Obama's Waste-of-Time 3-Day Summit on Poverty

President Obama -- apparently following Pope Francis' lead -- held a 3-day summit at Georgetown University which included various Christian groups in order to address poverty in the U.S.  In my opinion, if the President wants to understand why we experienced  a 50-year record high poverty level last year, he need only put his Big-D (Democrat) hat on and look in the mirror.

Over the last 50 years since President Lyndon Johnson declared a war on poverty, this country has spent $22 trillion on the problem in largely Democrat-led welfare programs.  Yet, poverty is more widespread today than ever. 45 million (14.5%) of our citizens are living in poverty.  Obviously throwing money at the problem isn't working.

You don't need a 3-day summit to understand its root cause.  Poverty is a direct result of a failed education system.  According to statistics released by the U.S. Department of Education, 19% of high school graduates cannot read at a 4th grade level.   If you can't read, you can't write.  And, if you can't read or write, the only jobs available to you are low level, low paying, unskilled jobs such as janitorial work.

The fact that we have 19% of our high school graduates unable to read or write points to the fact that we have too many teachers and too many schools who just hustle people out the door not caring that they are illiterate and what that means to our society.  Statistically, two thirds of those who can't read proficiently at the end of the 4th grade are destined for either prison or welfare; two major problems in this country.

But, Democrats like Obama would never go after teachers as a means of reducing poverty.  After all, the teacher's unions have a very close and symbiotic relationship with Democrats.  In fact, the President, in his first year in office, shut down the Washington D.C. voucher system which gave 1,700 low income students access to non-public and non-union schools.He did this in order to demonstrate his appreciation to the teacher's unions for their efforts in getting him elected.  This, even though the voucher system had demonstrated improvements in the test scores of those who participated.

Simply, the key to fixing our poverty and crime problems is to better educate our citizens and help people to understand why education is important.  Of course, this will have to be done at the state and local levels with strong direction and support from the President of the United States.  But, not this President.  Quite frankly, Obama and a lot Democrats would prefer the poor to stay poor. This ultimately insures that they remain a positive voting block because of their dependency on all types of social programs promoted by the Democrat Party.

References:

Pope Francis’ Poverty Agenda Draws President Obama: http://time.com/3854208/pope-francis-barack-obama-poverty/

That's rich: Poverty level under Obama breaks 50-year record: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/jan/7/obamas-rhetoric-on-fighting-poverty-doesnt-match-h/?page=all

U.S. Department of Education Illiteracy Statistics: http://www.statisticbrain.com/number-of-american-adults-who-cant-read/

Literacy Project: http://literacyprojectfoundation.org/community/statistics/

Literacy Statistics: http://www.begintoread.com/research/literacystatistics.html

Obama's Education Outrage - WSJ: https://www.google.com/search?q=Obama%27s+Education+Outrage+-+WSJ&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

Obama's War on Black Education: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2013/08/obamas_war_on_black_education.html