We must think about Pro-Child policies across all issues.
One thing that my policy will always stand against is those “reforms” put forth by conservatives that put the financial screws to poorer families in supposed hope that economic stress will “encourage” parents to make better choices for their kids’ futures, like cutting school lunch or breakfast programs on the logic that parents will provide better food for their kids if the kids are made to go hungry otherwise.
Crossing our fingers in hopes that financial stress will force parents to make better life-choices for their kids is an immoral risk of children’s well-being. Rolling the dice on an economic theory that has often resulted in the poor getting poorer, sicker, and worse education, as well as yawning economic inequality, is just wrong for our kids.
Freya’s a Lucky Girl!
I’ve been meaning to write this blog post for almost a month now. However, just five weeks ago, the most wonderful blessing dropped into an already full pair of lives. My wife & I had a baby girl: Freya! Having a new baby while both parents still have to keep up full work/school schedules is a challenge. But in the only major country in the world without laws that require paid parental leave, it is the only choice for most Americans, and so it is for us, too.
Becoming a father is the greatest thing that’s ever happened to me (well, tied with meeting Jasmine, my wife). It’s only made me more committed to doing what’s right for the Texans of tomorrow, like Freya, and millions of little ones like her. The moral compass that guides me in figuring out what’s right has come into focus more clearly now than ever. It really crystallized Friday when, after getting home from work, I was taking care of Freya while her mom was out grocery shopping. I took her for a walk to the park across the street from our apartment.
It’s wonderful to have a park across the street from us, and it’s just one way in which Freya is fortunate; she never did anything to “earn” the benefit of growing up next to a park. Nor did the other kids who play on its jungle-gym and develop their sports skills on its equipment.
In Texas, kids’ lives shouldn’t be bad (or good) based on the luck of circumstances they're born into.
While Freya and other kids in our neighborhood are living this good life, not all children in Lubbock, in the Texas 19th District, or in America are so lucky. For many, the best place to play in their neighborhood may be the weedy, vacant lots that are found all over Lubbock and other cites and towns where the stagnation of some neighborhoods is cheek-by-jowl with fancy new neighborhoods in highly uneven patterns.
But those kids who don’t have a park, or the other kinds of good fortune Freya has, have done nothing to deserve their poor fortune.
The logic of a Pro-Child Platform comes straight from the basic value that all people are created equal. We Americans have enshrined Equality in all our most important statements of our values: from the Declaration of Independence to the 14th Amendment of the Constitution, to the Civil & Voting Rights Acts, and the aspirational goals of FDR’s New Deal and Lyndon Johnson’s War on Poverty. Whatever good things some children have that enable healthy growth, safe childhoods, and the education needed to have a fair shot at the American Dream, every child ought to have access to those ingredients of the good life, and deserves them as much as any child born into privilege.
A Compass for Decisions: Judging Policies by their Results for Kids
Every policy affects children, and every policy should be evaluated by how it will affect this vulnerable and innocent population. My Pro-Child Platform would look at housing policy, for example, and ask “how can we help those kids whose parents don’t have good jobs or a lot of money get into decent housing?” And perhaps even more importantly, “what policy changes might threaten those kids’ opportunity to live in a decent place”? Maybe the way to go in housing policy is to expand access to Section 8 vouchers, or maybe to raise the value of such vouchers in more expensive areas so they can help families afford better quality housing. Or maybe the answer is to streamline the bureaucracy of the Section 8 program and make eligibility more stable, so that it becomes more convenient for landlords to accept such vouchers, and those who own nice apartments are more enthusiastic about having tenants who pay with such vouchers. Or maybe the answer is something else entirely, like requiring construction of affordable housing to counterbalance the $800k homes that go up in a place like Lubbock. Whatever the specifics, we’ve got to think first of the kids in circumstances where decent housing can’t be taken for granted.
My opponent, Republican Jodey Arrington take a different approach to policy. He wants tougher work requirements for the receipt of Medicaid and SNAP food benefits, and voted for a bill that would convert Medicaid benefits to a “block grant” and then cut them by $834 billion over time. Such policies will lead to families with children getting less help buying food and affording medical care—kicking almost ten thousands kids off of coverage in our district alone! This hurts those kids’ chances to grow up healthy and safe, and robbing them of a fair shot at the American dream. However he or anybody else might judge people who stay home with their kids rather than joining the rat-race (especially if the parents’ education makes it hard for them to find a good-paying job), a policy that has the by-product of punishing children is immoral.
A Pro-Child education policy is obvious, too. Today, with such low levels of funding for public education coming from the federal government, the main factor in whether kids get to go to a good school with good teachers (or not) is how wealthy the neighborhood they live in is. I believe that education is a key place where policy needs to be directed at evening out the imbalances between rich & poor areas. Every child in America should get the chance to go to a high-quality school, starting with free, universal Pre-K. And higher education--be it an Associate’s or a BA, Med School or vocational training to help build America--should be available at a reasonable price and without onerous debt.
A Pro-Child Position for any Policy Area
Even issue areas like Climate Change, Veterans’ Affairs, and Foreign Policy can all be guided by the same compass. What Climate policy will make sure all tomorrow’s Texans have clean water and a safe landscape (not one taken over by rising sea-levels!) to live in?
What policies for Veterans’ benefits will make sure the children of veterans are protected and have a great family life, even if their parents were injured during their service, or their sacrifice resulted in Traumatic Brain Injuries or other mental health issues that made an Honorable Discharge hard to achieve?
What foreign policies will lead to a safer, more stable world, where local governments in other regions can handle instability, and see America as a helpful friend. When our nation is viewed that way, rather than as a vengeful force committed to policing the whole world in defense of wounded pride, today’s kids will have a better world to grow up in. Such policies will ensure today’s children and tomorrow’s Texans will be called upon to put themselves in harm’s way less frequently in the future than over the past generation.
West Texas needs a voice in Congress that is not just looking for narrow advantages for certain stakeholders, or greedily eyeing opportunities to cut spending and give big tax cuts to the wealthy.
Trickle-down economic theories have been tried in Texas for a generation, and have resulted in more and more kids growing up in poverty. Here in our district, almost a quarter of kids under five are in poverty. And over a third of families with a single mom and kids are below the poverty line.
Policies that produce this kind of inequality is not what West Texas values are about, but our current Congressman claims that it is. Please help send a message that we need a Pro-Child Platform for Texas, and across America, by supporting my campaign to get him out of office.