Are The Poor Undeserving?

The common political mantra is “tax the rich” because as everyone knows the ‘rich” are the “lucky” ones --- the “fortunate” few, but no one ever seems to look below these statements to determine how the poor got to be poor and how the rich got to be rich. Yes, it’s true some people inherit their wealth but in reality they are truly a minority and the great majority of the “rich” are not truly rich and have gotten their wealth the hard way – they earned it. Well how about the poor? How did they get to be poor – did they inherit it or did they get it the old fashioned way – they earned it? I submit that the people who are poor --- in general – got to be poor by earning their status through personal decisions just as the rich got to be that way through personal decisions.

The undeserving rich – those lucky and fortunate few – seem to have several things in common. For example – they went to school – all 12 grades and frequently on to college although not always. They paid attention in school and learned to read and write and to speak proper English. They obeyed the rules and did not join a gang, steal a car, skip school, or get arrested multiple times. Of course there are those who see that criteria on how to become poor as racist (as if all poor people were minorities), insensitive, uncaring, greedy, or simply reflecting the inherent evils of capitalism. After all capitalism allows some people to get rich while allowing others to become poor, and this is seen as unfair and the greedy capitalists should be forced to give their ill-gotten gains to the poor, so everyone will be equal. What goes unsaid is that when this wealth redistribution is put into practice the result is making everyone equally poor.

But the real issue is how people get to be poor in the richest country in the world. Well if you examine those unfortunate poor you will discover that it isn’t a question of losing life’s lottery or being unlucky, but rather the result of a whole series of poor decisions. There is a failure to learn a trade or get an education, so they have no work skills and are left with only unskilled or lightly skilled jobs. In fact these people, if they are working at all – tend to just have a series of jobs rather than any kind of career or consistent form of employment. These are the people who when the do work spend what they make so they are never able to dig themselves out of the financial hole. These are the people who spend money on alcohol or drugs without seeing that the money spent on these things could be translated into a savings plan and thus eventually lead them into financial stability.

These are the people who fail to get married but instead elect to live together, which may not be morally acceptable but certainly common enough. The problem is that these informal liaisons yield children, many times multiple children by multiple father’s who may or may not be known or contributing to the welfare of the children. But the real problem is that this is simply another series of decisions that leads inexorably to a life of poverty. Children are expensive to have and each year the cost increases, so the decision to have children that you cannot afford is simply another decision that distinguishes the rich from the poor.

Then of course there is the work ethic. Employers expect their employees to be reliable, punctual, and willing to work. A close examination of these poor people shows that these are not common characteristics in the perpetually poor. Instead these people frequently have many excuses as to why they cannot work. They can’t get to work because of transportation issues, they don’t view punctuality as important, and when they do get to work they do not show a great deal of initiative, loyalty, or interest in the job, which leads to a lack of interest on the part of the employer, who drops the poor employee at the first opportunity. This contributes the cycle of poverty experienced by the individual just as it contributes to the idea that employers are greedy, insensitive, rich people who are exploiting their employees.

Of course the reality is that the employer is simply trying to maintain his business and to generate enough profit to pay himself, his creditors, and his employees. Marginal employees become a burden and drag the entire enterprise down, so it is the benefit of all for the employer to terminate these marginal employees. But it is important to realize that the employer – the undeserving rich person – is not lucky but the product of good decisions and a great deal of hard work. The undeserving poor person is not unlucky but the product of a whole series of bad decisions in association with a lack of motivation and a sense of entitlement. They feel the government or someone should help them and ironically many people – plagued by the guilt of success – agree with them.

There are many people who think that these poor people should share the wealth of the rich and if the rich are not willing to share it voluntarily then it is up to the government to seize their wealth through taxes and to give it to the poor. The reality is that there is no such thing as the undeserving rich just as there is no such thing as the undeserving poor. Both groups are the direct result of their decisions over their lifetime.

