The Patriot Post® · The Cause of the Poor

Mona Charen: “Every other sentence out of the mouths of President Barack Obama and other progressive Democrats seems to invoke the ‘middle class,’ and when they’re not promising to help the middle class, they’re obsessing about how to humble the rich. In the past two weeks, the left’s preoccupation with confiscating thy neighbor’s goods has been highlighted by two things: The reception of Thomas Piketty’s new book, ‘Capital in the Twenty-First Century,’ and the response to rumors that Sen. Elizabeth (‘Occupy Wall Street’) Warren might run for president. Both have received the full secular saint treatment, reflecting the progressives’ almost mob-like eagerness to lay hands on more of the property of the rich. Not for the poor, mind you, but for the ‘middle class’ (translation: themselves). … About 25 percent of the poor in America are working. Only about 2.9 percent work full time. Government largesse can keep people from destitution but it cannot provide a ladder out of poverty. Only jobs can do that. A Republican Party alert to its own interests, as well as those of the nation, would pick up the cause of the poor that the Democrats have abandoned. Instead of a disability, welfare or unemployment check, they should find a way to offer a job.”