BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush

Subject: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Alice
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 03:46 PM

I came across an interesting quote today. It is in an opinion piece written by Yoshi Tsurumi, a former professor of G W Bush at Harvard.
Professor Tsurumi now is a Professor of International Business, Baruch College, the City University of New York Here is the link to the entire piece.
http://www.glocom.org/opinions/essays/20040301_tsurumi_president/

Here is the quote that caught my eye:
==========

"At Harvard Business School, thirty years ago, George Bush was a student of mine. I still vividly
                      remember him. In my class, he declared that 'people are poor because they are lazy.' He was
                      opposed to labor unions, social security, environmental protection, Medicare, and public
                      schools."
==========

The title of Professor Tsurumi's essay is "President George Bush and the Gilded Age".

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 04:29 PM

I probably hold George W in lower regard than almost anyone in here (which is saying a LOT.) But, c'mon. He said something thirty years ago? I'd hate to have some of the comments I made thirty years ago put in print. I wouldn't be surprised if GW still believes that poor people are lazy, because I know people who openly say that. There's enough current stuff going on with GW to infuriate me.

Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Kim C
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:53 PM

Let's be honest. Some people - not all - are poor because they make bad choices. Others have circumstances that are simply beyond their control. But I think it's fair to say that most people of sound mind and body have to be responsible for themselves.

Now, that being said, I agree with Jerry. Thirty years ago, I was only 6. I'd hate to be judged by anything I said then. Likewise, even in my adult years, I have changed opinions on several things. I would hope no one would hold against me the dumb things I said and did when I was in college.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Mudlark
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 05:57 PM

Well, I for one agree with him. I've been poor most of my life and I am admittedly lazy, or would be if I ever got the chance. I've worked since I was 16 but my goal in life is to become a self-sustaining beach bum, idly drifting down the beach, picking up sand dollars. I think it's great that the congenitally rich and priviledged have such a deep empathy and understanding of the poor. Bush's humanity never ceases to amaze me.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Greg F.
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:18 PM

And of course, Dumbya- who's never had to work for a living, never held a real job in his life and lives off grandaddy's & daddy's money... isn't lazy.

Right. Gotcha.

I've seen no evidence that there's been any fundamental change in his opinions in the intervening 30 years.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Bee-dubya-ell
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:24 PM

Most rich people think poor people are lazy. They just don't usually say so in public, particularly if they won't those poor people to vote for them.

That Dubya would have said such a thing in a college classroom thirty years ago doesn't surprise me. To find that he said such a thing at a private cocktail party attended by his rich cronies wouldn't surprise me. If he were to make such a statement in a campaign speech it would surprise me, but not too much. After all, there is probably no limit to the man's ability to stick his foot in his mouth.

Bruce

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: wysiwyg
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:32 PM

I'll be sure to mention this idea about po' folks to my hardworking, underpaid pastor husband and all his clergy colleagues. Our families don't mind being poor, too much, but being called lazy to boot is over the limit.

Hmmm, I wonder how our righter-winged-than-thou clergy counterparts would feel about this.....

~Susan

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Bobert
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:35 PM

I agree with Bush on this one but for different reasons...

I know a little bit about poverty having worked for a CAP (Community Action Porgram) in the late 60's and what I found was that poor people breed more poor people. The system is designed that way. Just as rich folks breed rich folks.

But back to the lazy aspect of poverty. It's less a born trait than one that just come from the culture of being poor, feeling disenfranchished, having to attend crappy schools in crappy neighborhoods where opportunities of escape are slim to none.

Oh sure, you can find a few folks who beat the odds just as you can find some rich kids who don't beat the odds *BUT* these are exceptions and tend to be brought up mostly by folks who like to lay blame for poverty at the feet of the impoverished. Very cruel, shortsighted and down right wrong thinking!

As fir the term "Individual Responsibility" which the neocons PR PR folks are throwing around as if it actually means anything let me interpret: "I'm rich! You ain't! Get over it!"

Bobert

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Little Hawk
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 06:53 PM

Sure, some poor people are lazy. So are some rich people. I've met rich people who were very lazy.

On the whole, however, I would rather deal with a lazy person than a psychotic one. :-) Laziness is a minor problem. It's dishonesty, greed, violence, and things like that that cause major trouble in this world.

Whether Bush said it or not...this is just another tempest in a teapot. The rich have been accusing the poor of laziness since time immemorial, just to expiate their own guilt or bolster up their false pride. Sometimes the poor accuse the rich of laziness too. It cuts both ways.

