opinion
Newt gingrich’s War on the Poor
“Challenging people to Shape
a Better Future Now”
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R
epublican presidential can-
didate Newt Gingrich
launched a nuclear attack
on the needy last week by using
ugly stereotypes to argue that peo-
ple are poor because they are lazy
and the solution to widespread
poverty is scrapping child labor
laws and putting poor kids to work
in menial jobs.
He said in a speech in Council
Bluffs, Iowa: “Start with the fol-
lowing two facts: Really poor chil-
dren in really poor neighborhoods
have no habits of working and
have nobody around them who
works. So they literally have no
habit of showing up on Monday.
They have no habit of staying all
day. They have no habit of ‘I do
this and you give me cash’ unless
it’s illegal.”
What planet does Gingrich live
on?
My entire childhood was spent
in poverty and I can’t remember a
time that my mother and stepfather
didn’t have a job. In fact, I can’t
remember a time when Mama did-
n’t have at least two jobs. I’ve held
jobs since I was in the 6th grade,
jobs that included cutting the grass
of my elementary school principal,
delivering newspapers, washing
dishes at the University of
Alabama while I was a student at
Druid High School in Tuscaloosa,
and working as a waiter on trains
during Christmas breaks while
enrolled at Knoxville College in
Tennessee.
Evidently, my experience was
not atypical. An analysis of
Census Bureau data by Andrew A.
Beveridge, a professor at Queens
College in New York, found that
most children live in a home
t he C urry
r eport
George E.
Curry
where at least one parent works. In
fact, three of every four poor
working-aged adults have jobs.
The problem isn’t that those liv-
ing below the poverty line are
unwilling to work. The problem is
that their jobs don’t pay enough to
lift them out of poverty, which is
except when it comes to illegal
activity. His solution is to repeal
child labor laws and put poor kids
to work as library assistants or
assistant janitors.
Federal law already allows
young people to work.
The Department of Labor notes,
“The Fair Labor Standards Act
(FLSA) sets 14 as the minimum
age for most non-agricultural
work. However, at any age, youth
may deliver newspapers, perform
in radio, television, movie, or the-
atrical productions, work in busi-
nesses owned by their parents
(except in mining, manufacturing
or hazardous jobs), and perform
babysitting or perform minor
chores around a private home.”
My entire childhood was spent in
poverty and I can’t remember a time
that my mother and stepfather didn’t
have a job
defined as $22,050 for a family of
four.
According to the National
Center for Children in Poverty,
“Nearly 15 million children in the
United States – 21 percent of all
children – live in families with
incomes below the federal poverty
level – $22,050 a year for a family
of four. Research shows that, on
average, families need an income
of about twice that level to cover
basic expenses. Using that stan-
dard, 42 percent of children live in
low-income families.”
Gingrich falsely asserts that poor
children don’t have a work ethic
Republicans have a record of
railing against welfare, labor
unions and the poor as part of their
political strategy. During his 1976
presidential campaign, for exam-
ple, Ronald Reagan told the story
of a woman from Chicago’s South
Side who had 80 aliases, 30
addresses, 12 Social Security
cards, collected veteran’s benefits
on four non-existent husbands,
received Medicaid, got food
stamps and collected welfare
under each of her fake names, net-
ting her tax-free income of more
than $150,000. It was later deter-
mined that the woman resided
only in Reagan’s head.
Like Reagan, Gingrich has
sought to eliminate many federal
programs that assist poor people.
In 1994, he proposed kicking
young mothers off of welfare and
using that money to create Boys
Town-like orphanages. The New
York Times observed in an editori-
al, “The party that professes to
support family values seems
excessively eager to yank poor
children away from their mothers
and dump them in institutions.”
He also opposes extending
unemployment benefits for those
unable to find a job.
In an Aug. 12, 2011 e-mail to
supporters, Gingrich claimed “the
extension of unemployment bene-
fits has given people a perverse
incentive to stay on unemploy-
ment rather than accept a job.”
The only thing perverse is
Gingrich’s inability to understand
that most people do not choose to
be either poor or unemployed.
In an attempt to smear President
Obama, Gingrich has repeatedly
called him “the most successful
food stamp president in American
history.”
