In this season of giving, it’s ironic to hear such bitter words about “takers” in America.
That bleat represents a vitriolic response to President Obama’s re-election by his most strident opponents. The reason for his victory, according to a post-election assessment by Mitt Romney, the defeated Republican candidate, was “extraordinary financial gifts from government” by the president to certain groups of Americans — specifically, young people, Latin-Americans, African-Americans, and women. Free stuff. Government checks. Get in line.
The claim is a sure-fire way to stir up “hell yeahs” from like-minded people, long Facebook rants, and chain emails. The stereotyping also is unfair, distorted and inaccurate.
One of the most popular assertions by those angered by the vote involved “Obama phones” handed out by the administration for free to welfare recipients, who then presumably voted for the president. The accusation got repeated at a Romney campaign rally by the Florida agriculture commissioner, and then spread nationwide through a video of a woman claiming to have received one of the “Obama phones.”
A chain email expressed outrage that such a practice threatened bedrock principles of God, family and hard work, according to the Tampa Bay Tribune’s Pulitzer Prize-winning PolitiFact.com fact-checking team. The problem is, the Lifeline program (that’s the actual name, rather than “Obama phones”) was created in 1985 and expanded in 2008 under President Bush. It subsidizes phone service for low-income people. In 2012, the Federal Communications Commission actually modernized Lifeline to reduce fraud and waste, and ensure broadband availability to low-income Americans, PolitiFact found.
The Florida ag commissioner, Adam Putnam, retracted his comment, PolitiFact reported, posting on his own Facebook page, “About those cell phones: I’d heard about the YouTube video, wasn’t aware it was disclaimed. Won’t happen again.”
That’s the sad reality of the takers-versus-makers depiction of the nation. It panders to the baser human instincts and perpetuates fallacies.
A much different, refreshing response to the election came from the incoming chairman of the Republican Governors Association, Bobby Jindal, the Louisiana governor. Last Sunday on “Fox News Sunday,” Jindal distanced himself from comments by Romney, who earlier in the campaign famously wrote off 47 percent of America as unwilling to take personal responsibilities. Of the GOP, Jindal said, “If we want people to like us, we have to like them first,” adding, “You don’t start to like people by insulting them and saying their votes were bought. We are an aspirational party.”
Like Jindal, fellow Republican Carlos Gutierrez, former Commerce secretary under President Bush, voiced plans for action, rather than cynicism. Gutierrez, according to The Associated Press, is forming a super political-action-committee to support Republican candidates who endorse immigration reform, including legalizing the status of 11 million immigrants now living in the U.S. without authorization. A gift to buy votes? No. The immigrants, Gutierrez told CNN, “risk their lives, and they come here and they work because they want to be part of the American dream. That is what the GOP is.”
Those who continue to blame “takers” only divert the healthier, meaningful debate about strengthening the economy, and expanding opportunity. Before clicking “Like” on a Facebook tirade, consider some numbers: Seventy percent of U.S. counties with the fastest growth of food-stamp assistance during the past four years voted for the Republican presidential candidate, John McCain, in 2008, Bloomberg news service reported, quoting U.S. Department of Agriculture data. Why? The same reason it increased in other regions — the brutal recession.
Also, remember that favorable government policies and benefits to defense, energy and international corporations could also qualify those multi-billion-dollar entities as takers.
Instead, as the holidays unfold, let’s give the “takers” talk a rest. It’s time to move on.
Editorials
EDITORIAL: Put ‘takers’ talk to rest
Post-election blaming rant divisive distortion
- Editorials
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EDITORIAL: Waging the ‘readiness’ campaign
Almost every Hoosier who starts college intends to finish. Unfortunately, those who arrive on campus unprepared in key academic areas are far less likely to fulfill that aspiration.
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EDITORIAL: Insult to an independent press
Distrust of government secrecy has been elevated to an exceptional level with the disclosure the Justice Department covertly examined two months of Associated Press phone records to determine who leaked details to the AP about a foiled terrorist plot.
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EDITORIAL: Noteworthy in the news: Dashing finish for the Sycamores
It’s always thrilling to see Indiana State University’s athletic teams do well in high-level competition, and two specific teams rose to impressive heights last weekend in the Missouri Valley Conference outdoor track and field championships.
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EDITORIAL: Better monitoring needed to prevent local environmental messes
The nasty, hazardous messes lurking in the community raise a bottom-line, red-flag question. Could these environmental problems have been monitored and, thus, prevented?
