Posted by Tina
Americans have generously provided help to the homeless for decades, both charitable and through government policy, and still the problem persists. The obvious conclusion is that the homeless always be with us to one degree or another. How the homeless are used to further a political agenda is something else again. “The homeless” were represented in news stories throughout the eighties. It became a theme in the news making headlines nearly daily and always in the top five stories of the day. This was part of the concerted effort to discredit and smear Ronald Reagan and force the lie that under Reaganomics the little people suffered. I remember how these stories disappeared from the pages of magazines and newspapers and the headline news the very moment that Bill Clinton took the stage. The war provided enough fodder to discredit and abuse George W. Bush so the homeless remained “in the shadows’ throughout his presidency. Next Obama, a Democrat, was elected and although our nation suffered a horrendous economic and housing crash in which millions of Americans lost their homes, the homeless have remained off the radar…until today.
New York Post about a problem at La Guardia airport in New York that has finally become too big to ignore:
The Port Authority said Friday it will turn La Guardia Airport into a bum-free zone — but not until after the holidays.
The agency made the move following an exposé in The Post showing that at least 50 homeless squatters had moved into the busy airport, sleeping on vents, stealing food from shops and getting naked to wash themselves in the bathrooms. The homeless have also been taking up chairs meant for passengers while snoring under blaring televisions.
Some hang around during the day, arguing with cleaning crews and bothering shop workers.
PA officials said they made the decision because the growing homeless population forced them to station dozens of cops at the airport to keep the vagrants under control, and that safety had become a huge concern.
As I read this I realized this story could be repeated in publications serving cities and towns across America on a daily basis. But could anyone tell us, without looking it up, how many people are now living on the streets and in public facilities across America? In the eighties under Reagan the number was reported constantly…and it was Reagan’s fault; it was Reagan’s problem. There are many ways that the left has lied to and deceived the people to keep them ignorant, misinformed, and voting Democrat. This is just one example.
Back in October 2012 The American Spectator reported on homelessness under Obama:
Here are the facts:
First off, it’s difficult to get numbers on the homeless. They don’t register like the unemployed do, or like those filing for welfare benefits. Calculating the homeless requires careful study. HUD did just that under Reagan because of the utter hysteria by liberals. Homeless advocates like the late Mitch Snyder spoke of millions upon millions of homeless (three million, imagined Snyder) wasting away on the streets. One account claimed 250,000 homeless in Chicago alone, which was ridiculous — but the press dutifully reported it anyway.
And so, HUD in 1984 released its report, estimating 250,000-350,000 homeless at the end of 1983. That was the data going into Reagan’s fourth year, and just as the Reagan boom was starting. As Professor Andrew Busch notes, even by the late 1980s, most studies placed the homeless around 300,000.
As for today, under Obama, the most recent study is a report by the National Alliance to End Homelessness, titled “State of Homelessness in America 2012.” That report provided data through the end of 2011, heading into Obama’s fourth year. It listed 636,017 homeless in 2011, which is double the number under Reagan.
Do Democrats care about homeless people, homeless families, or homeless veterans? Only so far as they can be used to discredit the opposition, win elections, and gain power and control for the radical Saul Alinsky elements now in power in the Democrat Party. The sixties radicals that stood for communism and radical revolution have become a political power force known today by the less toxic sounding fundamental transformation. Leftist media elites continue to provide cover, in this case about the homeless, to serve this radical force.
The number of homeless under Obama is even more startling when you consider the way Obama has greatly expanded welfare, medicare, food stamp and other programs. The economy is in terrible shape and that too is largely ignored or softened by leftist media elites.
It will take a lot of effort to direct our nation back toward it’s founding principles and grounding. One thing any one of us can do for that cause is to notice the things that undermine our republic and misdirect or misinform the people and expose it. Tell your neighbors, tell your friends, tell your kids teachers, tell a stranger.
Obama’s homeless problem was exposed today by the New York Post, I just thought I’d pass it along.
The homeless are ignored by politicians until they need their votes. After that, they revert to being ignored, and the businesses near where they congregate suffer.
