Tag Archives: President Lyndon Johnson

Stating The Obvious

Posted on by

On Friday, The Daily Signal posted an article about the results of the War on Poverty. The results have not been what the stated goals were, although they may reflect a different agenda than the one stated.

The article reports:

America’s “War on Poverty,” launched by President Lyndon Johnson in 1964, has expanded into a vast array of federal social welfare programs that today exceed $1 trillion per year.

Upon signing the Economic Opportunity Act, Johnson stated: “This is not in any sense a cynical proposal to exploit the poor with a promise of a handout,” but rather a means to “help our people find their footing for a long climb toward a better way of life.”

While poverty has declined significantly over the past half-century, however, recent reports indicate that these programs simultaneously reduced the share of private income for America’s poorest, locking them into long-term dependency and limiting their ability to move up into the middle class.

A recent study by economists Kevin Corinth and Richard Burkhauser, which analyzed poverty rates before and after America embarked on the War on Poverty, concluded that, while poverty decreased substantially since 1964, this was achieved largely by welfare supplanting “market” income such as wages, investments, and profits. In addition, before the 1960s, market income had succeeded in reducing poverty at similar rates to what the War on Poverty achieved.

“Our new research shows that the United States made strong progress in reducing poverty during the quarter century before the War on Poverty began, and that this progress was entirely accounted for by increases in market income, not government transfers,” Corinth told The Daily Signal. “In other words, there was a lot of benefit and not much cost during this earlier period.”

Before the War on Poverty, poverty reduction was achieved across racial groups. Economist Thomas Sowell wrote in 2004 that the poverty rate among black families fell from 87% in 1940 to 47% in 1960, without government assistance.

The article notes:

A January report by the Congressional Budget Office found that, for the poorest 20% of Americans, government payments increased from 26% of total income in 1979 to 42% in 2022. And as welfare programs expanded, market income for America’s poorest declined as a share of total income. Whereas in 1979, welfare payments were only about half the amount of private income sources for the lowest quintile, the two income sources were roughly equal by 2022.

According to a February report in The Daily Economy by analyst Tyler Turman, based on this Congressional Budget Office data, “despite historically unprecedented economic gains for low-income Americans, more of them are dependent on government assistance than at any point in the country’s history.”

The article concludes with a statement that probably describes the actual goal of the War on Poverty:

If the goal of the War on Poverty was to boost Americans’ self-sufficiency, it appears to have fallen short. What it has achieved, rather, is a costly expansion of government, long-term dependency for the poor, and a perennial voting bloc for politicians who feed the addiction.

Christians and Politics

Posted on by

Author:  R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D.

As a practicing Christian, I have frequently been troubled by the seemingly low interest in politics in churches. Since this country was founded on Judeo/Christian principles, it is essential that those principles be proudly and consistently displayed and promulgated. If Christians would consistently vote in high percentages in every election, then those who want to remove Christian principles from our schools and culture would fail. In fact, John Adams, one of the original Founding Fathers, wrote that our country would not be successful if the people did not continue to practice Christian principles.

Let me give you an example. While attending church service a couple of weeks ago, I reminded the congregation that the upcoming election was crucial and that they should get out and vote and base their candidate selection on which candidate(s) advocated Christian principles. I did not specify any particular candidate.  A week later, I was informed that a married couple told the pastor that they would never again attend that church because politics were mentioned. Now you have to ask yourself, if practicing Christians do not stand up for Christian principles and values, who will? Fortunately, our pastor was not intimidated by the couple leaving and advocated exercising our constitutional right to vote and to select candidates with biblical teachings in mind. Good for him.

How did we ever get to this point? Throughout most of this country’s history, pastors routinely discussed what was happening in the political arena because they realized our freedom and welfare depended on who was elected. In 1954, Democrat Lyndon Johnson (who later as President would author The Great Society, a leftist program that destroyed the black family structure as well as making people dependent on the federal government welfare programs) introduced an amendment to a spending bill that prohibited churches from advocating for specific political candidates or they would lose their tax-exempt status. Note that even though no church has ever lost their tax-exempt status since the restriction was enacted, the majority of churches have caved in and restricted their own freedom of speech. The amendment only prohibits churches from formally endorsing or raising money for a specific candidate. The impact, however, has been the silencing of many churches on any matter that even appears in anyway to be political.

