Poverty

There has been a lot of talk since the disaster in New Orleans about poverty. Most of the discussions have centered on problems in the far south, people almost seem surprised that there are poor people there and act like that it is the only place in this nation with a problem. Well wake up people, I see people living in sub-standard conditions all over the country, all one has to do is take a drive through the centers of many of our biggest cities. You will see people of all colors living in poor conditions. Just this morning I delivered into a small suburb of Pittsburgh and saw conditions that would put some of the worse sections of New Orleans to shame. Houses in disrepair, boarded up and trashy. This was not in a big city but a small outlying town and the people on the streets were of both black and white races. The South and New Orleans have no monopoly on urban decay and blacks are not the only people who are poor. Too often we try to ignore the disadvantaged, we avoid that side of town or look the other way when we must drive by someone in need of help. Too long, have we allowed our fellow Americans to fall through the cracks of society? How do we solve this problem? The first step is to recognize that there is a problem and stop denying that one exists, after that, I do not know. We have spent decades throwing money at the problem of poverty and it has provided very little in return. One thing I have seen from the people from New Orleans is that many are happy to get out of the city and the state they were in, happy that they could get a job in the place where they were evacuated. Many people I see on TV are almost shocked that there are people outside of the slums that they lived in that care about them and are willing to help. Is it a mistake rushing to try to return these people back to New Orleans, are the politicians in hurry to get people back before they learn how badly they were being treated and kept down by the powerful in New Orleans? Is part of the answer getting people out of the welfare and cultural trap that they have been born into? I hope that we can learn from this disaster, maybe some good can come of it. The politicians have to quit bickering at each other and take some responsibility. Everyone has a stake in this, Democrats and Republicans both have contributed to the problems that we have. One can not blame one or the other, each side shares in the responsibility and need to work together to solve it. I am listening to Clinton on the radio now slamming the Bush administration for the problem. I hate to point out that Clinton had eight years to work on the problem and now all he can do is complain about someone else. Knock off the politics and work together to fix the problem.