Media Poverty Gap
by Tony Phyrillas

Everybody is talking about the poor these days.

That's a good thing. The media report that the gap between affluent Americans and the vast majority struggling to survive is growing. Contrary to what the liberal establishment and its media allies tell you, even if this is true--how can something always keep growing?--the disparity between the haves and the have-nots was not created by George W. Bush.

The poor have been around for a long time. Pick up the Bible and you can find Jesus Christ making reference to the poor 2,000 years ago. "For you have the poor with you always, but me you do not have always." Matthew 26:11

I think we can all agree that there were poor people during the eight years Bill and Hillary Clinton occupied the White House.

The media and the left will tell you that there are more Americans living below the poverty line than ever before. That may be the case, but there are also more Americans than ever as the nation's population nears 300 million. More people means more poor, more rich, more white, more black, more Hispanic, more of everyone.

What the mainstream media doesn't want you to know is that the poverty rate under George Bush stands at 12.7 percent, compared to a poverty rate of 13.7 percent during the same point in Bill Clinton's administration.

When Bill Clinton goes on TV to complain that "tax cuts for the rich are the cause of poverty," he's full of fertilizer. The Bush tax cuts for the middle class stimulated the economy to such a degree that more tax revenues are coming into federal coffers today than at any point during the Clinton administration. Lower taxes are good. Higher taxes are bad. All the more reason we need to make the Bush tax cuts permanent.

John Kerry promised to raise taxes during his run for the White House in 2004 and was told by voters to go back to representing the Socialist Republic of Massachusetts. Hillary Clinton can't wait to win the 2008 presidential race so she can raise your taxes. That's all Democrats know how to do - take more money out of the pockets of working class Americans.

George Bush inherited a mirage economy from Bill Clinton, who is always bragging about budget surpluses during his years in the White House. The reality is that Bill Clinton inherited the windfall of the Ronald Reagan tax cuts, but squandered it away. Clinton raised taxes every year he was in office. Where did all the money go? Why didn't Bill and Hillary Clinton eliminate poverty when they had all that money at their disposal? The truth is the Clintons don't care about the poor.

The federal government has spent more money on anti-poverty programs during the Bush administration than at any other point in history. Same goes for funding public education in America's poorest school districts. And for all the shameful race-baiting the liberal media engaged in during Hurricane Katrina, the left-wing elite can't ignore the fact that black home ownership is at an all-time high in the United States and there's a growing black middle-class under the Bush administration. There are still poor people in the United States and many of them are black, but the majority of Americans living below the poverty line are white.

If memory serves, Lyndon S. Johnson declared war on poverty in 1964. He pledged the full resources of the U.S. government to eradicate poverty. So there's evidence there were poor people in this country as far back as the 1960s when Democratic presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon S. Johnson ran the country. One might ask why we're still talking about poverty 40 years and tens of billions of dollars later.

The sad truth is that liberals deliberately work to keep a large sector of Americans in poverty to suit their political goals. Generations of Americans have been kept dependent on government programs and are indoctrinated into voting for Democrats.

Mona Charen wrote a best seller in 2004 about this phenomenon - "Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help." Do yourself a favor and read the book to understand why we still have poverty in this country as well as crime, substandard schools and poor race relations. The blame for these problems can be placed squarely on the American left.

"Liberals must be called to account for the real havoc they have created in so many lives," Charen writes. "They must be asked to offer something more than good intentions when their actions lead to disaster. Are liberals truly more concerned about the poorest and weakest members of society than other Americans? Or are they simply in love with the idea of their own self righteousness?"

Anybody who isn't drinking Kool Aid mixed by Howard Dean knows the answer.

Tony Phyrillas is a columnist for The Mercury in Pottstown, Pa.

Email the Editor