“America is coming apart,” American Enterprise Institute scholar Charles Murray wrote at The Wall Street Journal last week. The problem is one of “cultural inequality,” Murray said, and it reveals itself in “a new upper class with advanced educations, often obtained at elite schools, sharing tastes and preferences that set them apart from mainstream America” and in “a new lower class, characterized not by poverty but by withdrawal from America’s core cultural institutions.”
Murray roots working class decline, not in macro-economic factors like the loss of manufacturing jobs, but in social policy developed during the 1960s that he says “made it economically more feasible to have a child without having a husband if you were a woman or to get along without a job if you were a man; safer to commit crimes without suffering consequences; and easier to let the government deal with problems in your community that you and your neighbors formerly had to take care of.”
His solution to this alleged cultural divide is the affirmation of core “civic virtues” like marriage, industriousness, and religiosity. Not only should they be advanced by the working class folks who adhere to them, but he says, “Married, educated people who work hard and conscientiously raise their kids shouldn’t hesitate to voice their disapproval of those who defy these norms.”
That ought to go over well with the young’uns.
Restoring American Dynamism
Fellow conservative David Brooks took a different approach to the problems faced by a hypothetical economically disadvantaged woman in his January 23 column at The New York Times. Brooks advocated “a two-pronged approach” to “restoring American dynamism” that includes “more economic freedom combined with more social structure; more competition combined with more support.” This translates into a simpler tax code, corporate tax cuts, streamlined regulations, flexible immigration policy, and a long-term balanced budget, as well as a host of measures that support education and more child care options for families.
Sounds reasonable.
Comparing Costs
At The American Conservative, Rod Dreher struck an even more moderate tone, rebuking Newt Gingrich’s “food stamp president” remark by reminding readers that SNAP benefits have doubled since 2008 because “the country suffered its worst economic collapse since the Great Depression!” Dreher contrasted SNAP spending with the estimated $107 billion bill that the Pentagon will present this year to U.S. taxpayers for what he regards as a futile war in Afghanistan.
Thank God for comedians …
Smoking Out the Satirical in Progressive Elitism
At The Weekly Standard, humor writer P.J. O’Rourke charged progressives with hating poor people. He was riffing on Maine’s new ban on smoking in all public housing, but he applied the critique WIDELY. Here’s a single satirical sentence that Murray might consider when pondering cultural divisions:
“Smoking kills smokers, which is about what they deserve for engaging in such lowbrow, wrong-headed, retarded, vulgarian activity, except they get sick first and that drives up the cost of a single-payer national health care system, plus their second-hand smoke is worse yet because it is a, yuck, inhalation hand-me-down from uncouth people who probably haven’t flossed, and it kills progressive elites who don’t even know anyone who smokes while also releasing greenhouse gases and stinking up the cheery curtains that elites hang in public housing group activity areas to brighten the lives of the underprivileged who are confined to concrete tower blocks with six-by-eight-foot living rooms, seven-foot ceilings, plexiglass windows, and sheet-metal doors with a dozen locks on them.”
Linament Salesmen and Other Ills
Speaking of humor, in a new interview with The Root, comedy legend Bill Cosby took on those who criticize him for “airing dirty laundry” about the Black community when he denounces its social dysfunctions, calling them “liniment salesmen.” He also expressed his concerns about teen pregnancy, Black-on-Black crime, and illiteracy. “I’m telling you that I’m worried and very, very concerned today when a mother, speaking about the son being in jail, says, ‘I’m happy. He’s in a safe place.’ You cannot take that casually,” Cosby warned, and that’s not funny at all.
Winfrey the Non-Conformist Anomaly
Leave it to media mogul Oprah Winfrey to defy them all. In an interview with India’s NDTV, Winfrey said that she and Stedman Graham would have been divorced by now if they had gotten married. “I really am my own woman and I don’t really conform very well to other people ideas about who and what I should be and being married calls for some conformity,” said Winfrey. But then, these guys would probably say she’s the exception that proves the rule.
What do you think?
Is there a cultural divide between a new upper class and a new lower class. If so, who’s to blame and what, if anything, is to be done about it?
I may have watched one too many Republican presidential debates. At least that’s what I thought after re-reading my tweets about President Obama’s State of the Union address last night. I detected a note of cynicism in them that I surmise is a symptom of election season fatigue. The president struck strong notes for the middle class when he talked about ending tax breaks for U.S. companies that export jobs overseas, but lost me when he highlighted a laid-off 55-year-old man who found a green energy job. Clearly he hasn’t looked for work in four years.
