Tavis Smiley & Cornel West: ‘The Rich & The Rest Of Us’

Source:Amazon- Tavis Smilley's and Cornel West's book.

Source:The FreeState 

“Record unemployment and rampant corporate avarice, empty houses but homeless families, dwindling opportunities in an increasingly paralyzed nation—these are the realities of 21st-century America, land of the free and home of the new middle class poor. Award-winning broadcaster Tavis Smiley and Dr. Cornel West, one of the nation’s leading democratic intellectuals, co-hosts of Public Radio’s Smiley & West , now take on the “P” word—poverty.The Rich and the Rest of Us is the next step in the journey that began with “The Poverty Tour: A Call to Conscience.” Smiley and West’s 18-city bus tour gave voice to the plight of impoverished Americans of all races, colors, and creeds. With 150 million Americans persistently poor or near poor, the highest numbers in over five decades, Smiley and West argue that now is the time to confront the underlying conditions of systemic poverty in America before it’s too late.By placing the eradication of poverty in the context of the nation’s greatest moments of social transformation— such as the abolition of slavery, woman’s suffrage, and the labor and civil rights movements—ending poverty is sure to emerge as America’s 21st -century civil rights struggle.As the middle class disappears and the safety net is shredded, Smiley and West, building on the legacy of Martin Luther King, Jr., ask us to confront our fear and complacency with 12 poverty changing ideas. They challenge us to re-examine our assumptions about poverty in America—what it really is and how to eliminate it now.”

From Amazon 

“The latest census data shows nearly one in two Americans, or 150 million people, have fallen into poverty — or could be classified as low income. We’re joined by Dr. Cornel West and Tavis Smiley, who continue their efforts to spark a national dialogue on the poverty crisis with the new book, “The Rich and the Rest of Us: A Poverty Manifesto.” Smiley, an award-winning TV and radio broadcaster, says President Obama has failed to properly tackle poverty. “There seems to be a bipartisan consensus in Washington that the poor just don’t matter. President Obama is a part of that,” Smiley says. “I take nothing away from his push on healthcare, but jobs for every American should have been priority number one.” West, a professor of religion and African American studies at Princeton University, says that after the historic U.S. struggles against monarchy, slavery and institutionalized racism, “the issue today is oligarchy. Poverty is the new slavery, oligarchs are the new kings — the new heads of this structure of domination.”

Source:Democracy Now- author Tavis Smiley talking about his book.

From Democracy Now 

Tavis Smiley who personally I like, but generally don’t agree with, but who’s someone who I respect, hosted a panel discussion that C-SPAN (thank God for C-Span) broadcasted on MLK Day on Monday. If you guessed Tavis Smiley was there, you would be correct, but it had Professor Cornel West, New-Left activist Michael Moore, financial adviser Suzie Orman and a young woman. Who’s name I can’t remember and I didn’t recognize it. 

But I thought what won the panel discussion even though it wasn’t a debate, but hit the nail on the head (if you want to use that expression) and made very good job of making points and a case in how to win the War on Poverty, by actually moving people out of poverty, that you generally don’t hear from today’s so-called Progressives (Socialists, in actuality) Who generally use their time to bash capitalism, or call for more public assistance. 

A lot of this discussion was basically about how we can move away from capitalism and explaining how President Bush basically screwed the American economy. And that President Obama wasn’t left-wing enough to fix it because he wasn’t in favor of their big government programs. And calling for more Welfare etc, when it comes to poverty. Socialists tend to be more about giving people in poverty more Welfare.More Welfare insurance at taxpayers expense of course. And are more interested in sustaining people in poverty. 

The young woman at this C-SPAN discussion was talking about actually moving people out of poverty. Which is completely different, so they can be self-sufficient and get off of public assistance. And she’s the only person that made this discussion worth watching. The War on Poverty a war that President Johnson declared in 1965 47 years ago if you were born that year are middle age now. And today you might not even remember LBJ as President.

The solutions to finally win this war, are pretty simple, but harder to put into practice: 

First of all you need a good economy that has strong job growth. We are finally starting to see that now. But to help adults who currently live in poverty whether they are working or on Welfare or Unemployment Insurance, is through education and job training. Get them back into school, so they can get themselves the skills they need to get a good job and get off of public assistance. That takes money, but would pay for itself in the long run, because we would be creating new taxpayers.

Long-term what we need to be doing to avoid kids living in poverty as adults. Or end up in the corrections system, is to make sure they stay in school. And get a good education, while their parents are going back to school. And to do this we need to reform our public education system.

We need better educators and competition inside the public education system, so low-income parents can send their kids to good schools as well. That’s called public school choice and we have to do something about our high dropout rate. Encourage kids to stay in school, not drop out and have kids and end up on public assistance. Or get involved in organized crime and in the corrections system. We proved in the 1990s with the Clinton Administration, with Welfare to Work. 

We can do this, move people out of poverty and into the middle class by empowering them to get the skills that they need to get a good job and not live on public assistance to the point that we got our poverty rate down to 13%, a record low for the United States is an approach that we need to get back to.