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EDITORIAL: Memo to U.S.A.: You can ‘SPPRAK’ just as we do in Vigo County
Our kids, truly, are ‘Making a Difference’
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Some words in praise of boring government — Indiana’s
A conservative Republican governor has super majorities in both branches of the legislature. One might suspect such one-party government leads to major changes in public policy. This did not happen in 2013 in Indiana.
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EDITORIAL: Doc’s prescient prescription
Viewed through a 2013 prism, Doc Bowen’s response to the AIDS epidemic looks merely prudent, routine.
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EDITORIAL: Education remains worth the cost
Within the next few weeks, each of the local colleges will have conducted graduation ceremonies. A few days later, a different Class of 2013 will don caps and gowns for commencement — the seniors at five Vigo County high schools. It is still a smart, worthy aspiration for those high school grads to replicate the achievement of those college students by earning a higher-education degree.
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EDITORIAL: Good news for downtown
For decades, it seems, downtown Terre Haute has been in the throes of change
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EDITORIAL: Overall, state budget step in the right direction
For average Hoosiers uninterested in political point-scoring, the budget crafted by the Indiana Legislature inspires only muted, if any, fanfare.
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EDITORIAL: The lessons of organ donation
The range of emotion surrounding life-saving transplantation of a vital organ is extreme. It is the ultimate “good news-bad news” scenario.
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READERS’ FORUM: April 26, 2013
• Pence’s tax cuts benefit wealthiest
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EDITORIAL: Noteworthy in the news
This does not qualify as a surprise in any way. But the Wabash Valley’s response to widespread flooding of recent days has been nothing short of impressive, even inspirational.
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EDITORIAL: Still waiting for the jobs reward
The forces in control of Indiana government for most of the past decade need to show some results to Hoosiers in one primary category.
Good-paying jobs. -
MARK BENNETT: Littered with irony: Why do people callously discard their trash, and who are they?
Though they aren’t acknowledged by the U.S. Census Bureau, there are basically two demographic groups of people … Those who would dump their old toilet on the banks of the Wabash River or a rural roadside. And those who wouldn’t.
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EDITORIAL: Doing the dirty work to clean up tossed trash
A first-of-its-kind, coast-to-coast project to remove litter from U.S. roadsides brought the Pick Up America crew through the Wabash Valley two years ago.
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EDITORIAL: Keep school security a local issue
The decision to provide armed security inside a schoolhouse should be made locally.
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EDITORIAL: Noteworthy in the news
Indiana’s parks need your help.
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EDITORIAL: The return of terror
Emotions today remain strong and raw in wake of Monday’s terror bombings near the finish line of the Boston Marathon.
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EDITORIAL: A solution to distracted driving … stop it … now
You’ve got to stop. You know you do it. It’s a miracle you haven’t caused a tragedy already.
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EDITORIAL: ‘Women of Influence’: 2013 selectees have given much to their communities
For the second year, United Way of the Wabash Valley has teamed up with local sponsors to select and honor a group of women who have made outstanding contributions to their communities, professions and families.
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EDITORIAL: Noteworthy in the news: A new honor for our veterans
A commendation goes out today to state Rep. Clyde Kersey, a Terre Haute Democrat who led the charge this week in the Indiana House of Representatives to pay tribute to the nation’s Purple Heart recipients.
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EDITORIAL: Shifting view on marriage
One could argue, as many have, that Sen. Joe Donnelly did the right thing last week when he dropped his support of government-sanctioned opposition to same-sex marriage. It wasn’t a radical move, considering most Democrats have now made the switch.
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MAX JONES: The American Newspaper: Changing? Yes. Dying? No way!
It happened again this past January when all those “looking at the year ahead” stories started popping up on Internet “news” websites and broadcast “news” programs. Under a provocative headline reading something like “Five industries/businesses doomed to tank in the coming year,” there it was, a prediction based on an unsubstantiated “expert” analysis that the newspaper industry will continue in 2013 to suffer its slide into oblivion.
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EDITORIAL: A chance to change our bad cultural habits
The sight of diligent, eager young people dragging trash out of the Wabash River wetlands is both inspiring and sad.
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EDITORIAL: Maintaining high standards
Standards
It’s the raging buzzword in education circles these days. Everyone insists that higher standards must be met. Anything less is, doggone it, unacceptable. -
Noteworthy in the news
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EDITORIAL: Crack down on dumpers
There is a reason it’s called “illegal” dumping. It’s against the law. And there is a very good reason illegal dumping is against the law.
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Season of Day 2s arrives
Calendars in Cincinnati contain one extra holiday — Opening Day, traditionally the first Monday in April.
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Congress fails to recognize problem of education costs
Who hasn’t gotten this message yet? The cost of a college degree has become unaffordable for a wide swath of middle-class America.
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