Poverty in America

After a 'friendly' discussion with my soon-to-be mother-in-law, I needed to post about this. She is an ultra-liberal, while I am, of course, quite the conservative. My main contention was that poverty was being overblown by manipulating statistics by the left; there were other much more pressing concerns. In my mind, oil should come first. Nothing else needs to get done until these idiots in Washington lift drilling bans offshore, in Alaska, in the Rockies, and start turning coal into oil.

Here's why I think that:

1. Of those defined as poor by the census, 89% had enough food to eat throughout the year and only 2% had regular bouts with hunger.
2. 96% of poor households avoided utility shut off and 99% avoided eviction.
3. Did you know that 55% of POOR households own 2 or more TVs. And 63% have cable or satellite. 25% own a big screen TV. If that many of them are spending money on these LUXURIES then they don't need the governments attention.
(stats pulled from Glenn Beck's An Inconvenient Book)

Now you must be thinking I am some sort of callous bastard who sticks his nose up at poor people. Not true. My plan for oil will help poor people immensely. Right now, the cost of EVERYTHING is skyrocketing (3.69/gallon of milk?!?!) because of oil prices. And without the serious threat of us becoming more independent, those gas prices are not going anywhere but up. If the cost of everything continues to rise, then the poverty rate will rise with it as well. The poverty line right now is at $9,979 and if common goods such as milk start costing $5/gallon and upwards, then we are pricing more and more Americans out of these goods.

My last point/dig at liberals is if you look at the cities with the highest poverty rates in America, most have been run by non-republicans since 1965:

Cleveland is #1 on this list with 32.4% poverty rate and there has been a Republican Mayor just 38% of the time since 1965. In fact, of the worst 11 cities with regards to poverty, 8 have not had a SINGLE REPUBLICAN MAYOR since '65. Food for thought.