This is very unfortunate since issues in the political realm frequently reflect values and principles that are prohibited by the Bible. For example, homosexual marriage, abortion at any stage of pregnancy, and transgender mutilation of children are contrary to Judeo/Christian values and teaching, but are now rampant in our increasingly secular society. And we are the worse for it. A recent survey reported that 94% of atheists voted Democrat in the last election. It is past time for Christians in general and pastors in particular to stand up for the values and principles that are essential to the survival of this country. The invasion at our borders by people who do not share our values will destroy this country just as it destroyed other countries throughout history. This invasion is being facilitated by Non-Government Agencies (NGOs) many of which are religious organizations that are being paid to assist the flood or aliens into this country.

It is time for true Christians to stand up against this.

A Move In The Right Direction

Posted on by

CNS News posted an article yesterday about President Trump’s proposal to bring peace to the Middle East. The proposed plan allows Jerusalem to remain the undivided capital of Israel and offers financial incentives to Hamas and Hezbollah to end their reign of terror.

The article reports:

“Palestinians have been trapped in a cycle of terrorism, poverty, and violence, exploited by those seeking to use them as pawns to advance terrorism and extremism,” Trump said, adding that he returned from his visit “determined to find a constructive path, and it’s got to be a very powerful path forward in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.”

“To further this effort, I also met with President Abbas at the White House. Forging peace between Israelis and Palestinians may be the most difficult challenge of all. All prior administrations from President Lyndon Johnson have tried and bitterly failed, but I was not elected to do small things or shy away big problems,” he said.

The president said he delivered his “vision for peace, prosperity, and a brighter future for Israelis and Palestinians” to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was on hand for the joint White House press conference.

The article concludes:

“As I have seen throughout my long career as a dealmaker, complex problems require nuanced, fact-based remedies. That is why our proposal provides precise, technical solutions to make Israelis, Palestinians, and the region safer and much more prosperous,” he said. “My vision presents a win-win opportunity for both sides, a realistic two state solution that resolves the risk of Palestinian statehood to Israel’s security.”

Netanyahu has agreed to “endorse the vision as the basis for direct negotiations,” Trump said, calling it a “giant step toward peace.“

“This is the first time Israel has authorized the release of a conceptual map illustrating the territorial compromises it is willing to make for the cause of peace, and they’ve gone a long way,” Trump added.

I am never optimistic about peace in the Middle East, but this is an interesting proposal.

A Common Sense Approach To Saving Taxpayer Money

Posted on by

Welfare was meant to be a safety net–not a career choice. Unfortunately we have lost the war on poverty started by President Lyndon Johnson in the 1960’s. According to the social work degree center website, in the 1960’s, 22 percent of Americans lived below the poverty line. In 2014, 14.8 percent of Americans lived below the poverty line. In January 2016, The Daily Signal reported:

First, the War on Poverty has failed to achieve Johnson’s goal: to “strike at the causes, not just the consequences of poverty.” Since he declared “unconditional war,” poverty has thumbed its nose at its would-be conquerors.

The official poverty rate has hovered between ten and fifteen percent for 50 years. But that is only a part of the story. Since the 1960s, the institutions that contribute to self-sufficiency—namely, marriage and work—have declined. Today, more than 40 percent of children are born outside marriage; in 1964, only 7 percent were.

…Robert Rector, senior research fellow in domestic policy studies at the Heritage Foundation, writes that “taxpayers have spent $22 trillion on Johnson’s war. Adjusted for inflation, that’s three times the cost of all military wars since the American Revolution.” It’s time to change course. We need a new strategy against poverty.

The changes in our culture are part of the problem, but there is another increasing problem–people who come to this country to take advantage of our generous welfare system.

Breitbart posted an article today stating:

President Trump is set to save American taxpayers billions of dollars as his administration announces a new rule on Monday that will essentially ban welfare-dependent legal immigrants from permanently resettling in the United States.

A new regulation set to be published by the Trump administration will ensure that legal immigrants would be less likely to secure a permanent residency in the U.S. if they have used any forms of welfare in the past, including using subsidized healthcare services, food stamps, and public housing.

Below is a chart of current welfare expenditures:

I have no problem with having a safety net, but it seems that our priorities are out of order. The first group of people that we should be helping are our veterans. Too many of them come home and need help to get on their feet when they separate from the military. I would like to see that as our first priority in welfare spending.

The article at Breitbart concludes:

Currently, there is an estimated record high of 44.5 million foreign-born residents living in the U.S. This is nearly quadruple the immigrant population in 2000. The vast majority of those arriving in the country every year are low-skilled legal immigrants who compete against working and middle-class Americans for jobs.

If we don’t get a handle on immigration, we are going to bankrupt America.