As long as it is more economically beneficial to NOT work and still get a goofernment handout, we will have hordes of homeless.
Outstanding piece Tina!
I doubt exposing the homelessness situation exacerbated under Obama’s policies will become popular in the left-wing liberal lamestream media.
Off Topic : Hilarious Ted Cruz Christmas Message
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=e3hB3iOQKjY
(The Cruz girls are so cute.)
Ha…you beat me to it, Pie
A little tease: Rudolph the Underemployed Reindeer; The Grinch Who Lost Her Emails…
You are just shameless. Let’s see the details of this vast expansion of the federal welfare state coming out of YOUR Congress.
I mean, six years of not diddly-squat. Can’t even get an actual federal budget out of YOUR Congress, let alone any vast expansion of the welfare state.
Just shameless.
August 2012 CNS News, “Welfare State Grows by Nearly 19% Under Obama – to Almost $1 Trillion a Year”
See also here, here, and here.
My Congress? That’s rich. Your party took control of budgets in 2006 and had a super majority after the 2008 election through the 2012 election. The federal government and the debt grew as it always does.
“Your” president unlawfully failed to submit a budget in at least two consecutive years and pretty much announced to the Republican Party members of Congress that their input would not be sought, recognized, or accepted.
There has been no budget. We have survived on continuing resolutions. There is a “my way” strategy in the Democrat Party…NO COMPROMISE. Elitist Republicans with weak knees play the same game with Obama that he played with the Iranians…he gets his way. The President will not sign unless the budget is his budget, his way. His entire term in office is one shameless act after another, including undermining the separation of powers and an obligation to work with the people’s representatives and within the law.
And you…you are simply a partisan who refuses to admit what a mistake this guy has been for America.
According to reports the homeless situation is as bad now, if not worse, than during the Great Depression.
New York’s Homelessness Worst Since The Great Depression: 2013
“State and local governments nationwide have struggled to accommodate a homeless population that has changed in recent years – now including large numbers of families with young children. As the WSJ reports, more than 21,000 children – an unprecedented 1% of the city’s youth – slept each night in a city shelter in January, an increase of 22% in the past year; as homeless families now spend more than a year in a shelter, on average, for the first time since 1987. New York City has seen one of the steepest increases in homeless families in the past decade, advocates said, growing 73% since 2002, and “is facing a homeless crisis worse than any time since the Great Depression.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-03-05/new-yorks-homelessness-worst-great-depression
Invisible Child: Dasani’s Homeless Life – The New York Times:
“Dasani’s own neighborhood, Fort Greene, is now one of gentrification’s gems. Her family lives in the Auburn Family Residence, a decrepit city-run shelter for the homeless. It is a place where mold creeps up walls and roaches swarm, where feces and vomit plug communal toilets, where sexual predators have roamed and small children stand guard for their single mothers outside filthy showers.
It is no place for children. Yet Dasani is among 280 children at the shelter. Beyond its walls, she belongs to a vast and invisible tribe of more than 22,000 homeless children in New York, the highest number since the Great Depression, in the most unequal metropolis in America.”
http://www.nytimes.com/projects/2013/invisible-child/#/?chapt=1
“Conditions were ‘bluntly Dickensian’”: The disgrace of New York’s homeless shelters: 2015
“New York has its highest homeless rate since the Great Depression — Mayor de Blasio and Gov. Cuomo need to do more”
http://www.salon.com/2015/07/09/homeless_in_nyc_partner/
Tackling homelessness in pricey San Francisco:
“More than 200 people have moved into the center since it opened in the spring, but that’s a fraction of those who need help. A biannual count released in the summer found 6,686 homeless, an increase of more than 3 percent from the last count. Advocates say the true number is higher because counters miss those who don’t appear homeless.
Other cities are struggling with surging homelessness. The Los Angeles City Council and the governor of Hawaii have recently declared states of emergency. Last year the number of people in shelters in New York City was reportedly the largest since the Great Depression.
But in San Francisco, a city long known for its social tolerance and spirit of innovation, the response to homelessness has grown both more contentious and more creative. Everyone appears to agree on one central problem: The city is mired in a serious housing shortage that makes it hard for anyone without a six-figure income to find a place to live. While construction cranes fill the skyline, median rent for one-bedroom apartments is close to $3,300.
