Anyway, the conversation at dinner turned to poverty and inevitably to welfare. Sister’s claim was that “those people wouldnt need welfare if only they took better care of their real estate investments.” I thought boyfriends head was going to explode all over her nice clean white carpeting.

I’m always puzzled by the “throwing money at the problem” argument. No, *throwing* the money doesn’t work, but not *giving* people the money definitely doesn’t help at all.

What many here don’t realize is that welfare program LBJ implemented was designed as a deterrent, not a safety net. It was a means of getting rid of direct competition middle class whites had to face for jobs and for education against blacks, latinos and the rural poor. Welfare was not about helping one up, it was about holding you down and back. And the effects have been deadly. This one program alone has destroyed so many families.

If you go back and look through the old civil rights footage, not once is there any mention of “welfare”. It was all about equality.

People are not poor because they choose to be. It is the vicious cycle of welfare, lack of opportunity, and ignorance that keep people from having hope to become something more. I don’t have a lot of money but I managed to graduate at the top of my class, in a poor school who does not teach their students, and still manage to learn a lot of things that I did not learn from “simple” courses.

This is why I can’t watch CNN or MSNBC. When people who have been through some actual struggles of life can be put on TV instead of some puppets, then maybe I would start watching.

By the way, brown/black would only equal poor because that’s how it was from the start. It’s hard to get a race/ethnic group out of the poverty cycle when there were hardly opportunities before our generation.

poor people were not and are not poor because they lack money. They’re poor because they lack values, ethics, and morals.

That’s the classic wingnut let them eat cake mental masturbation.

Last I checked, this nations economy and moral standing in the world was driven into the ditch by primarily rich white men who lacked values, ethics, and morals and who were instead driven by greed, hubris, and a flagrant disregard for the law and common decency. I don’t think working class people of color had anything to do with greed on wall street, torture, and war mongering.

That the other way to get in is through academic merits and that the best academic merits can be gained by attending a private grade school which from Kindergarten to 12th grade can equal the cost of a luxury car or a starter house?

Though I agree with your larger point, this part is not necessarily true as there are many public high schools, especially those of the magnet variety which provide just as good, if not a better education than one could receive at an expensive private school.

Upon entering undergrad at a small private liberal arts college, I was shocked that there were expensive private high schools/boarding schools with far less rigorous graduation requirements than my urban public magnet….such as requiring only 2 years of “rocks for jocks” type science courses without lab whereas my public high school required 4 years of science courses….3 with rigorous weekly labs. This was underscored by the fact many of those private high school graduates struggled with their college courses….even some who had to take remedial coursework whereas many urban public high school graduates such as myself usually found the standard coursework to be quite manageable.

I speak as someone whose high school class standing would be far closer to the college graduation rankings of Senators John McCain and Joe Biden than Senator/incoming Secretary of State Hillary Clinton or President-Elect Barack Obama.

How many rich people, especially the filthy rich, have gotten to where they are today because of their outstanding values, ethics and morals?