Poverty and John Edwards
Presidential prospect John Edwards is on a mission this presidential season. He wants to end poverty in America. In my mind, Edwards is making poverty an issue the way Al Gore has become the champion of combating global climate change. Edwards’ website states:
End Poverty by 2036: John Edwards believes that ending poverty should be a goal our nation actively pursues. A national goal will rally support for the cause and help us measure our progress. In 1999, Tony Blair announced a 20-year goal to end child poverty in Great Britain and he has already reduced child poverty by 17 percent [Washington Post, 4/3/2006]. Edwards calls for a national effort to:
Cut poverty by one third within a decade, lifting 12 million Americans out of poverty by 2016.
End poverty within 30 years, lifting 37 million Americans out of poverty by 2036.
Currently the former Senator from North Carolina is in third place for the Democratic race trailing Obama and Clinton. The cool news though, is that should Edwards win the nomination, he would still beat any of the Republican challengers! The Edwards campaign has not done a good job of being able to really break out of the third place trap they’ve been in seemingly since people started announcing their intention to run.
Should Edwards not win the nomination, or the Vice Presidential nomination (I’m hoping for Bill Richardson as VP) he may be able to transcend the political spectrum to make poverty a values issue rather than a political one. Much like global warming, it’s hard to imagine that Republicans could really say that they are pro-poverty, which could make Edwards’ plans realistic regardless of who is in the white house. Then again, this is the party who has leaders who don’t believe in evolution… 
Wake up Walmart suporter = AWESOME!
Maybe one of these fights with Ann Coulter will push Edwards out in front of Obama or Hillary. Regardless, Edwards has made poverty the central issue of his campaign, and I fully believe it will become a central issue in America for the future regardless of who the next President is. You can read more about Edwards and his plan to end poverty in America at http://johnedwards.com/issues/poverty/
on July 15th, 2007 at
Is John Edwards To Poverty What Al Gore Is To Climate Change?…
Liberal College Kid thinks so…….
on July 15th, 2007 at
Edwards is either not serious about poverty reduction, or he’s just clueless on the subject. It is possible for government to reduce poverty. It is NOT possible for government to eliminate poverty, because there have always been and will always be people who make bad life decisions which lead to poverty. Government is not capable of preventing people from making such mistakes. Attempts to insulate people from any consequences of such mistakes are both costly and counterproductive, in effect becoming subsidies for the kind of self-destructive behavior which leads to poverty.
Whether Edwards proposes to eliminate poverty because he’s actually so clueless that he thinks it’s achievable, or because he thinks making impossible promises will get him elected, neither answer makes him attractive as a candidate. And clinging to such delusions will not help in the cause of poverty [i]reduction[/i], which is achievable.
on July 16th, 2007 at
LBJ ended poverty too. Or gave it a heck of an effort. Unfortunately, the unintended consequences of such a sweeping anti-poverty program was an increase in poverty, the ghettoization of urban centers, etc.
Anti-poverty measures must be shrewd, specific, and almost certainly “unsweeping.”
There are certainly some baseline bureaucracies that are good for the combating of poverty: I found food stamps, the EIC, school lunch programs and temp assistance to make a difference in my life. But other programs, especially certain “social” repairs, such as “affordable” housing projects seemed like unintended death traps to me.
Eliminating middle class corruption and abuse of anti-poverty measures should be extremely high on John Edwards agenda, or he’s not even serious about the issue. He should be wary of fancy sounding programs that don’t work (or worse, hurt). He should avoid rhetoric like “eliminating poverty in America” and instead underpromise and overdeliver.
The undeniable fact is that there are those who are in poverty because of circumstances and those who are in poverty because of consistent patterns of choice. The right programs can give the former a fighting chance, but the wrong programs can give the latter yet another excuse.
Edwards is completely arrogant if he thinks he can do what forty-some presidents before him haven’t been able to accomplish. Remember a “chicken in every pot, a car in every garage?”
on July 16th, 2007 at
You are still a “College” kid as your title says, so I think that exceptions should be made for your lack of “Real Life” experiences. Let me pass along two things that you should always remember when you read something like this.
The first one is that “people will never do anything unless it directly benefits them”, so ask yourself what is the benefit to Sen. Edwards by announcing this? How will this benefit him in the future? Don’t believe me; let me use you for an example. You are currently in school, (I am guessing political science). What is your motivation in going to school? Would you still go to school if you could make more money working at Burger King with a high school education? Would any body want to take on all of the debt associated with College if they could make the same or more money working fast-food, and some other menial labor?
The second thing is that “Perfection and equality will never be reached by society” meaning that you will never be able to force people to reach equality because equality is constantly changing and evolving, so even if you set a goal and achieve, the definition of equality will have changed to match the goal. Think of it this way: have you ever had the perfect beer? What made it perfect? Is there nothing that could have made it better? Was the taste perfect in all ways, were there enough bubbles, was the alcohol contact high enough, or low enough? Was it cold enough? Would you drink it forever and never drink any thing else? Then how can you say it was perfect?
To use you for an example again, lets say that you are taking a public speaking class, and you are doing all of your speeches, and home work and attending all of your classes, and putting forth your best effort to pass the class with an “A”. Then in your class there is a person who attends 5 classes out of the semester and does not turn in any of their homework, does not make any of the required speeches, and puts forth no effort to pass the class. Would you support both of you receiving a “C” grade so that equality can be maintained?
