Last week, civil rights activist Jesse Jackson said that President Barack Obama must do a better job of addressing poverty and crime in this nation.
His comments came before Obama’s address at the Democratic National Convention and news that Chicago’s homicide rate has spiked 60 percent compared to the same period just one year ago.
Another bit of awkward news was released this past Friday when the August job numbers were released. The economy only created 96,000 new jobs and the unemployment rate dropped from 8.3% to 8.1%.
The bad part for Obama is that over 360,000 people were not counted toward the unemployment rate because they simply gave up hope of finding a job.
That is where many Americans sit today. Their hope dashed and economic opportunity crushed.
The old middle class is the new poor or just an abbreviated version of the working class to many. You know, the neighbor who no longer lives next door and there is a foreclosed sign on his front door.
The empty cubicle in your office represents where he used to sit and the empty parking space is where his sedan used to park.
Those 360,000 Americans who decided that finding a job is fruitless are the invisible ones, the persons Rev. Jackson refers to.
But for a change, I actually agree with Mr. Jackson. Obama does not talk about the poor and impoverished enough, but not many politicians hold that torch.
It does not get the masses fired up and it doesn’t make many headlines to mention how much you ache for the poor.
Not really significant to mention that almost 50 million people now live in poverty in America or that 27 percent of African-Americans and 26 percent of Hispanics are poor.
Those types of numbers beg the question: Where should these individuals place their political loyalty?
Should it be with Obama, a man who has promised to re-shape the American economy, create more jobs and focus on expanding opportunity, if his contract is renewed for another four years?
Maybe Americans should turn their loyalty toward Mitt Romney, a candidate for president who has mentioned the poor and has promised to cut all individual tax rates. Is that enough to earn the trust of an individual who says that he wants to help, but would live in a mansion and make $400,000 a year?
No politician can fully make your personal circumstances dramatically improve. As much as I like Obama as a politician, I lack faith that he and the rest of the political crew in Washington can do much to change the aforementioned numbers.
I have less faith in the ability of his opponent, just for the record.
Maybe that is just personal cynicism but, what piece of policy from either side can we point to that directly addresses poverty? No, I’m not talking about the stimulus plan from a few years ago either.
It’s time for everyone to get serious about fully addressing the problem of poverty in this nation. An ever exploding number of individuals crossing the poverty line is shameful and sad.
If we do not properly address this as the biggest economic issue of our time then maybe we should go ahead and write the tale of our demise.
-JH