- LH

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Don Firth
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 07:16 PM

In the many years of "saving the world" in long discussions over coffee during and since my college days, I try to suss out the philosophical basis of the beliefs of those with whom I debate. Once one does that, the course of the discussion becomes clearly understandable and much more predictable.

One theory I have derived from this is that most conservatives, including most Republicans, adhere more or less to Social Darwinism. This becomes especially evident when talking about such things as welfare programs. Although many of them may never have heard of Herbert Spencer or Social Darwinism, more often than not these are the views that they express—although not as starkly as a conscious Social Darwinian might express them. When pointed out, they vociferously deny that that is what they truly believe. But they continue the same argument nonetheless.   

This captures the essence of Social Darwinism:

They believed that white Protestant Europeans had evolved much further and faster than other "races." And some, especially the followers of Herbert Spencer, took it one step further. Human society is always in a kind of evolutionary process in which the fittest- which happened to be those who can make lots of money--were chosen to dominate. There were armies of unfit, the poor, who simply could not compete. And just as nature weeds out the unfit, an enlightened society ought to weed out its unfit and permit them to die off so as not to weaken the racial stock.

I recommend reading the full article from which this is excerpted (HERE), especially the section headed, "The Misapplication of a Biological Theory."

Also very active in American history—and our present—is a belief in Calvinism and its doctrine of religious predestination. This explains a lot about American history, including such things as "Manifest Destiny."

Although many hard-charging Calvinists (and not all Calvinists are members of the Presbyterian Church—Calvinism permeates most Christian denominations in America) consider biological Darwinism (evolution) the work of the Devil, they would find Social Darwinism totally compatible with their religious beliefs, even though they probably don't know that's what it's called.

A few observations on currents at work in the American political system and throughout much of American society.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,Fred Maslan
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 07:47 PM

much of what we consider modern life was invented by lazy people. The car, washing machine dryer dishwasher computer etc.. all are labor saving devices. As a confirmed lazy person I appreciate not having to beat my laundry on stones by the river. And as I type this I realize I havn't used white-out in years. Hooray for lazy people rich or poor.
(there's a song here somewhere.)

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,petr
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 08:30 PM

lh - psychotic doesnt necessarily mean that one is violent - it refers to an inability to distinguish fantasy from reality. (although perhaps you meant that too)

I like mudlarks response - hey thats my goal too. I just spent a lovely weekend on Hornby Island exploring the beaches with my wife.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: kendall
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:07 PM

I get a kick out of people who have no clue talking about poverty. I had the misfortune of being born and growing up in one of the poorest counties in the country. I did not ask to be born to an alcoholic father in the middle of the great depression, it was not my fault that I had to go to a high school that was so sub standard that you could get a letter if you knew what the letter was!

I'd love to take away Bush's money and see him try to make a living without it. He has failed at everything he ever tried, and without that family fortune, he would be on skid row.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Amos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:17 PM

I'd like to see that, too Kendall.,   You and I could go have some fun for a change... :>))

A

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Amergin
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:30 PM

Hmmm...I would like him to meet my poor dad who worked two or three jobs at a time, because he was too lazy to earn enough at one job to keep a roof over our heads...at that time we were still living on government cheese...I was too lazy to go to work too...as I was old enough at 8-14 years old...same with my brother and sister they could have worked from ages 1-6.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Thomas the Rhymer
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 09:36 PM

Poor people say that Bush is lazy... ;^)

I caught a list on a college station yesterday... a list of programs having to tighten their belts because of the Bush 'plan'... many will cease to function...

These programs were all helpful to the poor... Maybe we should 'outsource' considerate values...
ttr

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: dianavan
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 10:34 PM

I've been on both sides of the fence.

Lazy? By far it is easier to be lazy when you have money. When you are poor, you have to spend all of your energy on trying to figure out how to put groceries on the table and pay rent. You can't be lazy or you will not survive.

Whats the point of having money if you can't afford to be lazy?

d

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Chief Chaos
Date: 09 Mar 04 - 10:47 PM

Let's all just hope that they're not so lazy that they can't vote him out of office!

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Little Hawk
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 03:03 AM

Right flippin' on, Kendall!

And what about people who are mentally lazy? Does this remind anyone of GWB?

