New York Times columnist David Brooks is ready for the "silver lining" of Katrina, basically a plan to rebuild the city but making sure that middle class people and poor people are culturally integrated, which will lift 'em up, don't you know. How about just getting people a decent job at a decent wage so someone working 40 hours a week can have health care and feed their kid?
Then Brooks throws in this dismissive kicker:
We can't win a grandiose war on poverty.Actually, Brother Brooks, we CAN. Clinton attacked poverty with the same vigor that Bush attacks taxes that keep the super wealthy from being even super wealthier. Poverty dropped under Clinton and fewer children went to bed hungry at night. Clinton also got people off welfare rolls and gave them their dignity.
Maybe what Brooks meant to say was that BUSH can't win the war on poverty. That's certainly true: lost amidst the terrible news was the fact that more and more Americans have fallen into poverty. The number of people living in poverty has increased every year of the Bush reign -- the increase has hit 17% and rising. So obviously BUSH can't win the war on poverty. But of course he isn't even trying.