Through a Middle-Class Lens
For a straightforward report on the speech, check out Cynthia Gordy’s at The Root. She summarized it like this: “The president largely focused on the economy through the lens of the struggling poor and disappearing middle class. Laying out his blueprint for restoring the economy through manufacturing, clean energy, education and a revised tax code, he also touched on what he called ‘the defining issue of our time’ — delivering on the American promise of hard work and responsibility paying off with the ability to own a home, raise a family and retire.”
Others weren’t so generous.
More Partisanship
At The New York Times, John Harwood declared the speech “more partisan than presidential,” saying the president’s “promises to heal the rifts between red America and blue America have fallen flat,” so “he is now trying to highlight his differences with Republicans in an effort to win a second term and new leverage.”
More Spending
Times Columnist Ross Douthat basically agreed, but concluded that “the substance of the speech could be summed up in one word: More.” More spending on, well, everything, “all of it to be paid for, inevitably, by more taxes on the wealthy.”
More Gridlock
The president’s new policies may not do much for Black unemployment, said Perry Bacon Jr. at The Root. This is because experts tie African Americans’ high jobless rates to their disproportionate work in America’s disappearing manufacturing base and in the public sector. “Obama’s speech included a number of ideas to further speed up the revival of American manufacturing. But many of his ideas, such as provisions to raise the tax rates for companies that ship jobs overseas, may not pass the Republican House of Representatives,” Bacon Jr. concluded.
More Republican Critique
Newser has a nice summary of Republican responses to the speech, including that of Herman “I’m Not Going Away” Cain. He focuses on Tea Party complaints like “Obamacare,” class warfare, and the “liberal media,” Newser reported. Cain also reportedly said sexual impropriety allegations like the ones that derailed his campaign have failed against Newt Gingrich because “the American people are waking up to dirty, gutter politics.”
Oh, is that why? Whoops. My cynicism is showing again.
What do you think?
Did the president’s speech inspire you or merely tire you?
STRAIGHT TALKER OR RACE BAITER?: GOP presidential candidate and former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich.
As moderator Juan Williams tried to question former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich at the South Carolina debate last week about Gingrich’s charge that President Obama is the “food stamp president,” there were loud boos for Williams and enthusiastic cheers for Gingrich.
“Speaker Gingrich, you said black Americans should demand jobs, not food stamps. You also said poor kids lack a strong work ethic and proposed having them work as janitors in their schools,” said Williams. “Can’t you see that this is viewed, at a minimum, as insulting to all Americans, but particularly to black Americans?”
“No. I don’t see that,” Gingrich brashly replied.
Williams then said his Twitter account had been “inundated” by people of all races, who wanted to know if Gingrich’s comments were intentionally meant to “belittle the poor and racial minorities.”
“The fact is that more people have been put on food stamps by Barack Obama than any president in American history,” Gingrich said. “I know among the politically correct you are not supposed to use facts that are uncomfortable.”
Playing Dumb or “Morally Evolved” Toward Truth?
“When Mr Gingrich replied to Mr. Williams that he cannot see why some might take umbrage at his comments that black Americans ‘should demand jobs, not food stamps’ and that poor kids tend to lack a strong work ethic, I don’t think it’s quite right to say he was ‘playing dumb.’ On the contrary, Mr Gingrich acts as though he is so morally evolved, so essentially oriented toward truth—as though he surveys the world from such an Olympian height, through such crystalline air—that he is unable even to imagine how his use of venerable racist tropes could be sensibly seen to serve a purpose other than transmission of the plain truth,” concluded a writer at The Economist’sDemocracy in America blog.
Just Stating the Facts
But Col. Allen West, the only Republican member of the Congressional Black Caucus, told Fox News that there is no racial coding in Gingrich’s charge. He said it’s a fact that there has been a four-to-one Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits increase since President Obama took office.
Do Facts Add Up to Truth?
The Washington Post agreed, sort of, reporting that “about 46 million participants in 22 million households” are receiving SNAP benefits. “But that’s mainly because there’s been record poverty levels, not because President Obama has taken major steps to make it easier to receive food stamps from the government.”
What Color Are SNAP Recipients?
As to the misconception that the majority of SNAP recipients are black, Bloomberg Businessweek reported that “about 34 percent of food-stamp recipients are white, while 22 percent are African Americans and 16 percent Hispanic, with the rest being Asian, Native American or those who chose not to identify their race.” Businessweek also reported that “some 41 percent of all recipients live in households where family members are employed.”