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: freda underhill
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 07:01 AM

george bush has a lazy conscience.

he is too lazy to apply any critical thinking to his own life indoctrination.

he is a poor excuse for a man.

oh.. that means he's lazy.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: kendall
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 08:41 AM

Ronald Raygun had the same mindset, the homeless want to be homeless. Right here in Portland Maine in the 80's they tore down all the affordable housing for "Urban renewal" and put hundreds out on the street.
Now, there is a 3% vacancy in housing here, and the average is $600.00 per month for a two bedroom apt. Who the hell can afford that on minimum wage?

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Frankham
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 08:56 AM

Social Darwinism is a smokescreen for a kind of criminal mentality.
It's a similar rationale that sophisticated gangland operatives use
when they dehumanize outsiders.

Many cults feel that it's fair game to exploit "outsiders".

There is
a "wealth club" in the US that threatens the stability of our
country. For more information, read Paul Krugman's book, "Unravelling". It gives you a picture of how this view of
economic hegemony operates.

Not all wealthy people however are tied to the "poor are lazy" philosophy. There have been and are philanthropic individuals who
are not featured for their accomplishments in the general media.
The news media for the most part has abdicated it's responsibility
for in-depth reporting on most every issue but that's another thread.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Alice
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 09:16 AM

Well, I didn't want to post the whole essay, which is why I posted the URL and a quote. The link is here,Click

When a person becomes President of the US and his ideology of thirty years ago is still ruling his policy, what he told his business professor thirty years ago IS important.... because it is shaping the America we live in TODAY.

Since most responses to my initial post did not relate to the whole article, which I hoped people would read, I'll post it here.

Alice

=================

March 1, 2004

                      President George Bush and the Gilded Age
Yoshi Tsurumi (Professor of International Business, Baruch College, the City University of New
                      York )

                      Something really strange has happened to the U.S. under the Bush Administration. With her
                      ever bulging budget deficits and foreign debts, America's skewed income distribution is rapidly
                      making the U.S. resemble Argentina or Mexico. The "Jobless Recovery" is not a political
                      mirage, but a serious problem. America's GDP is increasing at an annual rate of about 4.0%
                      this year. But, only those Wall Street "money gamers" and self-dealing "management
                      aristocrats" of Corporate America are dizzy with their huge bonuses, padded salaries, and
                      self-dealt stock options. The remaining hard working Americans cannot eat "GDP." The U.S.
                      has widening income gap between a few "haves" and many "have-nots."
                      During the last economic recovery period of March 1991 to April 1993, a 10% increase in GDP
                      increased manufacturing jobs and service jobs 3% and 5.9% respectively. However, for the
                      present economic recovery since November 2001, a 10% increase in GDP is increasing
                      manufacturing and service jobs only 0.7% and 0.9% respectively. Just to keep up with her
                      population growth, the U.S. needs to create about 230,000 jobs a month. If the U.S. wants to
                      employ the 3 million unemployed workers thrown out of work under the Bush Administration,
                      the U.S. would have to create a lot more jobs monthly. Last month, however, the U.S. only
                      created 115,000 jobs. President Bush has now abandoned his earlier declared promise of
                      "creating 2.6 million jobs by the fall of 2004."
                      The unemployed rate of January this year was 5.6%, dipping only 0.1 percentage point.
                      President Bush hailed it as the "unemployment declines for four months in a row." In reality,
                      however, the U.S. has had four months of consecutive decline in the unemployment rate
                      because so many formerly "unemployed" became too discouraged to keep seeking jobs and
                      were eliminated from the unemployment statistics. The U.S. has over 5 million part-time job
                      holders who want full time jobs but cannot find them. In addition, the U.S. has 8 million
                      persons who have had to settle for full time jobs paying far less than their previous jobs. The
                      "jobless recovery" and the widening income gaps are aggravated by massive migrations of
                      good paying manufacturing and service jobs abroad. Such migrations have been accelerated by
                      President Bush's misguided tax cuts.
                      At Harvard Business School, thirty years ago, George Bush was a student of mine. I still vividly
                      remember him. In my class, he declared that "people are poor because they are lazy." He was
                      opposed to labor unions, social security, environmental protection, Medicare, and public
                      schools. To him, the antitrust watch dog, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Securities
                      Exchange Commission were unnecessary hindrances to "free market competition." To him,
                      Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal was "socialism." Recently, President Bush's Federal Appeals
                      Court Nominee, California's Supreme Court Justice Janice Brown, repeated the same broadside
                      at her Senate hearing. She knew that her pronouncement would please President Bush and
                      Karl Rove and their Senators. President Bush and his brain, Karl Rove, are leading a radical
                      revolution of destroying all the democratic political, social, judiciary, and economic institutions
                      that both Democrats and moderate Republicans had built together since Roosevelt's New Deal.
                      In June 2003, Bill Moyers said that "Karl Rove has modeled the Bush presidency on that of
                      William Mckinley (1897-1901) and modeled himself on Mark Hanna, the man who virtually
                      manufactured McKinley. Mark Hanna saw to it that Washington was ruled by business,
                      railroads, and public utility corporations." President Bush's tax cuts have given over 93% of
                      their benefits to large corporations and well-to-do households with over 250,000 dollars of
                      annual income (about 10% of the U.S. households). Moreover, President Bush's tax cuts are
                      abolishing taxes on such asset-based income as stock dividends and capital gains. He is
                      opposed to taxing management aristocrats' self-dealt stock options (salary payment in kind).
                      He is opposed to requiring the corporations to treat such stock options as their personnel
                      expenses. More than anything else, management aristocrats' stock options are encouraging
                      many corporations to abandon manufacturing-and-supply procurements at home and switching
                      to imports from China and other lower-wage countries. He is phasing out estate taxes. All
                      these measures are transforming the past "potbelly flower vase" shape of the U.S. income
                      distribution to the "bottom-heavy hour glass" shape.
                      This was the same kind of income distribution that the U.S. built during the McKinley-Gilded
                      Age. There was no Securitiesy Exchange Commission to check "creative accounting" and
                      Enron-WorldCom like malfeasance of corporations. America had poor public schools and
                      medical care. There was no minimum wage or labor standard. Both federal and state
                      governments and courts were hostile to labor unions and civic groups protesting the "injustices"
                      of the society. The natural environment was ravaged by railroads, mining, lumbering, and
                      newly emerging oil and gas firms. Abortion was illegal. Women did not even have the vote. In
                      the South, Christian fundamentalists were pressuring public schools to stop teaching Charles
                      Darwin's evolution theories. During the McKinley-Gilded Age, America's democracy atrophied.
                      And America embarked on her imperialistic expansions of colonising Cuba, Panama, and the
                      Philippines.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Cobble
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 09:21 AM

