO this is one of the best

scenes from anything ever!

[malaise]

42. Great line

Thanks

[spanone]

18. K&R...

[zentrum]

20. Thank you Malaise!

[KPN]

25. K&R!

[CountAllVotes]

28. We need to focus on the opiate problem in America

As for the 250,000 people that are dead due to no medical care, ah who cares!

We must fight the opiate drug epidemic! That is the priority!

Damn these people sicken me!

[TheFrenchRazor]

53. yep; the "opiate epidemic" is just part of the drug war scam to terrorize/incarcerate the masses;

it's been working like a charm for decades. now they've added the perpetual "war on terror" as an excuse to justify massive new police/governmental powers over the people.

[Anon-C]

31. Meanwhile...

According to the World Bank, more than 500 million people were lifted out of extreme poverty as China's poverty rate fell from 88 percent in 1981 to 6.5 percent in 2012, as measured by the percentage of people living on the equivalent of US$1.90 or less per day in 2011 purchasing price parity terms.

http://www.worldbank.org/en/country/china/overview#3

[Upthevibe]

32. Malaise, Thank you for posting this...

It IS a must read. I've sent it out to some friends...friends who feel the same way I do. The people who need to read it are those f'ing so-called "born agains" who I grew up with (in Texas) who go to church every Sunday, say "Praise the Lord".

[bronxiteforever]

33. Kick and recommend.

[Beartracks]

34. Imagine a school that decides there are only so many A's that can be earned.

It doesn't matter how hard any one student works, or how smart you are; only a few students are going to get an A.

Oh -- and a small number of those students are already guaranteed most of the A's because their families sit on the school board. And the school board, of course, limits the availability of the A's.

Never mind that meeting all the learning requirements should merit you a good grade; in this school, Republicans would say, you just need to work harder so that you can be sure to get one of the only A's left. And in that way, somehow, magically, everyone will graduate with honors.

Obviously this is an off-the-cuff metaphor for how Republicans view American society, but this is precisely how they ideologically propose that Americans are to be able to provide for themselves -- they promise voters that 10% of the nation's wealth will, magically, provide for the health and livelihood of 90% of the people, "if you just work hard enough." And it's a lie, because it's simply not possible under the current school board rules.

==============

[FakeNoose]

45. This is an apt metaphor for the conservative philosophy

The Republicans and conservatives believe that the only way they can win is for everyone else to lose. The last 500-or-so years of Western history demonstrate this philosophy put into effect. "How do I get more and make sure everyone else gets less?" It has led us to world wars, countless skirmishes around the globe, political feuds/uprisings, holocausts, religious hatreds, etc.

Conservatives have been programmed since early childhood to think this way and have no concern for the damage they cause to others. These people should never be allowed political power over others, and it's up to liberals to defeat them and keep them out of office.

[StarzGuy]

35. You should add disabled persons

The right wing also want to pull the rug out from under those of us with disabilities. They do this by cutting funding for programs that help support us, Medicare, Medicaid and food stamps to name a few. They also do everything to see to it that increasing benefits like Social Security upon which I rely for most of my income never get increased. And these same people want to eliminate Social Security completely. I suppose they would just have us die so they don't have to bother with it.

[CountAllVotes]

60. +1

Well said.

[oasis]

38. K and R

[onethatcares]

40. thank you Malaise

for bringing this to our attention.

Now, it's time to do something about it.

[PatrickforO]

44. This is a great article.

I have always marked the assassination of JFK as the 'coup' by the military industrial complex that started us down this 'death-for-profit' road.

It is a question of priorities: Either our priority is we, the people, or our priority is the shareholders of companies that make up military industrial complex, billionaires and other big corporations.

We cannot have both, and capitalism is the cancer that has literally pulled this nation apart.

[malaise]

48. You're right - I break it down to society or market

and it seems to be one or the other in the US - when I read an article saying that finding cures is a bad business model, I worry that they are making stuff to make us ill so they can have perpetual profits.