Has the Mud Slinging Only Just Begun?
“If you hate negative campaigning, you may want to turn your television off for the next few weeks. Or maybe months,” said Chris Cillizza at The Washington Post.
What do you think?
Is Newt Gingrich engaging in shrewd but despicable race baiting, or is he just stating the facts?
More than 150 protesters, led by New York City clergy, were joined by several members of the city council Wednesday at a press conference on the steps of the Tweed Courthouse in lower Manhattan. UrbanFaith talked to several protesters, including two pastors who were previously arrested for trespassing and disorderly conduct as they rallied against the impending eviction of houses of worship from the city’s public schools.
Threatening Community Partnerships
Rev. Rick Del Rio, pastor of Abounding Grace Ministries, said the threatened February 12 eviction of his church from PS/MS 34 on the lower east side of Manhattan is “very difficult” because his congregation mostly serves poor members of a neighborhood that is increasingly being gentrified.
SPEAKING OUT: Tianna Williams joined others to confront NYC's controversial law restricting houses of worship from meeting in schools. (Photo: Christine A. Scheller)
“We’re going to survive because this is God’s church. However, we’ve been in real partnership with the city. … We have been doing things that the city hasn’t had to do and we didn’t use any city money to do it,” said Del Rio.
Del Rio, a 30-year New York City ministry veteran, also serves as a volunteer clergy liaison for the New York City Police Department. The NYPD sometimes calls him to intervene in tense neighborhood situations, he said.
“One time there was a murder that took place and there was going to be a gang war there. They asked me to intervene and talk to these kids. I took the whole gang to my house where we lived on 6th street and we served them hot chocolate and sandwiches and were able to defuse the situation and there was no retaliation that took place,” said Del Rio.
Paying a Price for Solidarity
Rev. Michael Carrion, pastor of The Promised Land Covenant Church, has been arrested twice for protesting the policy, even though it doesn’t directly affect his congregation.
“It affects my Bronx. I’m in solidarity,” said Carrion, who is facing two court dates from his arrests. “It is a small price to pay for my community.”
Standing Up for the Marginalized
DEFIANT CLERGY: (From left) Rev. José Humphreys, Rev. Ruben Austria, Rev. Michael Carrion, and Rev. Efrain Alicea. (Photo: Christine A. Scheller)
Rev. José Humphreys, pastor of Metro Hope Church, was arrested at the previous rally as well. Like Carrion, his church doesn’t meet in a public school. He said he didn’t wake up that morning thinking he would be arrested, but was prepared for the possibility.
“It was something that we believed in, because … whenever the marginalized, the poor, the disavowed are affected by unjust policies, when policies no longer serve their constituents, I think it’s a mandate for the church to step in and represents these people,” said Humphreys.
Civil Rights Movement Inspiration
“As a student of the civil rights movement, I think it’s always a good thing when the people of faith stand up and speak truth to power. I hope this movement continues … with the church standing up for all sorts of things where the poor are being affected,” said Rev. Ruben Austria, executive director of Community Connections for Youth, an organization that works to provide alternatives to incarceration for young people caught up in the juvenile justice system.
Could This Policy Spread?
Both Carrion’s and Humphreys’ churches are affiliated with the Evangelical Covenant Church. Humphreys said the denomination is “keeping a close eye on what’s happening in New York” because many of its congregations meet in public schools across the country.
Alliance Defense Fund (ADF) senior counsel Jordan Lorence told members of the media that New York City’s policy has been in place for 30-40 years, but that a 2002 federal injunction against The Bronx Household of Faith put other houses of worship at risk. (In that case, Bronx Household of Faith was represented by ADF.)
“It’s not required for the school district to keep it. They can get rid of the policy,” he said. “The mayor can do that. The state legislature can do that.”
“Of the largest 50 school districts in the country in terms of student population, only New York City has a policy banning worship services on the weekends or weeknights in the public schools,” said Lorence.
UrbanFaith asked Lorence if the New York City policy has the potential to spread to other municipalities. He said that although legal precedent should prevent similar policies from being enacted in other municipalities, “this does have the potential to be a problem elsewhere.”
“These policies were more frequent and common 30 years ago. A series of lawsuits, some of them going to the Supreme Court, have struck all of these down, or they’ve just been repealed because school districts say, ‘It just doesn’t make any sense,” said Lorence.
