Media Spin and the Hidden Poverty in America

#51 by tahmed32

[i see we have smelly indians like ranjit (the man who was gloating over the death of he earthquake victims) jumping in to fling mud at pakis.]

For a change, please let go of the insults and educate us as to why you think Ranjit is wrong. You`ve become so predictable that it is amusing some times to see you resort to insults when you have no answers to the uncomfortable questions Indians ask of Pakis.

hamidm #50 ``most indian students (and some pakis)``

the hell with the indians. why are you so deferential to these ba!stards when they come here with only one agenda on their mind - to fling dirt at ``pakis``??

masadi: i see we have smelly indians like ranjit (the man who was gloating over the death of he earthquake victims) jumping in to fling mud at pakis. Now that is real poverty, imho. Now this board is really going to start stinking!!

masadi,

``I used to go to school during the day (full time), work at the college cafetria from 4 to 8pm (7 days a week) and then work at another of your fantastic food establishments from 11pm to 7am and then be back at school at 11am.``

......... i am proud of you !........ but then what happened ?........ you, of all people should know how easy it is to make a decent living in this country - the 11 million illegal mexicans and the thousands of people who line up at american embassies every day testify to that, don`t they ?

......... having said that, i am beginning to see your problem too....... most indian students (and some pakis) figure out in a week or two that working in fine food establishments which have a drive through window is not the quickest path to the american dream - we leave that to mexicans and nicaraguans who don`t speak english .......... now, if you had worked in a restaurant with valet parking you could have made a couple of hundred a night .......... even better, you could have got the federal government to subsidize your education with research grants like most of us did ......... but i take that back - we don`t want the government squandering our money on useless research on poverty and ufo`s...........

Masadi sahib

(It is impossible to smell anything amidst the reprehensible, irrelevant stench of your post that tries to reduce the whole world to an India vs Pakistan contest. With over 90% real poverty in India, I do not think you can claim any credibility pointing your (stinking) comments at anyone )

Ranjit wasn`t the first one to start throwing stones at a more expensive better made glasshouse.

Regards

#46,writes <<< Wake up and smell the coffee. >>>

It is impossible to smell anything amidst the reprehensible, irrelevant stench of your post that tries to reduce the whole world to an India vs Pakistan contest. With over 90% real poverty in India, I do not think you can claim any credibility pointing your (stinking) comments at anyone

#45, I use the official US poverty stats, and their official definition of what makes a person fall below the poverty level, which is quite unrealistic that is why several studies have placed it to be atleast double the official numbers.

Masadi,

A Pakistani complaining about the US economy is like a prostitute complaining about the morals of a housewife. Just look at Pakistan or any other islamic country, for crying out loud!! Look at the mess and the absolutely pathetic socio-economic conditions. People in Pakistan commit suicide because they cannot feed their families. They line up outside every western embassy begging for visas to get out of Pakistan.

Have some shame, for God`s sake!! When you cannot feed and clothe people in your country and you are yourself an economic migrant to the US, at least have the decency to recognize and respect how the US is 100000000000 times better than the dump you come from.

You and other Pakistanis have this tendency of criticizing others, while overlooking what you are. For you, India`s democracy is a sham democracy, India`s secularism is a farce, US economy is a capitalist menace. In other words, everything better than you is actually worse. You suffer from a severe case of sour grapes!! And stop blaming everyone else for the crappy conditions of the Islamic world. Just because you cannot manage and administer a country, doesnt make it everyone else`s fault. Wake up and smell the coffee.

Masadi,

The accepted definition of poverty line is US$1/- per day. Is that your benchmark in case of US poverty? I think you should have defined it.

#43, what is ``shocking`` is the stink that your posts create wherever you decide to take them. The only thing more ``shocking`` than that stink is the moronic nature of them. Rather than use some specific discriptors that I have reserved for A.H`s like you, I will let it go and let you languish on in your incompetence and ignorant bravado, which is punishment enough in my opinion, but you probably don`t recognize it as such.

As for your ``shock`` treatment, try it on yourself, through direct application at the special spot that you brain resides at, behram sahib can inform you where that precise location is.

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Re: # 37

``today any idiot (documented or undocumented) can make a 100 a day mowing yards or cleaning houses ........ you should try it - it might give you an appreciation for real work instead of whining about the evil rich ......... ``

LOL!!

