The collectivist, populist, redistributionist dogma of Clinton, Obama, et al. is as tiresome as it is unsupportable. But John Edwards is downright scary, because he seems to actually believe the nonsense he spouts about "economic fairness" (i.e., they have yet to take enough of my money to give to people who didn't earn it). Now, he's going on a "poverty tour" to round up poor people and, "by telling their stories to the rest of the nation . . . attempt to shed light on the new faces of poverty in America."
The former U.S. senator from North Carolina has a plan for “ending poverty in America within a generation” that includes an increase in the minimum wage, investments in rural community colleges, creation of 1 million short-term “stepping stone” jobs, and a program to encourage responsible fatherhood and fight teen pregnancy.
Let us pass over, for now, the empty arrogance of pledging to "end poverty" within one generation, as well as the obvious point that relative poverty will always be present and, in a way, even necessary in a free society. But it must be pointed out that millions of people around the world die every year because of extreme poverty and that the poor in this country live with creature comforts not even the well-off of previous generations possessed. That's the most offensive thing about Edwards -- his complete lack of a sense of proportion.