“This city seems to be coming apart at the seams because of the explosive growth of the technology boom,” said Bevan Dufty, the mayor’s point man on homelessness and the head of Housing Opportunity, Partnerships, and Engagement in the mayor’s office. “What’s amazing is that people all over feel less secure. What will happen if they lose their apartment? What surprises me is how many people see homelessness as unconnected with what’s happening. Why wouldn’t we be in a crisis?”
http://www.sacbee.com/news/state/california/article42091380.html#storylink=cpy
Tina … 2006 ?!? … 2008 ?!?
Arrrrrrggghh!
I don’t know why I waste my time trying to communicate with people who can’t keep anything even remotely resembling a fact … straight !
I wonder why you do too.
Wikipedia:
Duh! The House is where spending bills are generated. The president proposes.
The Atlantic:
Arghhhhhh, yourself!
Arrrrr matey, that thar bilge rat has some serious problems wit ‘er noggin.
🙂
Breath. Breath deep.
Calmly now.
Tina, dear … we cannot discuss an Obama expansion of the federal welfare state in 2006, because Obama was not the President in 2006.
Can you grasp this fact, at all?
Libby dear…we can discuss the Democrat expansion of the welfare state as of 2006 when the Democrats took control of the House where spending bills originate! You’ve heard of Nancy Pelosi, right?
When Pelosi/Reid took control in 2007 the “unemployment rate was 4.6%” and the “national debt was $8.6 trillion”. By 2010 “unemployment was 9.6%” and the nation was “$13 trillion in debt.” some of that spending was in welfare programs.
You love to put all the blame on Bush, and he deserves some of it, but you also never hold the Democrat leadership to account and they deserve much of the blame:
Spending on foodstamps doubled between fiscal year (FY) 2008 and FY 2012 to approximately $80 billion. In 2009 the stimulus package pumped extra dollars into food stamps to “stimulate the economy.” (DIDN’T WORK-STUPID MOVE)
Welfare programs, like most budget items always go UP. See this chart on welfare programs.
Go ahead…pretend you people don’t love to redistribute wealth (as a means to power).
Convince me that Pelosi and Reid had nothing to do with the explosion in debt that began in 2007 after the 2006 belection.
But you cannot call it an “Obama” expansion, which you did, if it occurred in 2006. I’m not letting this go.
You lie. You get called on it. Then you come unstuck in time, space, mind and logic, trying to salvage your position … which is not even a position, it’s an aberration.
Libby: “You lie. You get called on it. Then you come unstuck in time, space, mind and logic, trying to salvage your position …”
Well said.
Aberration? How cute that you would choose that word with respect to Obama and the welfare state…redistribution by another name:
Obama lives for redistribution and big government solutions: “At an October 19, 1998 conference at Loyola University, Barack Obama spoke against “propaganda” that said government doesn’t work and the need to “pool resources and hence facilitate some redistribution because I actually believe in redistribution.”
Another word for redistribution is welfare. Take from some to give to others.
Obama (2008) believes strongly in government redistribution (welfare), including via the justice system. He calls it a right:
Obama’s signature health care law (signed March 2010) is chock full of Welfare. It’s the only piece of legislation Pelosi/Reid worked on and they worked on it with a vengeance. The most obvious transfers in wealth are called “subsidies” but there are other ways this law redistributes wealth through taxes and regulations.
The American Thinker:
In 2014 Obama’s immigration stance signaled his dedication to expanding the welfare state. The Daily Beast:
Go ahead, deny this president has done everything in his power to advance the welfare state and redistribute wealth and had that intention at least since the eighties! Deny that the expansion of welfare spending under Pelosi when the Dems took the House in 2006. See chart.
Welfare spending under republicans was $99.54 billion for 2005, $100.98 billion for 2006, $104.55 in 2007, (Pelosi), $115.30 in 2008 (Pelosi).
But none of this tells the entire story of wealth redistribution under these socialists starting in 2006 when Democrats took control of Congress.