Bush and his kind are like the royal families in europe they got where they are by stealing, murder and every dirty trick in the book. They are the biggest tax dogers and to avoid paying any extra tax they kill any legislation that will help the not so well off. We have had 2.000 years of it in the UK, why dont people learn by history, nothing ever changes unless you make the effort to change it.

                     Cobble

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: JennyO
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 09:43 AM

"It's the same the whole world over,
It's the poor what gets the blame.
It's the rich what gets the pleasure,
Ain't it all a bleedin' shame."

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Kim C
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 10:21 AM

Well, Bobert, I'm not rich, and I do believe in Individual Responsibility. I know that if I were willing to take a higher-stress job with less vacation time, I could make more money. But guess what?

I'm lazy. I want my 4 weeks vacation. I've even lobbied for employees to be able to convert excess accumulated sick days to vacation days.

Fact is, there are lazy people in every pocket of the universe.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Bobjack
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:08 AM

Lazy people will end up poor, simple fact.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: JenEllen
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:25 AM

Kim, there is a big difference between being lazy and 'taking back time'! *bg* (There is a great book called 'Take Back Your Time: Fighting Overwork and Time Poverty In America' that discusses that very thing) but, people are never going to be 'responsible'. There just aren't enough hours in the day to fix everything that is wrong. The nature of the beast is to look for greener pastures.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,guest from NW
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:40 AM

"Lazy people will end up poor, simple fact."

unless they are lazy people born into wealth who take their low self esteem issues out on people who are just trying to get by in this world. they end up rich, lazy, and a disgusting pox on the world. simple fact #2

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Bill D
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 01:21 PM

the problem is, NOT being lazy does not necessarily get you out of poverty in this society...the deck has been stacked in various ways, and Bush & his cronies are restacking it everyday.

Bush may not believe anymore 'exactly' what he said 30 years ago: that was pretty simplistic; but his every statement and plan and speech give evidence that he still operates on some level that hasn't changed much!

He acts as though 'privilege' is somehow reserved for a group of 'elite', and the world will be better off if they are allowed to function will little interference from the lower classes, who will be 'taken care of' as much as they need by the chosen people. Now, where have I heard ideas like THAT before?

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Kim C
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 01:34 PM

The other problem is, if Bush wasn't restacking it, someone else would be. But I think the deck is a little more stacked against people in the middle - those who make "too much money" to qualify for any assistance, yet barely scrape by.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Big Mick
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 01:43 PM

I agree with Jerry .... to a point. One should not be held accountable for things said 30 years ago .... unless one's actions point out that not much has changed. In this man's case, much of what he espoused then he practices now. My Granny used to say that what you are speaks louder than what you say you are. GWB says the right things, often as not. But his actions are where the pudding is made. And his actions on the environment, civil liberties, foreign policy, and the economy where it relates to retention of good paying jobs, do more than speak loudly. They are screaming for attention.

Mick

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Nerd
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 01:48 PM

KimC,

You don't sound lazy to me. You almost certainly work more than the average European worker, for example. We've just been brainwashed into thinking that

(1) wanting to have a life away from work is equivalent to laziness

and that

(2) wanting a life instead of more money is equivalent to laziness

and that

(3) it is a failure of our "individual responsibility" if the options that the rich folks who run our society offer us leave us unsatisfied.

Why shouldn't you, for example, be able to have more money AND four weeks vacation? The rich certainly do! You don't have the option, but it's not because you're less responsible.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Don Firth
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 03:53 PM

Rick Steves, the writer of travel books (Europe Through the Back Door and many others), has remarked several times in his half-hour television shows that Europeans in general tend to enjoy their leisure time, and since some countries (France, I think, is one of them—disgustingly uncivilized, those French!) have laws limiting the number of hours per week that a person can be required to work and mandating minimum lengths of vacations and numbers of days off. One of the results is that Europeans tend to actually enjoy their work, as work, not just as a means of making enough money to keep ahead of the credit card bills. He maintains that Europeans in general are looser, less driven, and enjoy life a whole lot more than Americans in general do. Life and the enjoyment of it is the goal. Work is both a means and an end, not the all-consuming monster that Americans make of it.

Hell's bells, I'm an expert on lazy, but that's not why I want Bush out!

To assume that a person is merely lazy because he or she is poor—not able to find a job that pays a living wage—is short-sighted, mean-spirited, unrealistic, and not very bright! By those lights, when Boeing lost a couple of government contracts (TFX fighter and SST) and laid off a bunch of people back in the early Seventies (Boeing employment went down from 102,000 to 35,000), 15% of the working population in Seattle were suddenly "lazy." There was a signboard on a highway leading out of Seattle that read, "Will the last person to leave please turn out the lights?" When a person is laid off because his or her job has been "out-sourced" or "off-shored" so the company can maximize its profits with cheap labor, is that person afflicted with a sudden attack of "laziness?" And if all that person can find are low-wage jobs so he or she has to work two jobs to pay the rent and put food on the table, and they still fall below the poverty line, is that person "lazy?" When 25% of the U. S. population were unemployed back in the Thirties and standing in breadlines, were that many people afflicted with an epidemic of "laziness?"

Bush's marvelous economic recovery (the one we'll be hearing a lot about during the next few months) has managed in the past month to produce 21,000 new jobs. The only problem is that it takes around 150,000 new jobs to stay even. That, I think any accountant can tell you, is what is called a "net loss."

Just so nobody misses it, let me quote a passage or two from the article on Social Darwinism that I linked to above:   

Another application of a biological concept to human behavior was the notion that any attempt to provide welfare for the poor was a tragically misguided mistake. Feeding or housing the poor simply permitted them to survive and to transmit their unfitness to their children, who in turn would pass it on to their children. . . . By the 1930s, the New Deal created a climate in which the government was responsible for a "net" that would not allow any individual to lapse into abject poverty, homelessness on a wide scale, hunger or destitution. However, in the 1980s, Ronald Reagan was elected on a platform which declared that New Deal policies were responsible for poverty, crime, and all other social problems. Government, Reagan kept on repeating, was not any part of a solution to the problem. Government was the problem. Therefore, a good many policies based upon the "net" concept were weakened or simply eliminated.

Recommended book: Reaganism and the Death of Representative Democracy, by Walter Williams. Scroll down for review. This Walter Williams is a professor emeritus at the Daniel J. Evans School of Public Affairs at the University of Washington, and is not to be confused with the Walter E. Williams, economist and conservative commentator who sometimes substitutes for Rush Limbaugh. Not hardly!!

