In These Times: How the Democratic candidates would help the Poor

[Karmadillo]

Or, as the article notes, how most of the Democratic candidates wouldn't help the poor. I guess that's understandable, inasmuch as proposing to help the poor pushes one closer to being "unelectable" (ie, one would have to fight for the nomination without lots of corporate cash and the blessings of Tim Russert). I excerpted a couple of profiles, but if you click on the link, you can find profiles for all the candidates.

http://www.inthesetimes.com/comments.php?id=382_0_1_0_C

Dennis Kucinich

The man who declared “poverty’s a weapon of mass destruction” is the only candidate to address the problems of welfare reform in his campaign statements. (He takes note of plunging college enrollment among welfare recipients, for example.) Like many congressional Democrats, he has called for expanded education and training opportunities for people receiving welfare, saying “education is the only solution proven to reduce poverty levels.” Unlike most of his Democratic colleagues, he believes home childcare should count as an allowable work activity. He supports single-payer health care.

Howard Dean

The Vermont governor’s credentials as poverty-fighter rest almost entirely on his plan to expand the Children’s Health Insurance Program—effectively creating a federal expanded Medicaid program to benefit the near-poor—covering everyone at or below 185 percent of the poverty level and all children and young adults at or below 300 percent of poverty. On other matters, there’s less evidence of a crusader for the poor: Dean’s Vermont was an early pioneer of workfare, and the governor has bragged of being one of the “pioneers of welfare reform,” which he thinks “has been an incredibly positive force.” Like most Democrats (and many Republicans), he opposes the 40-hour work week requirement and lack of childcare funding in Bush’s welfare bill, but that’s been the extent of his criticism.

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[DuctapeFatwa]

1. Your comments are very accurate

The poor, and the minorities so disproportionately represented in their ranks, have been effectively marginalized to the point of virtual disenfranchisement.

The political process in the United States belongs to affluent whites.

This is unfortunate, especially to those who had hoped that a political solution to the nation's crisis would be possible.

[villageidiot]

2. Singing an old popular song

Too many have forgotten the words and now just hum along.

[Loyal]

4. So true

n/t

[JohnKleeb]

3. Thats what I like about Kucinich

Very much like LBJ and RFK were on poverty. We need lol a good war and the war on poverty is good.

[Karmadillo]

8. Good point, John. Of all the candidates running, I can't think of one

more likely than Kucinich to lead that war. Not only has he repeatedly shown his actions will match his words, he knows first hand the effects of poverty.

[Karmadillo]

5. "Poverty up as Income drops"

http://www.startribune.com/stories/484/4121735.html

Published September 27, 2003

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Nearly 1.7 million people in the United States fell into poverty in 2002, and income levels declined for the second year in a row, the Census Bureau announced Friday. In Minnesota, the poverty rate and the median income remained fairly steady.

<edit>

"The economy is firing on all cylinders," said Sung Won Sohn, chief economist at Wells Fargo in Minneapolis. "The strong economic growth we are predicting in the future should create some new jobs."

But Democratic members of Congress and 2004 presidential candidates jumped on the Census Bureau report as evidence that President Bush has mishandled the economy.

"Income is down and poverty is up for American families," said Rep. Charles Rangel of New York, ranking Democrat on the House Ways and Means Committee. "The Bush administration seems more interested in spending tens of billions of dollars to wage war in Iraq than in doing anything to combat poverty right here in America. We need a national strategy to boost employment and reduce poverty, and we are not getting it from this administration."

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[Karmadillo]

6. One last kick

n/t

[rhite5]

7. This deserves another kick

:kick: