Rich Lowry, National Review's Clown-In-Chief

A few weeks (or maybe days? or was that months? I can't tell anymore) this blog went knocked National Review writer Kate O'Brien for her ridiculous and lazy column blasting Edwards' concern about poverty. Having the arguments of one of its dimmer foot-soldiers so thoroughly destroyed by the mighty B of P, it appears that the National Review has sent deployed its Editor, Richard Lowry against Edwards. However, despite the fact that Lowry is the editor of the post prestigious conservative magazine in America, his essay turns out to be nothing but erudite foolishness. Just like O'Brien, he uses a flawed study from the Heritage foundation to attack the Democrats' remarks about poverty. He then criticizes them for not putting forward a real program to fight poverty. In this vein, Rich Lowry complains:

Indeed, Democrats on the stump implicitly argue that if only more former Enron executives would be thrown in jail, the downtrodden would magically be lifted into affluence.

Lowry also praises Bush's "serious" anti-poverty agenda. According to Lowry :

As for marriage, the entire welfare system acts as a subsidy for single parenthood. With his proposal for marriage education and increased funding for abstinence programs, Bush wants to put a little government pressure on the other side of the scale.

There are a few problem with this assessment. In the first place, even if the conservatives are right about the importance of marriage, Bush's marriage education program is only aimed at already married couples, so the many millions of unmarried poor people are out of luck and the program is probably nothing but a cynical politcal ploy similar to the President's crusade against athletic supplements. "Abstience Education", by which Lowry means abstince only education, just plain doesn't work. So, basically Bush's plan is to done nothing, but appear "compassionate" and you know, have a lot of photos take off him standing next to "at-risk" Americans.

John Edwards (and some other Democratic candidates, such as Joe Lieberman), actually do a have anti-poverty plans of their own. Yes, real life poverty fighting plans that Lowry didn't even bother to mention. Eh, how about that Rich? Why not do a little goddamn research? Hell, I wouldn't be this bothered if he even game the proposals a very critical look, but the fact that he didn't shows that he is either a buffoon, has no respect for the reading public, or possibly both. Edwards plan, while far from revolutionary, is filled with good ideas. From exanding the Earned Income Tax Credit for working families to forcing fathers to take more financial responsibility for their children and eliminating the marriage penalty for the poor. So, it appears that Edwards is really more serious about personal responsibility and family stability that George W. Bush, since he takes the trouble to offer a real plan rather than just a cheap sop to religious conservatives. It appears that even the Best and Brightest of the conservitive punditocracy, such as Richard Lowry, are nothing but nonsensemongers of the first order. Next time, Rich, do better.