Hello folks looking to hear what you think

what can we do to make this issue have a higher profile.
It needs to start with mainstream media I think... and they don't touch it with a ten foot pole.

what issue?

:shrug:

sorry... should have been more clear on that.

It was discreetly postponed until after the election. I imagine that the data doesn't look good for Shrub Inc.

I would like to see that as well.

Well I don't have any silver bullet ideas (yet). If we want media to pick up this issue (as they should, we shouldn't have to force them) we need to associate this issue with the happenings of today and bring it to their attention. Show poverty as a continuum of the dysfunction of Social policy as opposed to an isolated issue. If that point cane be made and the media thinks it will sell papers or captivate audineces(the only thing they seem to care about) I think the issue can get the visibility it needs to be addressed in a substantive way.

(My two cents)

In order to understand why the right wants you to be poor.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=104x2682896

I like it though. It sums things up well.

when talking about education, health care, social security, taxes, and other issues. Beat the drum steadily.

I'm glad there is a group for this subject. Perhaps tomorrow I'll post links to some fine articles on Poverty in America and Class warfare...

I'm NOT going to vote for one more neo liberal elitist Dem who gives no voice to the very poor. Either we find Dems of the old school tradition who will stand up for ALL the people or my fellow dems can live with the likes of Fascistic Bushco without my vote...I'll go underground.

When in the HELL did "living to simply gather wealth and all knowledge" become the most singular point of the Democratic Party???

Certain elements of the Dem party have sure turned into some fine young cannibals!!! :grr:

It is the central banking system.

http://www.seek2know.net/money.html
http://www.perfecteconomy.com

When our local rag (Gannett) occasionally runs a story about a family in poverty, the issue is always presented as one of helping INDIVIDUALS move out of poverty. The underlying structural problems are never addressed. And while it is all well and good to encourage individuals to go to school, get skills, etc., that does not begin to address the problems of low wages, unaffordable child care, inadequate public transportation, substandard housing and poor schools in poor areas, the uninsured workers, etc. That's class warfare, bringing that stuff up - especially the low-wage part!

This is where good journalism is missed - in following the connections instead of taking everything at face value and repeating the conventional wisdom, which, over the past thirty years has become the voice of the right wing...personal responsibility and all that.

Without the connections, a story about hungry families will result in a temporary increase in donations to food banks, without ever laying responsibility and putting pressure on employers paying such abysmal wages that their workers have to USE the food banks to eat every month.

I admit to not having an answer. Letters to the editor are a place to start. Every time you see a story where these connections are NOT explored. Guest editorials, too. We will have to do the media's job for it.

no... the underlying structural problems are certainly not addressed.

Out of sight. Out of mind. Poverty is so close to many of us yet it is a world away.

I'm sitting in my office in very comfortable suburban North Jersey. Not five minutes away lies one of the bleakest sites of urban poverty in the Northeast, if not the nation.

Forty-five years ago Paterson, NJ had a dynamic downtown along with a significant manufacturing base. White-flight drained the life from the city in less than a decade. The retail stores went to the malls or closed outright. Theaters shut. Isolation set in.

Today there are few places to work. The schools are horrendous. I have friends who teach there and they describe lost generations of children.

What is the solution? It's not just money, which is subject to corruption and never seems to get to where it is needed. The social fabric needs to be rebuilt but out of what?

There is no political will to really do anything. There is no plan to make anywhere near the investment needed to restore the vitality of the city and the hope of those who live there.

New Jersey has a few such urban disasters. These cities are generally regarded as places to stay out of instead of places that provide people a wonderful place to live apart from the ravages of suburban sprawl.

I believe that only serious, visionary, and thorough government leadership can change the course for these areas. However it would take money that taxpayers do not want to spend for "them". The private sector will never make the investments needed.

It is amazing how readily we acquiesce to spending billions and billions on Iraq, or another nuclear submarine, or pick your favorite boondoggle. Yet to redirect this money to the complete revitalization of an American urban area would raise a political firestorm and a likely taxpayer revolt.

Perhaps sometime in the future when suburban sprawl becomes unsustainable will private investment flow back. Of course this can bring the problem of gentrification.

Our society continues to diverge into the haves and have-nots. There is little intermingling of the two, which is one of the great losses of our society from the dissolution of the fabric of the cities of the early-to-mid 20th century.

It has become a problem that in my mind is so massive, and so ignored, that I have great difficulty envisioning any improvement.

To further complicate matters, there is also the hidden poverty of the wealthy suburbs. Our local food bank has clients throughout the local "rich" towns. At least here there is somewhat of an economic foundation to help the poor. But the costs of maintaining a family in the suburbs grows more daunting and it is already possible to trace the decline of some of our suburban towns.

These issues didn't get much attention during the last election cycle. Try and think back on the last question during a presidential debate that had anything to do with our urban crisis. I suspect it has been many, many years, probably back to Reagan (remember his visit to the South Bronx?).

So how to give this issue a higher profile? Unleash a virus that will make people really care about what goes on in their country. Seriously, I wish I had a clue.

I'd send this in to Lou Dobbs or some other readily accessible so-called journalist in a heart beat.

Your piece is very well written and just says so much in a short space. I'd like to borrow it, give you credit...with your permission..and send it to this one and that one. OR YOU should start sending this type of writing around to all sorts of people. Newspapers, politicians, radio shows, TV personalities......this is excellent.

One thing that's plain to me is the change from the industrial to technology/information based economic age--which happened way too fast. The loss of (fair to say) unskilled labor related jobs: manufacturing et al has led to the poverty class of huge chunks of society. Not all persons are apt to go on and aquire a PhD........even so, white collar jobs are now leaving the country in some numbers.

When mom and pop and junior were employed at the washing machine plant down the road, paid decent wages, provided some healthcare benefits, then with some saving were able to purchase a modest residence, things ran pretty smoothly. People gathered in their communities for social activities, got to know one another, helped one another to some degree, shopped in their communities...even after the advent of some outlying malls...it was a good enough time.

The "death" of industry along with OFFSHORING/OUTSOURCING is the bane of our basic existance. Deregulation is the culprit also.

How in gawds name could we let this happen?!! We let the "devil" have the keys and he ran off with them. We bought the lies of "new age world economy", laid down and let it happen...no controls, no foresight, nothing.

With the exception of a few unmotivated, or the few that genuinely need help because of crisis or old age/disability, most people want to work making a living wage. They want to make their own way--the country is NOT providing a means for these people to do that. Most people want to own their own homes and mind their own business. Now, as you point out, even the suburbanites are having to visit the "food banks"............this is outrageous.

Again, great post!