Rights in Review

The newspapers are an endless source of insight into how the media think, liberals feel, and union labor reacts. It seems that Carly Fiorina (former CEO of Hewlett Packard) had the temerity to state – flat out – no spin or diplomatic political correctness – that NO ONE IS ENTITLED TO A JOB. This unvarnished statement gave the liberal press the vapors, caused some of the audience to swoon, and the unions to erupt into paroxysms of socialist regurgitation. Ms Fiorina rightfully pointed out that America is competing in a global economy where China and Russia have brought 300 million people into the workforce – workers who are competing with Americans for jobs. Many of these foreign workers have skills equivalent to Americans and many more have technical skills that are increasingly hard to find in America. She went on to say that the American education system is failing and that if something is not done soon to bolster our education in math and science America will no longer be able to compete.

Naturally this statement was met with denial and she was castigated for being out of touch, callous, and unfeeling. Notice that none of these attacks actually stated that she was WRONG – just that she was UNFEELING. What has gone unnoticed is that it is this focus on feelings by the elite media and the liberals that is the root cause. Such subjects as arithmetic, reading, and writing are no longer germane to the typical curriculum – instead we teach how to use calculators and computers – not how to build or design them. We focus on sex education rather than biology. We allow students to express themselves in writing but don’t mark off for grammar or spelling for fear of hurting their little egos by showing failure. Geography is deader than Latin as are the multiplication tables. The result is we are graduating kids who can’t read or write or even make change without a machine. These are the people that we are expecting to compete in a global labor market where the competition has been drilled in fundamentals from the first grade. Obviously this is an unrealistic expectation but then we send these same poorly educated kids off to the Universities which have ceased being centers of education but have become a cross between a poorly run business and a propaganda machine for the liberals.

These same under educated kids enter the university unprepared and disinterested in education. For the most part these are the final four years of high school where they are free to indulge themselves in sex, drugs, and rock n’ roll. They take majors in gender studies, black studies, political science, philosophy, but rarely do they get involved in engineering, mathematics, physics, or any of those classes that require hard work or might prepare them for work as adults. These are the people who leave college and believe that they have a RIGHT to a job because that is what their left wing progressive professors have told them. They are offended at the idea that they have no skills and that the market for Philosophers has softened since Aristotle made it pay. The ardent graduate in gender studies think that they are entitled to a high paying job and the fact that they can’t get one is demonstrable proof that business is run by a bunch of misogynistic old white men. The idea that the businessman might be looking for someone with skills remotely connected with his business is never considered. The government should investigate this discrimination because these graduates have a right to a job.

I don’t buy any of this and think that Ms Fiorina, like Bill Cosby before her, told the truth and the liberals can’t handle the truth. The country had better wake up and get control of this situation before the American labor force sinks to unsuitability for anything other than raw labor.

LIBERAL DEMOCRACY – AN OXYMORON?

Once again the newspapers bring new insight into how liberals think but in reality they don’t think – they feel. Liberals are always in favor of helping the poor and the expense of the rich. They are in favor of education but with diversity, love, and understanding for everybody. They see all cultures as equal and sincerely believe all persons (they cannot bring themselves to say men) are created equal. They feel these things just as they feel that those that have worked hard and have accumulated wealth have a moral obligation to share that with the (how I hate this term) less fortunate.

Today we are treated to the New York Times informing us that Wal-Mart could pay their employees more. Of course this is true, any employer – including the New York Times—could pay their employees more and the reason they don’t is called “competition”. Customers – like the readers of the New York Times – are only willing to pay a certain price for a product and once the cost of that product is out of alignment with similar service providers the customers go elsewhere. Apparently this simple economic fact is outside of the educational scope of reporters employed by the NYT and the liberal establishment. The liberals essentially hate capitalism, competition, and anything that allows one person or group to gain more than what they feel is fair. The fact is that Wal-Mart is a business that started out as a small business and is now the largest business in the world. Because of this the liberals think they are morally obligated to pay more to their employees, pay higher prices to their suppliers, but not charge more for their products although that would be OK if it resulted in making them less competitive.

The entire argument revolves around the belief that Wal-Mart has a moral obligation to pay higher wages because they are profitable. However, nothing is said about other companies paying their employees more just because they are profitable. The attitude is that Wal-Mart is exploiting their workers but Wal-Mart has over a million employees, world wide and over 20,000 suppliers. Apparently the majority of these employees and suppliers are satisfied because if they aren’t they can certainly go elsewhere. Clearly the liberal community simply wants to destroy Wal-Mart because it is a vivid example of successful capitalism.

