[lit-ideas] Re: [lit-id] The Poverty of Heritage

  • From: "Lawrence Helm" <lawrencehelm@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • To: <lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
  • Date: Wed, 24 May 2006 17:14:59 -0700

I don't understand the reaction.  These results are innocuous.  The U.S. is
the richest nation in the world by several orders of magnitude.  Why should
anyone be surprised that we are, well, rich?  Why should anyone be surprised
that our poor, defined as such by our own standards, are better off than the
poor of other nations?  This is a yawn as far as I'm concerned.  Only those
with a drum to beat, who want to demonize the U.S. would be disappointed and
doubtful.  They want the richness to turn to poverty.  They want to believe
that the U.S. is the worst nation in the world, that it is the most unfair,
the hardest in which to live, and to work, etc etc.  

 

There have been polls asking various people throughout the world, where do
you want to live, and of those who wanted to emigrate, the vast majority
wanted to live in the U.S.-even Middle-Easterners  Why would that be true if
all those Leftist demonizing stories are also true?  

 

Lawrence

 

 

 

-----Original Message-----
From: lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:lit-ideas-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of Carol Kirschenbaum
Sent: Wednesday, May 24, 2006 3:36 PM
To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [lit-ideas] [lit-id] The Poverty of Heritage

 

Skewing observable facts to support one's own argument is hardly limited to 

Conservative think tanks like the Heritage Foundation. But dear me, this 

report cites the fact that The Poor have color televisions as testament to 

their relatively opulent lifestyle in America.

 

Find a b&w TV these days. Really. Color TV sounds opulent, all right, but 

the truth is, color TVs are industry norm. (I paid $50 for mine, last year.)


Along the same lines, the report tells us that a majority of The Poor have 

air conditioning--up from 36%, I think it was--30 years ago. Again, look at 

the context--demographic shifts, in the past 30 years, to the American 

Southwest, thanks to AC. (Would people move back up north if there were no 

AC in areas that reach 100-plus degrees? With the price of fuel now, we may 

soon find out.)

 

 Ditto for cars. Three-quarters of The Poor have cars, the report says. 

Let's suppose this is true, and let's suppose, for the sake of argument, 

that The Poor who were interviewed for this report represents people in 

shelters and such. What's the proportion of The Poor, a la Heritage, who 

live in congested cities like NY, Chicago, DC,  where The Middle Rich don't 

usually have cars? So they're talking about the suburban/rural poor, then. 

Not the elderly or disabled, who can't drive. The other third, without cars,


are working age but don't work--the Idle Class, as this report implies.

 

It seems the Heritage folks are talking about welfare, specifically, women 

with dependent kids. The focus is on absent fathers and mothers who don't 

work "enough." Presumably, the report claims, more hours of work would lift 

this family out of poverty. More hours at minimum-wage jobs? Who takes care 

of those dependent children? Mom, if only Dad would come to his senses and 

be a responsible family guy.

 

But why doesn't it work this way? Sounds reasonable enough, right? That's 

the problem with this Heritage Foundation report, in a nutshell: They had 

the solution before they wrote, they thought, and they filled in the blanks 

with stats (many out of context) that supported their conclusions.

 

Lawrence, I hope your reading on Muslims has more power to it than this.

 

Carol

 

 

 

 

 

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