15 Shocking US Poverty Statistics!

As hard as it may be to believe, I have voted the 3rd party candidate EVERY year of my adult life, until a little train wreck called the Bush Administration came along.

At that point I saw the light. We have 2 parties to choose from. One is 100% evil, and the other is 90% evil.

I will no longer waste a vote on a third party fantasy.

The game is rigged - pick a side.

It matters because the article is actually full of FACTS that are indisputable, but many people here do not want to acknowledge what does not conform to their current beliefs.

Fortysix percent of all poor households actually own their own homes. The average home owned by persons classified as poor by the Census Bureau is a threebedroom house with oneandahalf baths, a garage, and a porch or patio.
Seventysix percent of poor households have air conditioning. By contrast, 30 years ago, only 36 percent of the entire U.S. population enjoyed air conditioning.
Only 6 percent of poor households are overcrowded. More than twothirds have more than two rooms per person.
The average poor American has more living space than the average individual living in Paris, London, Vienna, Athens, and other cities throughout Europe. (These comparisons are to the average citizens in foreign countries, not to those classified as poor.)
Nearly threequarters of poor households own a car; 30 percent own two or more cars.
Ninetyseven percent of poor households have a color television; over half own two or more color televisions.
Seventyeight percent have a VCR or DVD player; 62 percent have cable or satellite TV reception.
Seventythree percent own microwave ovens, more than half have a stereo, and a third have an automatic dishwasher.

Another fact that may surprise you, is I think MSNBC is also bullshit.

I would LOVE MSNBC to be AS PRO Obama as Fox is ANTI Obama, but that is not the case.

People like to be angry, so when the D's are in power, Fox does very well.

MSNBC is now almost leaning a bit right themselves, because if the power in Washington shifts, so will their bad ratings.

People do not tune in for good news.

Looks like Cut and Paste time on GFY. I want to play too!

You make $12k a year, rent a crappy apartment, drive a clunker, and yet our "media" would have us believe that "your" main concerns are :

1. selection of judges
2. whether a woman you never met has a feeding tube re-inserted
3. making sure that only "super-rich" people can still file bankruptcy
4. making sure that super-rich people can hold their family "booty" untaxed for generation after generation
5. making sure that public schools get little, if any federal funding
6. making sure that only rich people can use the judicial system when they are injured or defrauded
7. making sure that no woman has any reproductive choice
8. making sure that your employer has easy access to off-shoring YOUR job if he cannot get you to work for less
9. making sure that insurance companies are "well taken care of", even if it means that YOU cannot afford medical insurance
10. making sure that oil wells go into the Arctic reserve, even though it's a "drop in the bucket" that will probably end up in Japan..TEN years from now.
11. pushing for private accounts for social security, even though ALL reliable experts say this is a recipe for DISASTER
12. making sure that God is EVERYWHERE..in courthouses, schools, TV, radio..
13. making sure that gay people can never marry
14. making sure that "our borders" are "mexican-free zones"

It simply amazes me how such uneducated people are "experts" on tort reform, and energy and taxes, and social security, by virtue of regurgitating talking points.

I have to hope that in their day-to-day lives, these people are really thinking about.. :

1. How much Kraft mac 'n cheese will $5 food stamps buy?
2. How can I pay $125 a week daycare on a take home check of $220
3. Why does my crappy apartment cost so damned much?
4. How will I pay a $400 repair bill on a car that's worth $800?
5. Just how high of a fever does the baby have to have, before I break the budget and take him to a doctor?
6. At $2.75 a gallon, how many days will I have to hitch a ride to work?
7. How many part-time jobs are "enough"..2? 3?..
8. When you work 2-3 jobs, and pay for childcare, when do you have "family-time"?
9. How can MY values be instilled in my kids when they never see me?
10. How can a marriage survive when both parents work all the time, and never have any quality time together or with the family?
11. How can Grandma afford to stay in her paid-for home, since the nursing home wants to confiscate it for grandpa's care?

Cut and paste arguments are fun.

Greed Money Power
Both Sides
Good Day

Add: No compassion.

No shit... we are in a recession right now.

Great post!

But why does she have money and a cat toy?

http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/pover.../thresh09.html

Just how I always imagined you'd be.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_EBvgXNGTOI



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZAfoCX2hbio



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrgbJV0ppRE

Bruja, just because you're not concerned about those things, doesn't mean the intelligent segment of the population isn't.

The truth always has Liberal tendencies...

nah, liberals jerk each other off to create a consensus that reality doesn't provide.

WTF? Was that a Mad Lib gone wrong?

99% of the time people are poor because they choose to be.

You chose to be "Sausage" - what does that tell us?

I don't think any one side is any better than the other.

I think problem is instead putting the right guy into the election, they are putting the "winner" in - and the winner of what's become a popularity contest isn't the right person to become President. It's no longer about doing the right thing, it's about beating the other side.

And once either party gets into office, it's more of that same mentality. Don't vote for what's right, vote to beat the other side.

The whole fucking system is total bullshit, but I still believe, personally, that the D's are less evil than the R's.

On GFY however, people generally just read what they want. Each side talks past the other, so in the end all we ever achieve is a political impasse.... like the government itself!

Jobs aint coming back. Corporations are having banner years with less scared shitless people working double time. The right puts on a show but they know nothing they are going to do is going to do shit because you can give the biggest tax break in the world and it aint going to bring jobs back. When the Chinese are making iphones for .30 cents an hour. Cheap overseas labor serves two purposes big profits and cheap goods so people think they are doing ok on 47 k a year when their wages have been flat forever. When Reagan killed the unions he started the fall of the middle class.

So you have a problem with the NY Times hit piece but not George Soros and his band of unknown European progressive contributors funding projects like Center for American Progress, Open Society Institute, Media Matters and Air America? Somewhat hypocritical for someone that claims to only hate Democrats 90%.

Yeah, because George Soros is the moral equivalent to the Koch brothers and Dick Armey.

</sarcasm>

I knew you couldn't and wouldn't give a real answer to the question...that 10% hate difference sure is a stubborn one.

You wouldn't be happy with ANY answer I gave you. Sorros doesn't hide his involvement in his interests, but the Koch brothers certainly do.

In addition, the Sorros agenda is progressive and worthwhile - the Koch agenda is pro-pollution, and driven entirely out of greed.

There is no comparison.

The Tea Party is NOT a grassroots movement for the betterment of America. It is a funded movement against Obama. If you think it is anything else, then you simply choose to ignore the facts.

How predictible... people jumping on dems vs rep side.

Right and left aren't republicans and democrats anymore... it has evolved into an uncontrolable beast.