This brings us to the other item in the Newspaper where we are informed that government cuts in spending will reduce the number of internships available for low income students. First, it is worth noting that government cuts in spending never seem to impact any of the pork barrel projects, research grants to academia, or foreign aid, but they always seem to impact the poor, the down trodden, education, and fire and safety. But this is beside the point of this article which implies by its wording that students coming from affluent families will still get internships while those in low income families will be left out. How this conclusion is reached is not explained and I suspect it is not explained because it is untenable. As anyone who has ever hired an intern knows the number of internships is small but the ones that are available go to the most aggressive applicants with the best set of skills. It has nothing to do with their families and certainly has nothing to do with their need.

That is the thing about the liberal establishment, they want to make hiring dependent on race and need and independent of ability. It doesn’t matter if you can’t read or write or have only elementary qualifications, if you are homeless and poor you deserve to have a job or to be admitted to the finest educational institution on that basis alone. The liberals still cannot grasp the egalitarian concepts that underpin communism and socialism don’t work and have never worked. Rather that raising up the lower classes they bring down the upper classes so that everyone is equally poor. No one has any obligation to share their wealth or provide for the poor. If they do so then that is a choice but not an obligation.

Can We Talk?

Well I guess I have always known that education has nothing to do with intelligence and that a person can have multiple degrees and still not be able to pour soup from a bowl with the instructions on the bottom. After all just look at that flower power reject with a PhD -- Ward Churchill – at the University of Colorado. He obviously has been able to prosper without ever actually having a job or learning anything meaningful about America or American Society. So in my defense I have actually had a job (several actually) that required me to control my budget and earn more than I spent. I have been able to earn some rather impressive certificates that hang on my wall while doing this. But unfortunately I still fall into the category of people – mostly men -- who are brilliant on the outside but dumb as dirt inside – at least according to my wife who is convinced I am not only dumb as a rock but unable to communicate even the simplest thought. . Naturally I deny this allegation while seemingly doing everything I can to corroborate it – but then I am a brilliant manager, leader of men, author, and all around deep thinker, so I can’t be expected to master all of the petty details of everyday living and to communicate with any clarity to those who simply don’t understand what I am saying.

This reflection on my ability to communicate all began with a simple request from my wife who wasn’t feeling well and asked me to prepare dinner. Something I have done in the past with results ranging from WOW to “what on Earth is THAT???” But I am always up for a challenge so I agreed to prepare dinner. It seems that the menu called for us to have London Broil but there was only one (large) available, so my wife, languishing on the couch like the final act of La Boheme, instructs me to cut it in half. Now before we go on – ask yourself – what would YOU have done given that simple request? If you are a man you probably would have reacted like I did. I simply took the cleaver and whacked the steak in half as neatly as if I had used the Guillotine, plunked it under the broiler and went on to step two – the rest of the meal, which to me means – the potatoes. Now I should point out that there is nothing in life that my wife and I agree on, especially our food. When we were first married I accused her of confusing seasoning food with cooking in the same room as the spice rack. But then we were young and I hadn’t yet learned the cardinal rule of marriage which is “you’re wrong!” – accept it. But to my point, she likes her meat rare – very rare – dare I say disgusting-- while I like mine done – crunchy even. So when I served my dinner of steak and potatoes I was confronted with gales of laughter – confusing to me because I thought I had done a pretty good job. But Au contraire , it seems the steak should have been cut horizontally into two smaller steaks, not whacked in half as if it were a cantaloupe. This prompted an immediate telephone call to our daughter so that the two of them could laugh about the complete ignorance of the male sex and their general lack of commonsense. It also provided the opportunity to discuss communication and the almost total lack of the sexes to communicate with each other.

Of course any man who has been married for longer than it takes to get to the end of aisle, knows communication between husbands and wives is actually a rather simple affair and there are certain communication rituals, which are learned early if the marriage is to get off the ground. The proper answers are – in no particular order:
Yes dear
No dear
Of course I love you
You do not look fat!
I don’t mind going shopping with you

Of course the last item is said with a smile while inside you’re thinking I would rather have my fingernails pulled out by a hungry Tasmanian Devil than shop for anything other than a new computer or really big TV. But for some obscure reason women insist that their husbands accompany them on these excursions to the supermarket.