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Peace
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 04:03 PM

Something said earlier reminds me of Martha Mitchell in the '60s or 70s who decided she would duplicate the budget of a person receiving social assistance (welfare), If I remember correctly, she set out to show America that anyone could live on the SA payment. She told people how she bargain-shopped by driving to stores all over Washington, DC, and planned a healthy diet based around her purchases. She didn't factor in food or the fact that she used a car to get around. So f#ckin' blase it made me puke. People who have no idea about what poverty is ought to shut up about it. They just have no idea.

Bush was an idiot then and he's an idiot now.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Peace
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 04:18 PM

Sorry, meant to say she didn't factor in clothing, gas, utilities, medical care (or lack thereof), etc. Just food. Ya gotta wonder.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Walking Eagle
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 04:58 PM

I agree with you Kendall and Amos! Let the whole line of men standing outside the homeless shelter get down to Bush and have the volunteer close the door saying 'No more room at the Inn!'

Rich people think poor people are lazy because they don't 'see' them. They don't 'see' the maid,cook,gardener, and personal secretary that work for them. These people are invisble. I know that as I was a horse barn worker. The barn owner wouldn't talk to me directly even when I was standing right there. They'd talk to the horse owner instead. My best vengance? My horse and I beat the s$@t out of the barn owner and his fancy horse at a show.

Poor people simpy are't 'Seen."

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,freda
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:23 PM

Has anyone ever worked in a factory?

I have. its not "lazy work", its hard work and it doesn't pay well.
I now work in a more prestigious job with good conditions. I work just as hard now as I did then, the only contributing factor to being poor was the salary and conditions, not any personality flaws.

The economy and distribution of wealth makes people poor.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: LadyJean
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:37 PM

I clean for a childless couple. The wife doesn't have a job. She does the laundry on Monday, and, to the best of my knowledge, she spends the rest of the week either shopping, or sitting on the sofa watching television. But she is considerably more prosperous than her cleaning lady.

A classmate of mine in prep school informed us that "The poor are poor because they don't know how to shop." (She was Molly Picoun's niece, the resemblance was uncanny until she stepped on a stage.)

Bush is not a model of industry. How much time does he spend in Texas playing cowboys? But he is more prosperous than most of us.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Peace
Date: 10 Mar 04 - 11:57 PM

And, LadyJean, he is more preposterous than any of us.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Peace
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 12:23 AM

GUEST, freda,

I didn't work in a factory, but I did work in a warehouse. My back is still bad from it. I don't know rightly that I was poor, but I wasn't rich. I do know that I wasn't lazy.

My family circumstances as a youth meant we endured some poverty. My mom wasn't happy that I had one pair of pants, and I'll never forget her going to work wearing sneakers (running shoes) to her secretarial job because she had the choice of buying me a new shirt or herself a new pair of shoes. She didn't ask her husband to leave her, and she had two kids to raise.

I am not complaing. I didn't know we were hard up. I really thought everyone lived like that. No, poor people aren't necessarily lazy. Just poor. Even today, if I miss eating for a few days, it doesn't really mean much to me. I don't dislike those who eat regularly, but not everybody does. And often the reasons they don't are way beyond their control. Seems to me that calling poor people lazy is like calling rich people hard-workin'. It's a statemnt that doesn't mean anything. The logic's bad and the motivation for that type of remark would find a comfortable home in a cesspool.

Bruce M

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: LadyJean
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 12:29 AM

In Journalism school, I learned how to do paste up and layout, crop photographs, and edit copy with a blue pencil. When I graduated those skills were useful, and paid well. By 1995, they were obsolete. Any fool with a PC can do what I sweated blood to learn.
I stank at paste up and layout, and cropping photographs was beyond my capabilities. Today's lucrative skill is tomorrow's curiousity.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,Somehow cookieless W.E.
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 03:56 AM

You know what we used to call bologna on the res? Reservation Steak. Hey, when you got nuthin, you may as well laugh about it!

Daddy-o used to bail GWB out of his failed businesses. Some how I don't thing that's going to happen here!