Libby this the way our conversation unfolded.
First I posted a story about the homeless under Obama and the difference in media coverage for democrat presidents and republican presidents.
Libby: Let’s see the details of this vast expansion of the federal welfare state coming out of YOUR Congress.”
My reply: My Congress? That’s rich. Your party took control of budgets in 2006 and had a super majority after the 2008 election through the 2012 election. The federal government and the debt grew as it always does. I also posted evidence of increases in welfare under Obama: Since Fiscal Year 2009, federal and state welfare spending has risen from $779.9 billion to $927.2 billion, an increase of 18.8 percent. That fiscal year includes spending from Oct. 1, 2008 to Sept. 30, 2009. (2008-2009 is Pelosi’s budget)
Libby: Tina, dear … we cannot discuss an Obama expansion of the federal welfare state in 2006, because Obama was not the President in 2006. Can you grasp this fact, at all?
My reply: Libby dear…we can discuss the Democrat expansion of the welfare state as of 2006 when the Democrats took control of the House where spending bills originate! You’ve heard of Nancy Pelosi, right? (I did not say Obama was to blame for this expansion of welfare)
Libby: But you cannot call it an “Obama” expansion, which you did, if it occurred in 2006. I’m not letting this go. You lie. … trying to salvage your position … which is not even a position, it’s an aberration. (Chris piles on)
My response: Aberration? How cute that you would choose that word with respect to Obama and the welfare state…redistribution by another name:
Obama lives for redistribution and big government solutions: “At an October 19, 1998 conference at Loyola University, Barack Obama spoke against “propaganda” that said government doesn’t work and the need to “pool resources and hence facilitate some redistribution because I actually believe in redistribution.”
The piece was about Obama’s homeless problem. I never said he was responsible for welfare increases after 2006. I said when Democrats took control of Congress welfare spending increased…and showed proof of that being true. I also threw you a couple of bones, one was that spending went up as it always does.
Obama still has a tremendous homeless problem and it is rarely reported.
I’d call you and Chris liars for calling me a liar but that would be really silly, don’t you think?
Have any thoughts about the UNDER REPORTED homeless problem on Obama’s watch?
Worse than shameless.
Try calling your beloved politicians demanding they support bills removing tax cuts for companies moving jobs out of the country and give tax cuts to those who bring jobs home.
Tell them that the number of homeless vets is abominable. This is a repeat of the Vietnam era. Use our citizens for fake profit wars and turn your backs on them when they come home, distressed and injured.
Raise wages to a living wage so working families do not need food stamps.
GW desecrated this county with the so called conservative policies. The Republican held congress has blocked any and every bill the Obama admin has put forth including fixing our infrastructure. But even with a republican coup the economy has grown slowly. The deficit has shrunk too fast.
I have plenty of things to rail Obama on namely Trade deal the and the lack of corrupt bankers in jail…. but article is pure hate and fantasy.
This wreaks of WW2 German Style Propaganda.
America is a wasteland with not enough good paying jobs to go around. Is your home filled with Chinese goods? Well Wall Street is doing great! Those extra profits are making them richer!
Question …the unregulated so called free markets are going to crash hard…… Will you rail the millions who become homeless?
The pension and social security crowd seems to be pulling up the ladder behind them with their retirement and government checks.
Dewey the problem with many of your solutions is they would have the opposite effect you expect.
“article is pure hate and fantasy. ”
If you’re going to make outrageous statements like that at least have the decency to back them up with more than hate and fantasy.
“the unregulated so called free market”
The free market is so heavily regulated it can no longer really be called free. Tax policy and regulation have run businesses to nations that have friendlier policies! If you want to attract business and jobs to America you will need more than vinegar my friend. We need simplified reasonable regulations, the fewer the better. Complex law creates opportunities to cheat or find loop holes.
When we speak of free markets we are often speaking in terms of the concept as opposed to the collective concept which describes the socialist brands. They favor power in the hands of the elite, redistribution of wealth, and corporatism just like the Nazi’s and the communists.
Dewey, I’ll say it again, you are one confused Dude.