War On Poverty

Lyndon B. Johnson became President of the United States after John F. Kennedy’s assassination.  He moved quickly to implement a liberal plan to increase the size of government. 

President Johnson’s vision for the country was what he called The Great Society.   The number one objective was what he called the War On Poverty.  In addition to welfare expansion, huge spending programs for urban problems, medical care, transportation, and education were put in place.  

How has this worked out after fifty years?  The War On Poverty has cost taxpayers over $22 trillion.  Yes, that is trillion with a T, and we are losing the war.   We have enslaved people in some urban areas to a life of welfare.  We now have second and third generations that know no other way of life. 

When I was a Ford-Mercury dealer in the early 1970s, I overheard one of my salesmen talking to a female customer.  She was shopping for a new car.  When he told her what the payments would be, her response was, “I will have to have another kid to afford that payment.”  I later learned she had several children and had never been married.  Her only source of income was welfare and Aid to Dependant Children.  This was in a relatively prosperous rural area.  I can only imagine how many examples of this we’d see in urban areas today. 

Some of our earlier Presidents like Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Franklin D. Roosevelt were advocates of helping the poor, but their approach was providing work, not handouts.  They would be appalled if they knew what we were doing today. 

The rest of The Great Society spending programs also seem to have failed.  Urban decay is beyond help in some cities.  Our infrastructure needs work.  Thanks to the federal Department of Education our education system is no longer the best in the world. 

Medical care takes a larger and larger portion of our income.  Obama Care is more concerned with people having medical insurance than having health care.  In case you have not noticed, they are not the same thing. 

The Great Society was a great success if the objective was to increase the size of government and the power of the political elite.  Liberal politicians have bought the votes of everyone who is on the government teat.  What happens to this country when the number of people paid by the government exceeds the number paid by the private sector?  Take a look at any communist country.

Government debt is now over $18 trillion, and will double during Obama’s Presidency.  The working middle class is continually suffering the consequences.  The top 1% and the political elite continue to get richer, and the welfare class continues to grow and live better every year.  Isn’t it time for some Real Change?