I feel the need to give space to some ridiculous rumors about the Global Poverty Act that are circulating in blog-land. Someone even brought this subject up as a comment here, but since "anonymous" referred to the legislation by the wrong name and gave no specifics, I didn't know what they were talking about at the time.
So there's this blogger-dude Cliff Kincaid that took it upon himself to write a post on Valentine's Day for a site called "Accuracy in Media." His post was, shall we say...inaccurate at best. I'm not even gonna get into the main accusations he made about Obama being a socialist (which he's not). This is the Anti-Poverty Blog, so let's focus on the anti-poverty parts. He said:
" an Obama bill, "The Global Poverty Act," has just been rushed through the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, with the assistance of Democratic Senator Joe Biden, the chairman, and Republican Senator Richard Lugar. The legislation (S.2433) commits the U.S. to spending hundreds of billions of dollars more in foreign aid on the rest of the world, in order to comply with the "Millennium Goals" established by the United Nations. Conservative members of the committee were largely caught off-guard by the move to pass the Obama bill but are putting a "hold" on it, in order to try to prevent the legislation, which also quickly passed the House, from being quickly brought up for a full Senate vote. But observers think that Senate Democrats may try to pass it quickly anyway, in order to give Obama a precious legislative "victory" that he could run on. "
WHAT?!?! Has Kincaid ever heard of govtrack.us? This is not what S.2433 is about.
The Global Poverty Act has no funding provisions in it. It neither authorizes nor obligates the federal government to spending new money. It is a vehicle for us to make it US law to promote (not pay for) 3 things: reduction of poverty, elimination of extreme poverty and the achievement of the MDG's. Through it's requirements for the President to develop strategies for this and report back to congress, it commits our government to efficiency, consistency, and coherence in our efforts to reduce global poverty. Please see my post for Thurs, Jan 31st, 2008 for more detail or better yet, do what Kincaid failed to do and look it up "S.2433" on govtrack.us.
Now, "Obama bill"? Hardly. I am proud as an IL resident that he introduced it and is an original co-sponsor, but nine other senators are co-sponsoring it. It has support from both Republicans and Democrats; the legislation was shepherded through the House last year by Republican Congressman Spencer Bachus from Alabama.
It's one thing to take a swipe at a presidential candidate with "swiftboating" type lies and emails. It's quite another to misrepresent a piece of easily checked, poverty fighting legislation that has 10 bi-partisan co-sponsors just because one of them happens to look like he's winning an election. If Kincaid's assertions about the Global Poverty Act are this wildly off and off-putting, how accurate do we think his assertions about Obama are?
4 comments:
YOU DO NOT KNOW WHAT THE HELL YOU
ARE TALKING ABOUT WHEN IT COMES TO
GLOBAL POVERTY ACT, AMEICA GIVES
A LOT OF MONEY ALREADY, WE DO NOT
HAVE TO BE DICTATED BY UNITED NATIONS
AS TO HOW MUCH PERCENTAGE TO GIVE,
AND THERE IS LOT'S MORE IMPLICATION
THAN JUST MONEY.
GO RESEARCH AGAIN
Hi, anonymous!
The US does give quite a lot of money, but does it surprise you to know that it is only 0.17% of our national income? We were not "dictated" by the UN to give 0.7%...we agreed to it and are not standing up to our commitment. Out of 22 developed countries that agreed to give 0.7%, the US comes in dead last with no plan in place to meet it in the future. A shameful fact which no longer only is a matter of morality, charity, and social justice, but also a matter of national security. As hunger riots spike across the world, the perception of our country will become more and more important if we don't step up to do our part.
A major part of the Global Poverty Act is coordinating over 20 federal orgs that help give poverty-focused aid. This would help the considerable money we give have much more benefit as they currently sometimes work at cross purposes. Even if you do not supported an increase in aid (which is not called for in the GPA...it allocates no funds itself, just requires a strategy), ESPECIALLY if you don't support an increase, then you should be excited to streamline the process so that the money we do give is more effective.
By the way, your caps lock is stuck. Might want to check in to...hurts your credibility. And I allowed minor profanity once, but more than that will not be posted.
Thanks for participating in the debate!
Get your freaking hands off my money. I need it to fend off "my current poverty".
I wonder if this is the same "anonymous"? Either way, you failed to read the post or failed to believe it. I'll repeat the important part, "The Global Poverty Act has no funding provisions in it. It neither authorizes nor obligates the federal government to spending new money."
Also, it sounds like maybe you didn't hear the presidential debates or President Elect Obama's many stump speeches. Unless you make over $250,000 per year, your taxes will not go up. If you're making more than a quarter of a million per year, it would be surprising for you to be experiencing poverty. If that's not you, then it's pretty much already the government's money and you should be very happy that some people are fighting very hard to make sure it is effectively used to alleviate poverty instead of wasted in bureaucracy.
Lastly, this is silly for you to be getting riled up about this now because this bill is pretty much dead.
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