It's aparently Poverty in America Awareness Month in the Catholic Church. The Seattle Archdiocese paper has
an editorial dealing with poverty in general, and social security specifically. I thought the social security bits were interesting in light of how there is no crisis.
Poverty is misunderstood by those out of touch. One wonders, at times, how in touch national leaders may be.
Vice President Cheney took the opportunity during a presentation to a carefully selected audience at The Catholic University of America last week to speak in favor of the administration's plan to change Social Security. The change could, he said, yield greater retirement benefits for those who invest in the stock market.
Without getting into economics, this seems out of touch, even when $40 million is spent on inauguration celebrations in a city streets whose streets are ordinarily home to hundreds of people who bed down each night on subway grates.
This stock broker was poor; the investment analyst was poor.....
Social Security, of all things secular, seems to approach most closely the Christian understanding of community. The strong are made responsible for the weak -- even if by statute
Barbara B. Kennelly, head of the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare, said that deconstructing this 70-year old plan would be "to take Americans out of the community pool where we share the risk, and put each of us into our own pool of one to fend for ourselves. That's fine if you're rich."
Historically, CCHD's strategy has been to help low-income Americans gain political and economic power.
An admirable goal, particularly if everyone is to fend for themselves