Ignoring The Root Of The Problem

Posted on by

Thomas Sowell posted an article at National Review today about how government policies since the 1960’s have hurt the black community and are partially to blame for much of the unrest we are seeing now. As the article states, most of those policies are favored by the Democratic Party. One can’t help but remember that it was Democrat President Lyndon Baines Johnson who stated, “I’ll have those n—–s voting Democratic for the next 200 years” as he confided with two like-minded governors on Air Force One regarding his underlying intentions for the “Great Society” programs.

The article at National Review reminds us:

In 1960, before this expansion of the welfare state, 22 percent of black children were raised with only one parent. By 1985, 67 percent of black children were raised with either one parent or no parent.

A big “favor” the Obama administration is offering blacks today is exemption from school behavior rules that have led to a rate of disciplining of black male students that is greater than the rate of disciplining of other categories of students.

Discipline is part of the process of becoming an adult and a responsible citizen. We are not allowing children to develop properly when we refuse to discipline them. That is a very large part of the problems with youth we are having today.

The article further notes:

Kids from homes where they were not given behavioral standards, who are then not held to behavioral standards in schools, are on a path that can lead them as adults straight into prison, or to fatal confrontations with the police.

The article notes that one of the things that has helped children in the ghettos is the emergence of Charter Schools. Oddly enough, Democrats and the NAACP both oppose Charter Schools.

The article concludes with the explanation:

The Democrats’ special interest is in serving the teachers’ unions, which oppose charter schools and support Democrats financially.

The NAACP’s special interest is in serving the same donors — and in keeping ghetto schools controlled by racial activists, as part of their turf.

Unless the black community wakes up to the damage the ‘generosity’ of the Democratic Party has done to their culture, they will not survive as a community. There are a number of black churches in the city where I live in that are working to bring a healthy culture back to the black community, but it is an uphill battle. Theoretically life in America means that we are all pulling the same wagon together. Those that seek to divide us so that they can climb into the wagon and get a free ride need to either help pull or get out of the way.

The Current American Welfare System

Posted on by

Yesterday The Daily Signal posted an article about the current state of American welfare spending. It seems that those leaders who believe that we should become more like Europe and Scandinavia in our welfare spending practices might want to take another look.

The article reports:

The U.S. Census Bureau has released its annual poverty report. Conventional wisdom holds that the U.S. has a small social welfare system and far more poverty compared with other affluent nations. But noted liberal scholars Irwin Garfinkel, Lee Rainwater, and Timothy Smeeding challenge such simplistic ideas in their book “Wealth and Welfare States: Is America a Laggard or Leader?”

Garfinkel and his colleagues examine social welfare spending and poverty in rich nations. They define social welfare as having five components: health care spending, education spending, cash retirement benefits, other government cash transfers such as unemployment insurance and the earned-income tax credit (EITC), and non-cash aid such as food stamps and public housing.

The authors find that in the U.S., social welfare spending differs from that in other affluent countries because it draws heavily on both public and private resources. By contrast, in Europe, government controls most of the resources and benefits. For example, in the U.S., government health care spending is targeted to elderly and low-income persons; the American middle and working classes rely primarily on employer-provided health insurance. The U.S. government health care system is, therefore, more redistributive than the systems of most other developed nations.

Note to Bernie Sanders–we are already redistributing wealth.

The article goes on to explain that ‘poor’ families in America usually have air-conditioning, a car, and cable or satellite television. Poverty in America looks very different than poverty in many other parts of the world.

The article concludes:

It is, of course, a good thing that left-wing claims of widespread deprivation in the U.S. are inaccurate. But government welfare policy should be about more than shoveling out a trillion dollars per year in “free” benefits. When President Lyndon Johnson launched the War on Poverty, he sought to decrease welfare dependence and increase self-sufficiency: the ability of family to support itself above poverty without the need for government handouts. By that score, the War on Poverty has been a $24-trillion flop. While self-sufficiency improved dramatically in the decades before the War on Poverty started, for the last 45 years, it has been at a standstill.

A decent welfare system would return to Johnson’s original goal of reducing poverty by increasing self-sufficiency. It would require able-bodied recipients to work or prepare for work if they are to receive benefits. It would reward, not penalize, marriage. In other words, it would be the exact opposite of the welfare behemoth we currently have.

We have lost the War on Poverty. We are spending billions of dollars to create generational dependency rather than to create economic independence. It is time to refocus and encourage working instead of collecting money from the government. This process was begun under President Clinton (with the assistance of Newt Gingrich), but halted under President Obama. It’s time to bring a work requirement back into the welfare program. Please  follow the link and read the TopRightNews article about what is happening in Maine to bring welfare programs back under control.