Gingrich asserted, “We have
people who take their food stamp
money and use it to go to Hawaii.”
We should not be surprised by
anything Gingrich says. This is the
same person who claimed he
“helped balance the federal budget
for four straight years [1998 to
2001].” He wasn’t even in office
those last two years.
Gingrich will say anything, even
if he knows it is a lie.
Read the rest online at
www.theskanner.com
Bullying and Its Consequences: Suicide
I
hope you watched Extreme
Home Makeover on Dec. 2, as
I did. For me it was an oppor-
tunity of pride, as Bennett student
Dominique Walker was featured,
with her family, for a trip to Los
Angeles, and a home upgrade.
Why? Her family remained in
pain because their 11 year old
brother killed himself after vicious
bullying.
Carl Walker-Hoover was hazed
because folks thought he was gay.
He was bothered, bullied, and
besieged. He tried to talk to folks,
but he eventually found out that no
one wanted to hear what he had to
say. He hung himself at home, and
the family avoided his bedroom
because they were in pain.
Our pain. The child was bullied
and badgered and he couldn’t take
it. He was like more than 1 in 6
young people who say that bully-
ing is part of their life. Many man-
age, and many manage by becom-
ing bullies themselves. Many
don’t manage. They are left out,
dropped out, worn out, pulled out
with parents so oblivious to the
effect of bullying that they think it
is just a childhood thing. A game
young people play with each other.
Not.
The worst of it is that the
Internet compounds what used to
be simple schoolyard chatter.
Now, young people put rumors
and nonsense into cyberspace
about each other. And cyberspace
page 4 The Portland Skanner December 7, 2011
B eNNett
C ollege
Julianne
Malveaux
doesn’t simply whisper, it yells.
Young people’s reputations are on
the line because bullying has taken
on an Internet space.
they shrivel? While we pay lots of
attention to yo0ung people and
their bullying, shouldn’t we also
pay attention to the adult among
us, those who thing that we gain
because others lose, we rise
because others fall, we use our
tongues in a way to diminish, not
flatter? As I watched the pain of
the walker family on Extreme
Home Makeover, I realized that
perhaps few meant harm, but
many contributed to the utter
tragedy that family had to manage.
The worst of it is that the Internet
compounds what used to be simple
schoolyard chatter
Carl Walker-Hoover, an 11 year
old, was “outed” as gay when at 11
he probably was only different.
Young people decided to play with
him in the worst way, picking at
him and on him and around him
and through him. One day he
awakened and told himself he
couldn’t take it anymore. Now his
life can be our light and his family
can be a symbol against bullying.
What is it about us, human
beings that allow us to batter each
other? Does it make us feel bet-
ter? Do we grow when others
shrink? Do we flourish because
We are all indebted to ABC and
the Extreme Makeover team for
deciding to help this family. They
remind us that pain and passion
reverberate. I say lots of ads fol-
lowing the special, and into the
next few days, of young people
talking about the effects of bully-
ing. Carl Walker-Hoover’s suicide
puts a face on bullying and
reminds us that there is a possibil-
ity of an anti-bullying movement.
The ads tell the story, but can the
people tell more?
Here’s the bottom line. We have
all been bullied, one way or anoth-
er, with a friend or colleague with
a vicious, ugly mouth. And
because we have all been bullied,
we have all been bullies in our
space. Humanity requires us to
understand that the behavior we
model is behavior that young peo-
ple replicate. It requires us to
understand that everyone can’t
meet a bully, face to face, eye to
eye, and resist the nonsense that
can be called hazing.
For whatever reason, Carl
Walker-Hoover could not stand up
to his bullies. He had enough. He
shared how much of enough he
had with his suicide. Who knows
what he might have been – an
author, a scientist, a leader. When
he died he was a young black man
whose life spread out before him,
a life he chose to end because he
could not endure bullying. How
many more lives will we lose?
How can we learn to value every
life, and to kick bullying to the
curb?
I am so proud that Carl’s sister,
Dominique, is a Bennett student.
We hope to use her knowledge to
help us grapple with the many
ways we choose to hurt ourselves.
She is a survivor of this bullying
nonsense, as so many are. She is
one of the leaders we have been
waiting for!
Julianne Malveaux is President
of Bennett College for women in
greensboro, north Carolina.