#40, Jang writes <<< amrican poverty is different..the poor are fatter becuase....>>>

The poor suffer equally regardless of where they live. If you`ve read ethnographic studies of them in the US you`d realize that. As far as the link to obesity is concerned, there is similar link that has been found in third world countries, and it has nothing to do with caloric intake, rather the psycho-social impace of the stress they face. (see this study for example,

---

Wider income gaps, wider waistbands? An ecological study of obesity and income inequality
Kate E Pickett1, Shona Kelly2, Eric Brunner3, Tim Lobstein4 and Richard G Wilkinson2
1 Department of Health Sciences, University of York, UK
2 Division of Epidemiology and Public Health, University of Nottingham, UK
3 Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, University College London, UK
4 International Obesity TaskForce, UK
http://jech.bmjjournals.com/cgi/content/abstract/59/8/670

---

Statistically, when you equalize the bases you can compare poverty across the board. I would argue the poor suffer even more in the US due to greater relative deprivation, poverty amidst pleny and the breakdown of tradition and family to add to it. Like I mention in my article ``(quote)Poverty, a meticulously well-hidden phenomena in the US, both in social consciousness and actual visibility (due to segregation), ``(end quote). Social consciousness contoured by the media has so programmed people that they deny that the poor suffer in the US when they do as fact, I see similar surprise in the students I teach, that have been so enveloped by official propaganda.

Hamidm2 writes in #34 <<< .......... how many people can run a 4 minute mile ?...... not too many, but most of the under thirty crowd should be able to run it in under seven minutes ..... however, we all know that there will always be that 10% that will find it hard to waddle in under 10 minutes ........ there will always be waddlers and slackers and those who feel they are entitled to a good life without having to work for it like the rest of us ................ >>>

Why stop at 10%, if this system (and institutional structure) that you are defending is kept in place, ofcourse poverty will hover around a number as it is now and get much worse during downturns. Is that acceptible and humane, of course not. Is that an inevitability as your false analogy suggests, of course not. There is more than enough surplus in the world to ensure that the basic needs of ALL of humanity are met, and after that still enough surplus can be left to line the pockets of your elite several hundred times over. How can that be ensured, i.e. the need fulfilment of the poor (the benefits of which in the form of all the great work that is lost when people stuggle for mere existance would be greater than any cost undertaken), it can only be ensured by altering the structure of the current system.

amrican poverty is different..the poor are fatter becuase they eat bad food..pasta and balogna-wonder bread sandwiches , or 99c deals..and dont ``work-out`` to get buff. so i dont think you can look just at fatness. they do get food but not mesculan salad with goat cheese and 7-grain bread with lean boars-head turkey. there is poverty, but not the indian kind. its all relative.

hamidm writes in #37 <<< same old nonsense....(ad hominem).... and by the way, have you ever held a real job other than doing ``social research`` (whatever the heck that is ) .... i mean a job that actually adds to the gnp that can then be distributed to the ``poor`` that you seem to care about so much .......... same old nonsense >>>

yes, I still hold a job, and have held one ever since I arrived in this godforsaken country, be it a low paying, hard work, service job, working over 60 hours a week while going to school full time. There was not one of your other immigrant, Indian, Pakistani or Arab or African, European or American that could hold a candle to my hard work during my school days. I used to go to school during the day (full time), work at the college cafetria from 4 to 8pm (7 days a week) and then work at another of your fantastic food establishments from 11pm to 7am and then be back at school at 11am. So take your nonsense and shove it where we can`t see it.

Re: #21 by tahmed32
<<< if you are looking for poverty, go outside america. go to africa. go to asia. go to latin america. where babus like masadi rule. >>>

Such claims are made by detractors (like tahmed) to distract away from the problem at hand and to absolve the US elite of all wrong doing by claiming `` atleast they are doing better than x, y, z.

However, the US being one of the wealthiest countries of the world has extremely poor (worse than third world) poverty statistics if we equalize the base of comparison. Such was alluded to in my article (but was apparently lost on tahmed) when I said (quote) ``Rather than outrage at why 37 million Americans are poor and chronically hungry in one of the wealthiest countries of the world, there is gloating over a fictitious one percentage improvement compared to a previous administration`` (end quote)

So, let us undertake a simple exercise and you can do it for whatever country you want in Asia and Africa, the US census bureau published the world population data sheet for countries around the globe, and the UNDP publishes official poverty figures for countries around the globe. Let us pick one country in Africa, Nigeria and let us compare their poverty figures with poverty figures with the US, fair enough tahmed?

Nigeria: GNI (PPP US 2002$): $800 per capita
US : GNI : $36110 per capita

US GNI is 45 times (45X) Nigerian GNI (36110/800)

Nigeria: Official Poverty Rate (UNDP) 58.1 per 100 population
USA: Official Poverty Rate 13 per 100 population

Nigeria`s Poverty times US poverty 4.5 times (X4.5)

Now if we take wealth and GNI as the indicator, the poverty in the US is MUCH WORSE than the poverty in Nigeria given that the GNI of the US is 45X that of Nigeria whose poverty is only 4.5X (times) that of the US. Given that the poverty for the under 18 population in the US is almost 18% (official rate) and the Nigerian population of under 15 is almost double that of the US, adjusting for that would make the US picture emerge even worse.

Of course all this will also be lost on tahmed who wants to support this miserable US elite at all cost, however my point is well established.