He described New York City as “the last stronghold of this extreme view of separation of church and state, that the govenment has to basically drive out private religious speakers that are clearly not state sponsored, in order to show that they’re neutral towards religion.”
After the press conference, the protesters marched around the block to the city’s bi-weekly council meeting to urge members to overturn the school worship ban.
What do you think?
Is the New York City worship ban a violation of the civil rights of religious citizens?
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration that took place at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center in Newark Thursday night was not only a celebration of the civil rights leader, but a worship service led by two dynamic gospel music stars and a highly accomplished pastor. Three extraordinary women were also honored for following in King’s footsteps and changing their communities for the better.
Richard Smallwood: ‘Anybody Can Serve’
Richard Smallwood
Gospel Music Hall of Fame artist Richard Smallwood told UrbanFaith that Dr. King was “a prime example” of someone who devoted his life to the service and blessing of others.
Noting King’s statement that “everybody can be great… because anybody can serve,” Smallwood said, “It’s not about your name in lights …or how many houses you have, how many cars you have, but who are you helping, where you are making a difference? That part of him always gets my heart.”
Smallwood grew up with at least one intimate model of selflessness, in the person of his mother. She died in 2005, but encouraged her only child to study classical music and worked overtime so he could attend Howard University.
“She really was my biggest cheerleader. So it was very difficult when she transitioned,” said Smallwood, who didn’t write music for four years after she died.
In 2004, Smallwood completed a Master of Divinity degree at Howard out of a sense of calling from God.
“People said, ‘We know you’re going to preach.’ And I’m like, ‘No, no, no, no, no, no! I don’t want to do that.’ It finally got to the point where I knew that that was a part of my calling. It was something I was going to have to do, because it was what I was born to do,” said Smallwood.
“I was nervous because I was like, ‘Okay, I’ve been in music all my life. I’m going to have to do papers, and a lot of reading, and stuff like that. It wasn’t easy, but it was a joy, because I had to do a lot of stuff in hotel rooms when I was traveling, in airports, writing papers and sending them back home to my professors. But it was a great experience,” the ordained Baptist minister explained.
Like King, who said he didn’t want to be remembered for his awards, but for his life of service, Smallwood wants to be remembered for the gifts he has bestowed on others.
“My prayer has always been that my music is what people will remember a long, long, long time after I’m gone … because I’ve seen how God can use gifts and really make a difference in people’s lives.”
Tye Tribbett: ‘Stand Up and Make a Change’
Tye Tribbett
Gospel artist Tye Tribbett grew up in Camden, New Jersey, where he said he led a “very sheltered” life as the son of strict Apostolic Pentecostal pastors. Even so, he couldn’t help but see the rougher side of life in his city.
“Some of the stereotypes that are on Camden, we have to take the blame. We caused a lot of [people] to have that perspective on us. But a lot of us now are also taking the initiative to turn that whole thing around,” said Tribbett.
“I think that’s what Martin Luther King’s birthday is all about: somebody being frustrated enough to stand up and make a change, and voice that we don’t have to stay this way. We don’t have to. I think that’s what Martin Luther King did against all odds. He stood up, not only felt it, not only thought it, but spoke it,” he added.
Six months ago, Tribbett and his wife Shante′ started The Word on the Street, a Bible study that meets at a public school in Camden. Three hundred people gather, Tribbett said, with a vision for turning the city around.
“We’re right in line with the dream that [King] had years ago,” said Tribbett.
“It’s not the normal Bible study,” he explained. “We’re taking a different approach, a fresh approach, because I believe right information creates right believing, and right believing creates right living. Or better, better information, better believing, better living.”
Tribbett knows something about the power of belief. After a particularly challenging time in his marriage that was brought on by his infidelity, he battled suicidal thoughts.
“I felt very guilty and ashamed, so when I started feeling and sensing voices, quote unquote, of suicide, it actually scared me. So I ran to the shelter of mentors,” said Tribbett.
He confessed his suicidal thoughts to them and said there were times when they didn’t leave him alone.
“A lot of young people today who are committing suicide because of bullying and all that kind of crazy stuff, I don’t think they have mentors,” said Tribbett. “I don’t think we have leadership. I don’t think we’re accountable to anybody, so we’re left to our own thoughts, and we’re left to whatever we feel. So I think it’s wise for young people, and older people, just to find somebody to be accountable to, to submit under somebody so they can bring you in when you’re way out there.”