If Sen. Edwards wants to really stop poverty in the US, he could take 90% of his money and give it to the poor, that if distributive properly could give almost every one that is bellow the poverty level a $100,000.00 and lift them right out of poverty. But that is not what he wants to do; he wants to raise your taxes to lift these people out of poverty, while earning more and more money for him self. There is a saying that I do not know the origin of but it goes like this “The rich will often shackle the poor with burdens that they themselves would never lift a finger to alleviate.” Think about that for a while.
on July 16th, 2007 at
Jacques,
There are 37 million Americans living in poverty… 1 in 8 people. If Edwards gave $100,000.00 per person it would cost $3,700,000,000,000. If you think Edwards has that much money… You’re basically an idiot.
Besides, why does the person advocating for the poor have to be poor himself? We all know it takes millions of dollars to run for office in this country because of the lack of campaign finance reform. We have a system where only the wealthiest can run for office and then we wonder why none of the poor people have a voice in government.
There are social programs that can be put into place to end poverty. Go beyond food stamps and government housing. Imagine, if people didn’t have to pay for healthcare or child care, if they made a living wage, we can end poverty as so many know it in this country. And I know I would much rather be paying to give poor people in America healthcare than paying to subsidize big oil companies as they occupy Iraq. We can change taxes and change the things we fund in government. Cut back the military and the defense industry subsidies and we can have a government that truly works for the people.
on July 16th, 2007 at
[…] and see how intricate are the patterns,” they said. The poor old minister stared and stared. Still he could see nothing, for there was nothing. But he did not dare to say he saw nothing. “Nobody must find out,”‘ thought he. […]
on July 17th, 2007 at
Hi Big Joe;
Resorting to name calling “You’re basically an idiot” I would have expected much more our of someone who is so clearly well educated as you are, but I guess some “kids” just never learn to grow up!
Did I say that a person who is advocating for the poor needs to be poor, you are making assumptions, I stated that if Sen. Edwards was serious about helping the poor, that he could start by helping the poor, in stead of standing up on a stage and grandstanding and making hallow promises in exchange for votes. Sen. Edwards is the perfect image of a modern day hypocrite, so quick to tell people what to do but so slow to do it themselves. If Sen. Edwards wanted to help the poor, then start by helping the poor, not by figuring out how to pay fewer taxes, and how to work the loop holes.
You state the “we have a system where only the wealthiest can run for office” this is not true. You should get your facts straight before you make assumptions. The reason that this is the case is because every body wants to have money and power. We have been conditioned to assume that people with money, know how to mange things well. Until we change our perceptions we will continue to elect inept leaders and representatives, and then we will continue to complain when these leaders who turn out to be the morally corrupt and inept yet have money. We really have not had a great leader in this country for quite some time, Richard Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, John F Kennedy, Gorge Bush, and Gorge W. Bush. All of these Presidents had problems and controversy in office, yet all of them had money. The next President will be the same the last President, and will continue to be inept, making promises that they can not keep, and will continue to pander to the people and business that put them into office. The only reason that you like one President better then another is because they pander to people and businesses that you agree with.
I agree with you “There are social programs that can be put into place to end poverty.” I am sure that you have figured out how to pay for all of these programs as well. Maybe you could enlighten the rest of us “Idiots” as we are obviously less educated and inferior to your superior knowledge and experience in life. Tell us how would you reorganize the government? How would you deal with the military and the defense industry? What companies would you subsidies? How would you deal with those that drop out of school and refuse to work to pull themselves out of poverty? How would you handle the next September 11? How would you handle Afghanistan and Iraq? How would you handle China? How would you handle heath care? How are you going to make everyone happy? How would you handle Russia, Iran, Africa, Indonesia, Israel?
I want to hold you responsible for your opinions just like you do the rest of the leaders of the world. Publish what you would do and let everyone in the world have a glance at your opinion, and who knows if we like them maybe we will elect you as President.
on July 17th, 2007 at
Big Joe:
“There are social programs that can be put into place to end poverty. Go beyond food stamps and government housing. Imagine, if people didn’t have to pay for healthcare or child care, if they made a living wage, we can end poverty as so many know it in this country.”
You can imagine it all you want to. I can imagine that it rains pennies. Doesn’t make it possible. Universal health care and child care wouldn’t eliminate poverty, even if they make it more tolerable (though even that comes at significant cost to society). And a “living wage” would likewise not eliminate poverty, it would only push the losers into black market (meaning off-the-records, not necessarily criminal) jobs or out of the job market completely. No government program can keep people from making bad decisions. And if you try to prevent people who make bad decisions from becoming poor as a result of those bad decisions, you’re basically subsidizing bad behavior. And what happens when you subsidize something? You get more of it. That way lies disaster, for everyone.
The elimination of poverty is not possible, and any attempt to do the impossible will be wasted effort, or worse. I’ve got no problem with efforts to reduce poverty, but once you start talking about eliminating it completely, you’re no longer doing any good. You’re chasing a foolish utopian delusion. The world has suffered enough in the pursuit of such mirages.
on July 19th, 2007 at
Intergalactic space travel, just monarchies and “ending” poverty all are conceivable fantasies that are empirically disprovable.
Poverty isn’t like polio, or a moon shot. It is an integral, historic social challenge. Eliminating poverty has the same likelihood of eliminating avarice, eliminating conflict, eliminating waste. You can’t neutralize the poor into a higher income bracket and make it go away.
Far, far, far smarter men than us have historically come to the same conclusion.
Edwards isn’t framing it as “reducing” or “managing” poverty (because that doesn’t inspire donors) - he’s twirling his finger in the dimple of his cheek and saying “naysayers be damned, I’m gonna lick this thing once and for all.”
It seems disingenuous coming from him. He may truly care about poverty, but framing it this way is painfully laughable.
I’m amazed at how poverty is always cured every presidential term that has a (D) behind the name.
The rhetoric of national healer is really, really tired. I just want a national manager for a change, and someone who declares himself as such. No more messiahs!
Vote Coolidge in ‘08!