Sunday, August 26, 2012

The Truth About Obama and Welfare Reform

The old line is that there's a simple way to know a politician is lying: His lips are moving. Odds are good that any lurid charge leveled against a candidate is largely fraudulent. So it was no surprise that when Mitt Romney accused Barack Obama of gutting welfare work requirements, fact checkers said his trousers were conspicuously aflame.

They have a point. Romney claims that under the new Obama policy, "You wouldn't have to work... They just send you your welfare check." In fact, no such changes have been made. As written, the policy merely gives states more leeway in their enforcement of work rules, subject to federal approval.
But -- and I know this will come as a surprise -- the Romney camp also has a point. If the revision wouldn't single-handedly cripple the work requirement, it "has opened the door to changes in welfare reform that could destroy it from within." So concludes New York University political scientist Lawrence Mead, one of the experts whose research paved the way for the "workfare" law passed in 1996.
He's not alone. Romney's critics cite Brookings Institution analyst Ron Haskins, who as a Republican committee aide helped draft the historic welfare reform measure -- and who favors granting states more latitude. But he also told The Fiscal Times that if the administration "wanted to undermine the work requirement," the new policy "is a way to do it."

Read more: http://townhall.com/columnists/stevechapman/2012/08/26/the_truth_about_obama_and_welfare_reform

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