Arrow-right Camera
The Spokesman-Review Newspaper
Spokane, Washington  Est. May 19, 1883

Politicians should protect the poor, not pander to rich

Donald Clegg Correspondent

I always enjoy synchronicity. Or, as my dictionary somewhat longwindedly says, “the simultaneous occurrence of events that appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection.”

I’d already started this column, including one of my favorite epigrams by Dubya, when I read an editorial by Providence Journal columnist Froma Harrop which included the same quote.

And, still more synchronicity, she’s also been reading investigative journalist David Cay Johnston’s new book, “Free Lunch” (Portfolio Hardcover, $24.95).

The subtitle, “How The Wealthiest Americans Enrich Themselves At Government Expense (And Stick You With The Bill),” pretty much says it all.

Johnston’s last book, “Perfectly Legal,” described the reworking of our tax code to the benefit of the super-rich. “Free Lunch,” which sometimes reads as if written by Stephen King, describes the adverse effects of these changes on virtually everyone not in that tippy-top 1/10th of 1 percent – a mere 300,000 Americans.

A measly 300,000, with as much income as the bottom half of our country’s citizens. Can you say 150 million people? Hallelujah.

Put simply, we’re getting the shaft. Put simply, the playing field is as straight as a funhouse mirror. Put simply, millions upon millions of Americans have virtually no chance at all, right from the get-go, because they lack the myriad advantages that the haves and have-mores take for granted.

Proper nutrition, early childhood education, adequate daycare, ready access to good health care – to name just a few basics that a civil and just society should provide – are so beyond the reach of many that we might just as well be living in Mexico, Brazil or Russia.

Johnston notes that these are the countries whose distribution of wealth most closely resembles ours at this moment.

But, hey, “I mean, people have access to health care in America. After all, you just go to an emergency room.” (George W. Bush, Cleveland, July 10, 2007.) Why worry?

Contempt for the poor remains the standard for many of the privileged, of course, as well as those, shall we say, of a particular political (and often religious) persuasion, whether privileged or not.

A couple of more quotes:

“”And so many of the people in the arena here, you know, were underprivileged anyway, so this – this (she chuckles) is working very well for them.” – on evacuees at the Houston Astrodome, in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, having been dispossessed of home and belongings.

“”Poor people aren’t necessarily killers. Just because you happen not to be rich, doesn’t mean you’re willing to kill.” –Washington, D.C., May 19, 2003.

While I’m at it, let’s go for one more:

“”The disposition to admire, and almost to worship, the rich and the powerful, and to despise, or, at least, to neglect persons of poor and mean condition is the great and most universal cause of the corruption of our moral sentiments.” – circa 1759

So who’s behind door No. 1? That would be Barbara Bush, mother of the compassionate conservative Christian lurking behind door No. 2, G.W. Bush.

The third? Just that author of “An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of The Wealth of Nations,” the good Scotsman Adam Smith himself, who might be a bit ticked at the distortions of, and uses put to, his magnum opus some 200 years later.

I put to mind these quotes when I consider our priorities, which are part and parcel of our beliefs, principles and morals.

I place a priority on equal opportunity for all, equal treatment for all, and I have a certain fondness for the third clause of Article 6 of the Constitution. You know, the one that goes, “No religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.”

I put to mind these quotes when I consider, this political season, the usual pandering by almost every candidate to the religious vote. Specifically, of course, the Christian vote. And most specifically, the fundamentalist Christian vote.

Who has the most, of the rightest kind, of Jesus? Who cares?

My question is this: Who has the most contempt for the poor? If that’s your man – or woman – you lack all “Christianity,” no matter what your religion or lack thereof.