The Romney Campaign Goes Old School — Here Come the Welfare Queens!
One of the signature dishonest (of many) tales told by Ronald Reagan was one of some Chicago woman who was able to put together enough fraudulent participation in enough government programs to net more than $100K per year. Even as Reagan never named this woman and no one could find a public record of anyone who was that productive in getting government assistance. Certainly no one who was caught and tried for the fraud that this would have represented. This exaggerated tale was often repeated, never substantiated but it did its job — tap into existing resentments and stereotypes of welfare cheats — even though the typical welfare recipient never looked the way the stereotype had it. It was more dogwhistle politics from the ultimate dogwhistler — one who kicked off his campaign at the Neshoba County State Fair (county where Schwerner, Chaney and Goodman were murdered), calling for a reinstatement of “state’s rights”. This was,of course, a coded message promising these folks to roll back the rights the Feds were giving to minorities. And now that he is cornered on the issue of his tax releases, Mitt Romney has decided that the Gipper’s dogwhistles can work for him too.
Romney’s campaign has released an ad that claims that the Obama Administration is fundamentally changing the welfare program (actually it is called TANF now) to eliminate the work requirement of the program. This is a false claim, of course:
The claim that the administration’s changes amount to an “end” to welfare aren’t new — they popped up in July when they were first announced. But they are especially misleading given that the move by the Department of Health and Human Services came in response to requests from at least two Republican governors in Utah and Nevada, who complained paperwork requirements and narrow participation metrics were hampering their ability find recipients work. This had been a complaint from Republican-led states in the past: Romney himself signed a letter with 28 other Republican governors in 2005 requesting Congress grant waivers to allow more flexibility in administering the program.
Did you get that? A couple of GOP governors asked for some flexibility in reaching their TANF goals and Mitt Romney — Supersonic Lying Machine — spins this up to feed into the right-wing narrative that somehow President Black Man is raking money from hard working white people to send to the lazy homeboys and homegirls. Romney is even working at getting Bill Clinton and Newt Gingrich into the act, trying to pretend that the effort to provide these Governors with some additional flexibility on this program somehow makes Obama the Liberalist President Ever.
We’re supposed to forget that Romney asked for a similar waiver when he was Governor of Massachusetts, even though we are not supposed to talk about those days. But did you catch that Romney’s TANF program gave free and/or subsidized cars to some TANF participants? Cost them $1M over three years.
So what does it say about the Romney campaign that they are reduced to Lee Atwater’s old playbook? For folks who were highly confident that all they had to do was point to the economy to win their way to the White House, this move looks alot like flop sweat to me.
Tags: Mitt Romney
It bears pointing out that Romney’s Father is probably rolling over in his grave. George Romney endured quite a bit of political pressure for refusing to support Goldwater due to his civil rights stance.
I can’t wait until Mitt suggests that Obama was born in Kenya. George was born in Mexico.
And this is different from Reid saying that Romney hasnt paid any income taxes with only a ‘heard from a realiable source’ how?
“So what does it say about the Romney campaign that they are reduced to Lee Atwater’s old playbook?”
That they are desperate.
And why wouldn’t they be? They can’t talk about anything. Romney’s business experience at Bain? Nope, can’t talk about that. Olympics? That seems to off the table. Economic policy? Nope. And on and on.
And now his campaign is citing Romneycare:
Conservative heads are exploding. Oh yeah, Team Romney is a desperate mess.
Give it a few hours and we’ll see Romney flip-flop again. This man stands for nothing.
“And this is different from Reid saying that Romney hasnt paid any income taxes with only a ‘heard from a realiable source’ how?”
One is potentially provable, the other is a straight-up lie with a racist
overtoneleitmotif.Neshoba County State Fair? Which was it, county or state?
hey puck, I dont see the racial overtone at all. And besides, I believe more white are on welfare than any other race. WHy do you have to interject race into the message? Do you feel that you must hide your racial feelings?
@Dan — Neshoba County, MS Fair
Cassandra, I would be very careful knocking the gipper, he only helped free hundreds of millions of oppressed people after the colapse of communism. The gipper may have told a tall tale or two, (starwars had the russions shaking in their boots). Ronald reagan started expousing his anti communist views in 1946, when gorbi was 10. So if you think those hundreds of millions of people that were freed care about your chicago story, you are dead wrong. And if you dont believe me will ship your ass down to cuba and see how you like loosing all your freedoms
Actually he didn’t. He worked at outspending the Soviets until they cried uncle, damn near bankrupting us all. But then, isn’t it interesting that you have to go halfway around the would to find Communists that Reagan helped. Not the Americans here that he wanted to re-relegate to second class citizenship.
And if anybody’s ass gets shipped to Cuba it will be yours. If anything because you’re a proven idiot and you’ll believe whatever Fox news tells you. Scratch that — even the Cubans won’t have you.
“(Republicans)…who complained paperwork requirements and narrow participation metrics were hampering their ability find recipients work.” This is so true. The Gingrich planks embedded in the TANF programs force the participants into a cyclical pattern, where those trying to find employment, unfortunately have to jump through so many hoops to keep from having their benefits cut off, they don’t have time to get a job.
It is wise to notice that both states are in the middle of those areas hit hardest by the housing bubble collapse, without which, there was not much with which to employee people….
The wisdom behind this decision will eventually come out, long after the triteness of politics have subsided. It was the correct action required and Obama did it, probably fully knowing that it set him up as being soft on welfare-ism.
We all know what any Republican would have done were they president at this time.. Blamed the Katrina-like effects on those who lived there….
Democrats should be damn spankin’ proud of this man.
I spent a good portion of last Thursday morning researching welfare facts because I was sick of my Facebook friends sharing those snarky little ecards and such about welfare. Here are some of the facts I found:
1) Reagan’s welfare queen didn’t exist. There is some possibility that she was based on a real woman, but he greatly exaggerated her abuses.
2) You have a maximum of 2 years on welfare to find a job, or risk losing benefits.
3) Over 80% of everyone who receives welfare is on it for 5 years or less.
3) The average welfare payment for a family of four is $900 per month. The average food stamp payment for a family of four is $500 per month.
4) Roughly the same number of blacks and whites are on welfare.
5) The largest single group that receives welfare benefits in the U.S. is children.