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Dave Hanson
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 07:42 AM

No Dubbya must be right cos I'm poor and I'm lazy.
eric

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Alice
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 09:30 AM

There is a new "reality" show on tv that I saw the other night. It puts CEO's in the frontline jobs of their companies and follows them through their work days, trying to do the jobs of their lowest paid employees. The program I saw was the head of a luxury hotel chain working in one of the hotels as a bell hop, a valet, at the front desk, in the kitchen, and in housekeeping, cleaning rooms. What did he think at the end? That housekeeping was the hardest job and that all the jobs were much more physically difficult than he expected (especially housekeeping). He did none of the jobs well. In going back to his boardroom, he had recommendations from his own expericence to improve the working conditions of the employees, and plans to require every executive on his staff to go spend a day working in the position of one of their employees in a hotel.

I have friends at all income levels, and I've lived in El Salvador, a country where poverty is not as easy to leave behind as it is in America. People I know who were born into wealth and inheritance have no idea what poverty is. One wealthy friend of mine said that she was tired of hearing people say they were broke (this is a person who had trust funds to back her up and didn't have to work). She said, Everyone's broke, because everyone spends what they have. Hmmmm... it's different to be broke because you paid the rent and power bill and have no money for food compared to being broke because you just bought an expensive new car (her only experience of being broke, waiting for her next trust fund check).

Please read the entire essay I posted. The point of starting this thread is to bring attention to the way the Bush administration is promoting their ideology that is destroying this country in the image of the McKinley Gilded Age.

====
"President Bush and his brain, Karl Rove, are leading a radical
                      revolution of destroying all the democratic political, social, judiciary, and economic institutions
                      that both Democrats and moderate Republicans had built together since Roosevelt's New Deal.
                      In June 2003, Bill Moyers said that "Karl Rove has modeled the Bush presidency on that of
                      William Mckinley (1897-1901) and modeled himself on Mark Hanna, the man who virtually
                      manufactured McKinley. Mark Hanna saw to it that Washington was ruled by business,
                      railroads, and public utility corporations." President Bush's tax cuts have given over 93% of
                      their benefits to large corporations and well-to-do households with over 250,000 dollars of
                      annual income (about 10% of the U.S. households).

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Amos
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 10:26 AM

Bush is so full of cowshit he should be declared a National health risk.

The fact is that low-salary jobs are more demanding than high-salary jobs in terms of sweat, if not in terms of stress. In general, they are more repetitive, less creative, and more exhausting.

It is ironic that they are also debilitating because of the stress caused by not earning enough money. A double whammy.

The reason is that there are more people willing and able to take them, being unqualified or unable to persuade themselves into higher salary positions. SOmetimes it's a matter of location. Sometimes it's a matter of logistics. Laziness ? I have met plenty of people for whom it was a factor, some of them poor, but it's not the general rule in my experience. I've worked streets and plain day labor jobs, and lazy wa snever part of the equation.

A

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Don Firth
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 02:08 PM

Alice, the speech by Bill Moyers that Prof. Tsurumi is referring to can be found HERE. I first heard it on "Alternative Radio," and it was so powerful and to the point that I looked it up on the internet and downloaded a copy of it.

Bill Moyers is one of my heroes. This speech is must read.

Don Firth

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Alice
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 02:52 PM

Yes, Don, he is one of my heroes, too. Bill Moyers is one of the last real journalists researching and reporting news on US television.

The fact is, there are more low paying jobs than high paying ones available, so even having more training and education does not guarantee a high paying job. I have far more education and experience than needed for the job I am in, but after months of looking last year, a $10 an hour management job was the best I could find in the state where I live. I work full time and take freelance illustration work or painting commissions when I can get it.

One of my relatives manages a Starbucks in Seattle. She is over educated for her position, too. She told me she knew the job situation in Seattle was really bad when she got a job application for a coffee barrista opening from someone with a Harvard degree.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: GUEST,pdc
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 06:17 PM

Don, that speech by Bill Moyers said it all, and said it well. I'm not sure it is applicable today, as it discusses the ideals upon which the US was founded, the resurrection of those ideals when they were lost, etc.

Would idealism and trust in the traditional American vision of democracy work in today's cynical political climate? I don't think it would -- I think the only way to take back democracy is by somehow beating the Roves of the world at their own game, and I have no idea how to do that.

Subject: RE: BS: Poor people are lazy says Bush
From: Big Mick
Date: 11 Mar 04 - 06:19 PM

Second, third and fourth on Bill Moyers. This is a savvy man, and PULLLEEEEAAAAZZZEEE read the speech. Thanks for posting it, Alice.

Mick