Have you noticed that in the supermarket the men fall into specific groups. You have the single man shopping for himself. He is easy to spot because his basket is only partially filled and what’s there consists of various types of chips, soda pop, frozen pizza, a few frozen dinners, and maybe some bread and lunch meat. The emphasis is on speed and convenience without regard for nutrition. Then there are the married guys. These are the ones standing around with one hand on the cart staring off into space clearly wishing they were home watching curling or badminton, waiting for their wives to examine every single item in the aisle while searching through a stack of coupons. You feel their pain and can see that they have reached an out-of-body state bordering on comatose. Now everyone knows that shopping has to be done and that food has to be purchased and placed into the refrigerator, but why does that have to involve the husband? I asked my wife that because clearly neither I nor any of the other men I see in the market are doing anything other standing around staring into space. Her response to this question was “Training – all of you guys need training and all of us women are determined you are going to understand how hard our job is - so stay alert!” See – it’s all in the communication!

But as every man knows there are a lot of adjustments in a marriage. You get used to the idea that there are her things, our things but there are no “my things” other than your underwear and toothbrush. But it is the little things that act like grit in an otherwise smooth running machine, like the tooth paste. For example after years of arguing over the toothpaste and how it should be maintained, we now each have our own tube of toothpaste, which is zealously guarded. Mine is neat and trim while hers is squished and disgusting. I spent years in the Army and that training stays with you and to this day I can sleep in a bed without touching anything. When I get up the bed is almost undisturbed. In fact, I cannot sleep comfortably in a bed that is not tucked in. My wife on the other hand can get into a king sized bed and within 3 seconds can turn the entire bed into a mound of material that looks like the remains of a Laundromat after it was hit by a tornado. But we adjust – we all adjust to the little foibles of our mates – for example--it was my wife’s birthday.

Having already experienced the aftermath of several forgetful events I had learned that certain gift giving occasions have a great deal of meaning to women and birthdays are one of them. So on this particular birthday I was brimming with pride because I not only had remembered I had purchased a nice personal gift AND a card, plus a card from the children. But as the evening wore on my darling wife became less and less communicative and finally burst into tears. After some coaxing it seems that while I thought I had hit a home run I had in fact struck out because there was NO BIRTHDAY CAKE. Horrors! How could I be so callous and forgetful – unfortunately it was now almost 9 PM and all of the stores were closed except the nearby supermarket. I dashed out of the house and raced to the market determined to bring harmony back to our little home. But the market was closing and after some desperate pleading on my part, I was able to make ONE purchase but the bakery only had two cakes available. So I purchased one and dashed home – triumphant – bearing my cake like tribute to Caesar.

Well my wife opened the box and there it was – a beautiful white birthday cake suitably decorated with flowers and spring flowers at that. I was bursting with pride as if I had just slain the Dragon and saved my little Princess from durance vile. However, there was no joy in Mudville for I had once again struck out. My wife looks at the cake and ignoring my triumphant look once again bursts into tears and between sobs points to the offending cake and says “It says Happy Birthday Amy. Who is Amy?” “Well of course it says Amy” – I reply with all of my masculine logic – “what did you expect? That’s the only birthday cake they had – the other cake said Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad”. Well that stunning logic sort of brought the conversation to a halt and after a moment of reflection on my dedication and overall rising to the moment we were able to laugh and put it into perspective and since that time every birthday cake in our family says “Happy Birthday Amy”.

So in spite of everything the politically correct can do, the fact is that men and women are different. In spite of those who think they should be alike I think most people – especially those who have been married for a while – are glad of these differences because it brings spice and perspective. It is these little challenges and adjustments that make each day an adventure. Excuse me now, because I have to go and explain that the printer works best when the little light is on. It indicates that the power is turned on.

