Monday, September 17, 2012

It gets worse

There are 47 percent of the people who will vote for the president no matter what. All right, there are 47 percent who are with him, who are dependent upon government, who believe that they are victims, who believe the government has a responsibility to care for them, who believe that they are entitled to health care, to food, to housing, to you-name-it. That that's an entitlement. And the government should give it to them. And they will vote for this president no matter what…These are people who pay no income tax.
While one might think the above simplistic moralizing was spoken by some right-wing fanatic on public access, its source is in fact the Republican nominee for president, speaking months ago to $50,000+ donors.  It betrays Romney's apparent dichotomous view straight out of Atlas Shrugged of a virtuous productive class which is preyed upon by freeloaders.  And one can declare oneself productive if only they can find the wherewithal to vote Republican.

Romney continues, in reference to the same 47% of the country who are lazy Obama voters, saying "[M]y job is is not to worry about those people. I'll never convince them they should take personal responsibility and care for their lives."

This is a horrifying statement in a few different ways.  Romney is stating that a near-majority of the nation are destined to never produce anything or even care for themselves.  It ignores any degree of social mobility or changing circumstances; the portion of the population that doesn't pay income taxes is in fact constantly shifting.  Romney also betrays his apparent view that these people aren't worth worrying about, and he doesn't intend to even try to convince them to get off their lazy, poor duffs and do something with their lives.  If he really thinks many of us won't take care of ourselves no matter what, it lends a more sinister tone to his proposals to devastate spending on social programs.  If he doesn't think it will stimulate people to support themselves, what does he think will happen to them?

The rest of the video clips are worth watching, too.  Romney includes such gems as claiming that he would have be doing better in the campaign if his father had been ethnically Mexican instead of just being born there.  He discusses his theory that Obama only won because of the potency of his advertising, and that merely the news of Romney's election will help the economy, even before he gets into office and does anything.

1 comment:

nyb said...

Not that Romney's correct in everything he said, but there is a significant (I wouldn't say 47%) segment of the population that has lost the ability to perform basic functions of living (supporting oneself through one's own efforts, taking a personal responisibility for one's well being). Our society has been working hard at creating a permanent underclass via programs designed to "help" people. Anecdotal evidence isn't the best, but in the area that I live in Pittsburgh, there is a significant underclass presence. At the local grocery store, EBT cards are not used for necessities (things like rice, beans
, and canned veggies are *cheap and relatively healthy*) but instead cans of Pepsi and bags of chips. Cigarettes are bought using a wad of cash. These poor choices only reinforce the problems that the underclass has, and instead of having to deal with the consequences of their actions (which is how humans *learn*), they are picked back up by the so called "safety net" so they can continue their unsustainable lifestyle.

There will always be poor with us, but we need to stop pretending that most poverty is due to external forces beyond one's own control. Structrual poverty does exist in cases of severe medical & mental health problems, and these cases are where our attention should be focused on.