Barack Obama On What It Means To Be An American And Not Just A Democrat

Today, Barack Obama spoke in Washington D.C. to address the first half of his policy for dealing with poverty entitled Changing the Odds for Urban America. The senator will be following this speech with another one in the coming weeks outlining his rural agenda for poverty.

Obama's poverty agenda is similar to his recent energy policy plan insofar as that it draws from elements of other plans that worked on a state or community level and then applys it to the national level. He then injects the plan with new ideas that look beyond the narrow specifics of previous partisan attempts. That is exactly the kind of plan Obama's urban agenda encompasses.

He acknowledges early on in his speech that both, the left and the right, have failed in their previous attempts to address this issue:

What you learn when you spend your time in these neighborhoods trying to solve these problems is that there are no easy solutions and no perfect arguments. And you come to understand that for the last four decades, both ends of the political spectrum have been talking past one another.

It's true that there were many effective programs that emerged from Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty. But there were also some ineffective programs that were defended anyway, as well as an inability of some on the left to acknowledge that the problems of absent fathers or persistent crime were indeed problems that needed to be addressed.

The right has often seized on these failings as proof that the government can't and shouldn't do a thing about poverty - that it is a result of individual moral failings and cultural pathologies and so we should just sit back and let these cities fend for themselves. And so Ronald Reagan launched his assault on welfare queens, and George Bush spent the last six years slashing programs to combat poverty, and job training, and substance abuse, and child abuse.

One thing to note, and I am sure this causes some concern for those who admire a more partisan tone, is that Obama has shown the ability to address issues from both sides of the partisan divide. He is willing to acknowledge mistakes made by both parties which should be considered admirable not centrist. Obama very keenly noted a quote from Dr. King in which he said, "it is not either-or, it is both-and. Hope is not found in any single ideology - an insistence on doing the same thing with the same result year after year." I say to that . . . amen Dr. King.

He then goes on to outline his five point plan. The first part of his plan takes the Harlem Children's Zone plan in New York and applys it to the national level:

The philosophy behind the project is simple - if poverty is a disease that infects an entire community in the form of unemployment and violence; failing schools and broken homes, then we can't just treat those symptoms in isolation. We have to heal that entire community. And we have to focus on what actually works.

If you're a child who's born in the Harlem Children's Zone, you start life differently than other inner-city children. Your parents probably went to what they call " Baby College", a place where they received counseling on how to care for newborns and what to expect in those first months. You start school right away, because there's early childhood education. When your parents are at work, you have a safe place to play and learn, because there's child care, and after school programs, even in the summer. There are innovative charter schools to attend. There's free medical services that offer care when you're sick and preventive services to stay healthy. There's affordable, good food available so you're not malnourished. There are job counselors and financial counselors. There's technology training and crime prevention.

. . . So we know this works. And if we know it works, there's no reason this program should stop at the end of those blocks in Harlem. It's time to change the odds for neighborhoods all across America. And that's why when I'm President, the first part of my plan to combat urban poverty will be to replicate the Harlem Children's Zone in twenty cities across the country. We'll train staff, we'll have them draw up detailed plans with attainable goals, and the federal government will provide half of the funding for each city, with the rest coming from philanthropies and businesses.

The second part of his plan deals with keeping fathers in the home:

The second part of my plan will do this by providing families the support they need to raise their children. I'll pass the plan I outlined last year that will provide more financial support to fathers who make the responsible choice to help raise their children and crack down on the fathers who don't. And we'll help new mothers with their new responsibilities by expanding a pioneering program known as the Nurse-Family Partnership that offers home visits by trained registered nurses to low-income mothers and mothers-to-be.

The third part of his plan deals with expanding access to more jobs:

I will invest $1 billion over five years in innovative transitional jobs programs that have been highly successful at placing the unemployed into temporary jobs and then training them for permanent ones. People in these programs get the chance to work in a community service-type job, earn a paycheck every week, and learn the skills they need for gainful employment. And by leaving with references and a resume, often times they find that employment.

To make work pay, I will also triple the Earned Income Tax Credit for full-time workers making the minimum wage. This is one of the most successful anti-poverty programs in history and lifts nearly 5 million Americans out of poverty every year. I was able to expand this program when I was a state Senator in Illinois, and as President I'll do it again.

The fourth part of his plan, and the most important one at that, deals with bringing businesses back to the inner cities:

The fourth part of my plan will be to help bring businesses back to our inner-cities. A long time ago, this country created a World Bank that has helped spur economic development in some of the world's poorest regions. I think it's about time we had something like that right here in America. Less than one percent of the $250 billion in venture capital that's invested each year goes to minority businesses that are trying to breathe life into our cities. This has to change.

When I'm President, I'll make sure that every community has the access to the capital and resources it needs to create a stronger business climate by providing more loans to small businesses and setting up the financial institutions that can help get them started. I'll also create a national network of business incubators, which are local services that help first-time business owners design their business plans, find the best location, and receive expert advice on how to run their businesses whenever they need it. And I will take steps to help close the digital divide and increase internet access for cities so that urban America is just as connected as the rest of America.

The final part of his plan deals with affordable housing:

The final part of my plan to change the odds in our cities will be to ensure that more Americans have access to safe, affordable housing. As President, I'll create an Affordable Housing Trust Fund that would add as many as 112,000 new affordable units in mixed income neighborhoods. We'll also do more to protect homeowners from mortgage fraud and subprime lending by passing my plan to provide counseling to tenants, homeowners, and other consumers so they get the advice and guidance they need before buying a house and support if they get in to trouble down the road. And we will crack down on mortgage professionals found guilty of fraud by increasing enforcement and creating new criminal penalties.

Jonathan Alter of Newsweek went on Tucker Carlson today and praised Obama for dealing with the issue of fatherhood and nuclear homes as a leading cause of poverty. Obama's plan draws on many different elements and he clearly recognizes that the old way doing things does not work. Simply setting up social and welfare programs, as the democrats use to, do not lift people out of poverty nor do ridding the country of all entitlement programs, as the republicans want to, and letting everyone fend for themselves, will not help the issue much better. As Obama says:

The moral question about poverty in America - How can a country like this allow it? - has an easy answer: we can't. The political question that follows - What do we do about it? - has always been more difficult. But now that we're finally seeing the beginnings of an answer, this country has an obligation to keep trying.

You do not have to be a democrat or a republican to care about poverty. The only minimum requirement is that you are proud to be an American. Senator Obama proved in today's speech that he is just that.

For more info visit Obama's Fighting Poverty webpage.

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