The Erosion of American Education

More and more I despair over the continuing decline of what purports to be our educational system. In fact the term “education” is increasingly a misnomer as the professors use their podiums, not to educate, but to indoctrinate the students in their liberal points of view. This is an example of a “discussion” that was held in a college classroom.

the conversation in the class was revolving the relationship between black drug addicts, crime, and the supposedly deplorable state of taxpayer-funded rehab programs. The general sentiment was that the “only” reason crime occurs is because individuals are in some way involved in the drug trade. Either they are addicted to drugs and they have to steal in order to feed their addiction, or they produce or deal drugs. Apparently, adherents to this theory were also trying to convince my friend that this is why blacks are so disproportionately represented in the penal system. One person, a black woman, said that “the reason black people are ‘all’ on drugs is because the government does not provide good enough drug rehab programs!”

Please note the total lack of any idea or concept that the drug addicted individuals had any responsibility for becoming drug addicted. That this was a personal choice was never even considered. Also note that there was never even any discussion regarding the high dropout rate among blacks, their seeming inability to speak proper English, and how these are related to their high unemployment rate. There is no attempt to make any correlation to these statistics. Then we have the assumption that it is the GOVERNMENTS fault that so many blacks are drug addicted prisoners because they failed to provide enough drug rehabilitation programs. Note that there is no attempt to demonstrate the success rate of the existing programs nor is there any attempt to correlate education with crime and drugs. This is a vivid example of how the liberal community focuses on victim-hood while ignoring personal responsibility. Liberals always seem to focus on groups rather than individuals.

But this goes on and then we see the Professor moving onto personal attacks:

The instructor apparently knew that my friend was a Republican and he started jabbing at her about how the only reason she went there (to a Republican sponsored election party) was so that she could hob-knob with some rich folks. He said to her, in front of the class, that people “like her” are republicans simply because they want to be associated with elites that have cash. “Because Republicans are all the rich folks and people that associate with them just want to get close to them so they can benefit from their wealth in some way

The fact that this is hate speech or stereotypical speech is obviously overlooked because it is attacking conservatives who clearly need to be attacked. However, what no one seems to notice or to mention is that the war-chest assembled by Senator Kerry came from some very wealthy folks – like Michael Moore, George Soros, and a host of others. No mention is made that Senator Kerry is a zillionaire, Senator Kennedy is a zillionaire, and most of the prominent people who supported Kerry were very rich. Admittedly many Republicans are wealthy but not all and certainly this criticism is not only unwarranted it would never be tolerated had it been leveled against Democrats or the liberal establishment.

Now I’m sure that many of my academic friends will insist that this discussion was intended not as a partisan attack but as an attempt to have an open discussion. To this argument I can only respond with “HOGWASH”. I have been associated with the academic community and have had three children go through what is purported to be a university education and based on my personal experience I can assure you that this was not an attempt at an intellectual discussion but just what it appears to be – an indoctrination based on some (unspoken) assumed truths.

It was recently reported in the news paper that a student was protesting a failing grade because the professor assigned the class to write a paper on why President Bush was a bad president. The student wrote a paper essentially pointing out the positive side of the President’s actions. The student was failed, protested the grade, and the professor was upheld by the university because the student didn’t do the assignment, which was to point out how bad President Bush was. The fact that the assignment may have been intellectually shallow or biased was never even considered. THIS is how our university system is being run today, not as an educational forum but as a propaganda and indoctrination mill.

As a manager I refused to hire any Harvard, Princeton, Berkley, or University of Michigan graduate because I knew that they would have limited education and would be personally disruptive due to their generally anti-business attitudes. I think it is time for Universities to stop awarding PhD’s to students who have never worked at a profit driven company. I think that would go a long way to curtailing this groupthink.

Opening Comments

Liberal Thinking
By
Puntocracy
It seems ironic that in the same batch of emails, I received the commencement speech made by Neal Boortz and a promotion piece from a consulting firm. The connection between these two is tenuous I admit but nevertheless there. These consultants are from some respectable Universities but a careful reading of their rather impressive resumes shows that they are “consultants”, have always been “consultants” and really don’t plan on doing anything beyond telling others how to work. And to me that forms a connection between the speech and the solicitation because Boortz is exhorting the graduates to go out into “the real world” and get a job. The implication being that they would start doing real work for which they would be compensated. Concurrently, he accuses the “gaggle of gowned academics” of leading sheltered non-productive (implied I admit) lives where they can wallow in emotional “caring” for those less ‘fortunate” than they are while infecting their students with this irrational thinking.

