Poor Families Likely to Lose as Congress Debates Reauthorization of Welfare Reform Act

Interview with Debbie Weinstein, Children's Defense Fund conducted by Melinda Tuhus.

The 1996 federal welfare reform law ended 60 years of "welfare as we knew it." It created a five-year lifetime limit on support to poor families and gave the states a lot of leeway to design programs and establish income levels.Five years after the legislation was signed into law by President Clinton, the number of people on welfare in the U.S. has dropped by half.

Advocates for the poor say the law has pushed women into low-wage, dead-end jobs, many without adequate day care for their young children or health care. And while supporters of the law claim the 50 percent drop in caseloads is proof that reform is working, critics counter that these statistics prove only that the law is effective at cutting people from the welfare rolls.

The welfare reform law, set to expire on Sept. 30, was scheduled for reauthorization this year, but President Bush signed a stop-gap measure to continue funding through Dec. 30. Meanwhile, the House has passed a bill that requires women on welfare to work a minimum of 40 hours a week to receive benefits while providing minimal child-care and negligible funds for training. The Senate is working on its own less severe version, which mandates a 30-hour a week work requirement, counts education toward work hours and provides more funds for child care.

Between The Lines' Melinda Tuhus spoke with Debbie Weinstein, director of the Family Income division with the Childrens' Defense Fund, about the critical issues facing poor families and changes to welfare legislation her group is advocating.

Contact the Fund by calling (202) 628-8787 or visit their Web site at: www.childrensdefense.org

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yet another wonderful example of how the Right is Right and the Left is wrong.

Even the Clinton administration had to admit that this Act was a bigger success than they could have imagined.

Welfare is harmful to working people. It promotes the break up of families, which leads to more crime and poverty.

The biggest issues facing African Americans today are crime, education and the break down of the family.

Republicans are offering the policies that will help -- tough law enforcement programs, school choice and ending the government subsidy of single parenthood.

The Left stands in the way of this, seeking to undermine law enforcement, opposing school choice to protect ineffective Union/Government jobs, and paying people to have children out of wedlock.

Its enough to make one upchuck.

If the Left is so wrong how come the entire economy goes into a nosedive and we are on the brink of WW3 every single time the Republicans have power?

Well, could it be that every time the Democrats are in power they stick their heads in the sand, ignore or appease any problem and pass the buck? Or even collude with despots for their own enrichment (Clinton China) Could it be that be opposing these problems you end them? Ronald Reagan deserves a Peace Prize, not Jimmy Carter. And about 300 million or more people living in the former Warsaw Pact would agree with me.

Ronald McDonald Reagan deserves a firing squad

And the right still can't manage the economy any better than your average chimpanzee

Also there is a large difference between opposing problems and creating them

And Bush and Clinton do the exact same things when it comes to war etc .. Clinton had Bosnia etc, the Dems are just slicker with PR, the Republicans are just generally incompetent on all fronts (no more or less evil, just crappier at hiding it)

Ronald Reagan ended the cold war. So say our opponents in that conflict. He did so by taking the bull by the horns and engaging him, not by slinking away and compromising. So just say thank you to the man, and get on with your sissy-ass whining. Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and others prefer to take polls and promises and sign treaties that will guarantee peace in our time. Oops, the North Koreans had their fingers crossed, Jimmy. Idiot. Oh, I guess it's time to really really give them a talking to. The Democrats are pitiful at foreign policy, thinking always of their political lives here first.

You show an enormous misunderstanding of history and a great degree of fantasizing about powerful but inept men.

The Soviet Union didn't collapse because of Reagan - this is almost laughable that you would even suggest it. The Soviet Union collapsed because of widespread dissidence particularly in the satellite nations, following the failures in Afghanistan. If you want to give anyone credit for it, it would have to go mainly to the Afghans and East Germans.

I'm almost cracking up imaging runty little Reagan out there wrestling down the entire Soviet Army with his bare hands. You're a politically challenged joke, my friend.

So, you want to give credit for the Soviet Empire collapsing to the Afghans? Would these be the same Afghans that you insist shouldn't have been armed by this runt of a former president? You're talking out of both sides of your face again, kiddo.

I'm not speculating on whether the collapse of the Soviet Union was a good thing or not. But the Afghans should not have been armed, obviously.

It still doesn't change the fact that credit goes to them. You don't say that arms manufacturers are to be given credit for winning WW2, that goes to soldiers. Likewise regardless of where they got the weapons the fact is it was the Afghans who actually did the deed - not Runty.

Who's talking out of both sides of their face now, simpleton?

So, you don't think the collapse of the Soviet Union was a good thing? Why don't you ask a Pole or an East German, or a Hungarian, or a Czech, or a bunch of other East Europeans if they think it was a good thing that your beloved worker's paradise collapsed. Oh, and while your at it, ask them whom they credit with the end of the cold war. You'll hear Reagan's name.

You admit it was a result of the policies of Ronald Reagan that the Afghans were armed. If they had remained unarmed they would not have been capable of resisting effectively. This resistance, you also insist, was instrumental in the collapse of the Soviet Union. Ergo Reagan is responsible for the collapse of the Soviet Union. I knew you would say it eventually. Don't you feel better now?

how stretched your analogy. It was the policies of the Afghan people, not Reagan. They could have purchased weapons elsewhere. Reagan was just a salesman. So much for wrestling bulls.

And btw, it appears you don't know too many former Soviet residents. They mostly feel hard done by under capitalism. Go read Pravda some time. A little self education wouldn't hurt, you know. You won't melt.

also I said clearly (that is for those who are at least semi-literate) that I wasn't speculating whether the collapse was good or bad. Only a true moron would take this to mean I supported it and thought it was a "worker's paradise" - thankyou for making your lack of comprehensional reading skills 100% evident, I will endeavour to bring you up to a grade 4 level over the next little while. If it can be done.

No, what you said is that you wouldn't opine on whether the collapse of the Soviet Union was a good thing or not. I will. It was a very good thing. I have known many Russian people. The ones I know have moved here and are pursuing the American dream. I have known a good number of former East Germans and Poles and a couple of Serbs. Same story. All would be happy to tell you about life under Socialism.

And the United States didn't sell weapons to the Afghans. We gave them to them. This is because they didn't have any money. They are a dirt-poor country. Nobody else was going to give away sophisticated military hardware like the Stinger missile system to non-paying customers. Only us. And only because of the policies of Ronald Reagan. Without American arms your heroic Afghans would have been stamped out like so many sand fleas.

You wanna buy a USS Ronald Reagan cap? It's cool.

...SheMex you lowlife patronizing FUCK...unless you happen to be an African-American, which I somehow think is unlikely, then you would be the last fuckin person on earth to talk about issues facing African-Americans...

...y'know, I gotta bird that says senseless shit all the time, but, hey, he's just a fuckin' bird repeating what he hears...

...what's your excuse?