The Scandinavians have a more balanced approach.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

64. "making stuff to make us ill?" They are, Malaise.

It's called fast foods, prepared foods, comfort foods, soft drinks, etc. The "market" pressures people to work harder and faster, thereby increasing the need for fast food, and with little time to consider health effects or to shop and prepare healthy diets.

Works really well with their free, unfettered market principles. Also kills a lot of hard working Americans at an early age. No better example that most all drug stores and gas stations here that also sell cigarettes, junk foods, soda pop and energy drinks.

Thanks for posting the article to remind us of our better days and progressive roots!

.............

[malaise]

65. We know about those killer foods but what happens when the same

companies that makes that shit own the drugs needed for the illnesses they cause.

[KY_EnviroGuy]

66. That would indeed be the worse case scenario but....

I would hold that most major corporations are in the big profit-making bed together and could care less about public health or safety. We won't find drug makers calling out food or drink producers, for example. Even our doctor and hospital professional organizations have soft-pedaled many of those issues for decades. No better example than looking at how long it took for the revolt against tobacco to finally get the market to turn against its use.

What's disgusting now - after many hard-earned years of progress - is the Trump administration's degrading of the very institutions that have helped to protect public interest against dangerous and unhealthy consumer products, including foods. As you know, many GOPers actually believe the market can solve all of society's problems without any government intervention. We must remove these heathens from office, weaken America's love affair with the stock market, and get campaign funding back to individual small donations only.

.....

[malaise]

67. +1,000

Great post

[KY_EnviroGuy]

68. Sorry, Malaise - just felt the need to rant a little.

tRump sort of brings that out in me every few days. Actually, I'm too damned old to be dealing with this much daily shit, LOL.

[red dog 1]

47. K&R...Thanks for posting

[suffragette]

49. So damn true. On another note, this shift seems to be global. Recently watched I, Daniel Blake

The film depicted how the UK has adopted the worst, most callous and most crushing aspects of the American welfare reforms, including the outsourcing of processes to private American companies, which push means to exclude (such as means tests that measure everything but the critical aspect of the personal need) and sanction by withholding assistance.

Highly recommend the film.

[dlk]

50. The Republicans Are Largely Responsible for Shifting the War on Poverty into a War on Poor People

Yet, so many claim to be Christians. Trump has shown us who they really are. They are the party of redistribution of American wealth upward to the very top.

[raven mad]

51. Kicking for us way-out folks.

malaise.......... I mourn that this article is so true. It's not just in the deep South; you'd be amazed at what the assholes are doing up here.

I've never thought I could truly hate.

I now think differently. And that has me crying.

[malaise]

55. Most of us can't believe what we're seeing

and not just in the US.

[raven mad]

56. We have a lot of interaction with folks from British Columbia and the Yukon Territory.

They really don't like the U.S. any more.

[TheFrenchRazor]

52. the rich deserve to be rich, the poor deserve to be poor; been going on since the 80s,

and there doesn't seem to be any end in sight. there is more behind it than just voter suppression, although that is certainly part of the anti-democratic, anti-american strategy.

[Solly Mack]

54. K&R

[barbtries]

57. the war on poverty ended with Reagan

if not sooner. the war on the poor never ends it seems. sad sick country.

[Progressive dog]

58. In 2015, 13.5% (43.1 million) of Americans lived in poverty

way less than 1/3 of the 140 million quoted.

[bucolic_frolic]

59. Class Warfare!!

That's what Republicans used to yell at us

[Permanut]

62. Always want to include Newt Gingrich on the list..

of those who vilify the poor.

"When free welfare is provided, people choose not to work".

This from that wonderful Christian who, with his wife, brought us "Rediscovering God in America". You know, that wonderful public servant who now has a net worth of $7 million.

[Dark n Stormy Knight]

63. I'm not a fan of religion, but if all religious people viewed the world as

Reverend William Barber does, I'd feel a whole lot better about it.