This position isn’t totally without merit because so many of the academics that staff the major universities have gone from kindergarten to PhD to professor with no stops in between to garner any real experience either in their field or in the brutal competitive environment of business life. In my opinion this lack of any practical experience does not qualify them to teach and certainly doesn’t qualify them to express opinions on business or the evils thereof. As Boortz says, the sheltered life of the average academic allows them the luxury of indulging in causes and caring about groups but what he implies but doesn’t say is that this non-competitive environment fosters their belief in egalitarianism, wealth redistribution, and the evils of capitalism (raw brutal competition). It is no accident that the academic community is not only the breeding ground for communism and socialism but it seems unable to grasp the realities of these ideas.

Consider that the Communist Experiment in Soviet Russia was an abysmal failure, that Communist Cuba is a failed communist society that has sunk into oppressive dictatorship, or that the socialist ideals of Scandinavia and Europe have left their countries sapped of their competitive will and economically weak. Nothing is said regarding these failures, instead they are excused on the basis of flawed leadership rather than a flawed concept. After all, it wasn’t communism that was bad it was Stalin and his successors just as it is the oppressive policies of the United States that have created chaos in Cuba, not communism and Castro. The whole idea of Socialism and Communism seems attractive since its objective is to care for everyone but in reality it is nothing less than wealth distribution, where the government picks the pockets of the rich to give to the poor. Of course the assumption is that the poor are poor for reasons totally out of their control but the reality is that only a small percentage fall into this category while the great majority are in that position due to personal choices. They have chosen to not go to school, not get an education, to have children prematurely, not to look for a job, or worst of all, find they can make more money by not working than by working. In effect a large percentage of the “poverty stricken” have been put into that position by the very people who are “caring” for them.

The “caring” group are in fact (unintentionally I’m sure) creating a permanent underclass because there are people in the world who are – lazy. These are people who would rather lay around in substandard (and subsidized) housing, living off of food stamps and welfare than go to work. Admittedly there are people who are in these situations through no fault of their own (well not totally but I’ll cut them some slack), but a great many are there because to them the alternative of acting as a responsible self-sustaining adult is worse. Most – if not all – of the support for wealth redistribution comes from people who are in non-competitive situations – universities primarily. I am reminded of a study that was done by one of my professors when I was an undergraduate. This study had to do with land reform in Mexico. It seems virtually every Mexican President since the French were driven out – (Santana, Juarez, Zapata, etc.) gave the land “back to the peasants”. The issue was if each President seized the land from the wealthy land owners why did the landowners end up with all of the land? The answer was there were too many peasants and too little land. When you gave each peon his own parcel of land it was too small to sustain him and his family. They were forced to sell their land back to the Patrons and the cycle renewed itself. Not quite the same as wealth redistribution so lets examine a point I heard made by a businessman. He stated that his business was worth roughly $12M and he employed 300 people directly and influenced the community even more. So if the government seized his business (think Lenin, communism, and socialism) and gave the proceeds to the population -- $100 to each person in the countryside then they would not have enough money to do anything effectively with it and 300 people would be put out of work. The same thing happened in the Roman Empire, the Emperor Septimius Severus taxed the rich so heavily that he reduced their total number and reduced his tax revenues thereby. So the paradox was the higher the taxes became the lower the revenues.

So what seems to be lacking today, in addition to the almost total absence of critical thinking, is any historical perspective. Even when confronted with irrefutable facts many of the internationalists and liberal thinkers seem to be in a state of denial. For example, with the rise of the Sandinistas in Central America the academic and liberal community in general applauded their ‘for the people” position and anti-America and anti-United Fruit stance. There was a general denial by the Democratic Congress and the liberal community that the Sandinistas were communists. There was great opposition to any support for the Contras because they were viewed as being “against the people”. Later when the Sandinistas admitted publicly that they were Marxists and intended to establish a Marxists government, there was general denial by US media and liberal community that ALL of the Sandinistas were Marxists. Of course the Reagan administration eventually forced a real election and the Sandinistas lost, but even then and continuing to this day, there is a general denial that the Sandinistas intended to establish a Marxist dictatorship. Such is the thinking of the liberal media and liberal community in general. In general the liberals tend to see the world as they want it to be not as it is.