The metro section of today's New York Times carries an article that runs under the headline, "State's Poorest Facing Loss of U.S. Aid." The article reports that 71,400 families "risk losing their federal welfare benefits at the end of this year," when the five-year time limit associated with the 1996 federal welfare reform kicks in.
The article claims in its fourth paragraph that these families "are likely to suffer from mental illness or substance abuse problems. About 15 percent are considered to have a disability that keeps them from working. That is twice the share of disabled people in the overall welfare caseload."
You have to read way down into the story to find out that the federal government "will make exceptions for some of those welfare recipients who cannot work because of a disability." And you have to read way, way, down into the story to find out that state and county officials "will try to transfer some" of those about to lose benefits "to other federal aid programs, like those that offer disability benefits." And, also, that the state and county officials "will go after child support payments from absent fathers more aggressively."
The Times spins this story in two important ways: first with that big headline, "State's Poorest Facing Loss of U.S. Aid," and then again with the assertion in the article that "advocates for the poor say the numbers of people facing the deadline gives cause for concern." An alarmist representative of a "poor people's advocacy group" is duly quoted. The overall effect is to frame this as an impending disaster.
Of course, there's no quote in the Times from a non-governmental expert or advocacy group that was in favor of welfare reform, or that represents working taxpayers. Such an expert might have made the point that it's about time the government got tougher on deadbeat dads, and that it is a shame that it has taken almost five years for such a crackdown. Such an expert also might have expressed hope that the time limit will actually force some of these welfare recipients into jobs, which are the best way out of poverty. And such an expert also might have voiced a bit of concern about how these welfare recipients facing a cutoff to their benefits are all of a sudden going to be discovering "disabilities" that make them eligible for aid indefinitely. Not that there aren't genuinely mentally and physically disabled persons out there who are deserving of assistance. But it will engender some skepticism among the taxpaying public -- if not at the New York Times -- if the number of such disabled persons skyrockets the month that the time limits on the Temporary Aid to Needy Families program (the program formerly known as Aid to Families With Dependent Children) kick in.
Defending Hillary: Smartertimes.com defended Senator Clinton from the objections the New York Times editorialists had to her book deal. This morning, the Times editorialists again want to hold Mrs. Clinton to an unreasonable standard. "We strongly urge her not to undertake any soft-money fund-raising," the Times says in its lead editorial this morning. This sort of silliness should enrage the Times' core audience of liberal Upper West Side public-television types, because it would mean that while Senator Trent Lott and Rep. Tom DeLay are out raising soft money for conservative causes and candidates, the Times wants Mrs. Clinton, presumably, to stay at home and bake cookies. The justification, according to the Times, for such a policy of unilateral disarmament is "the growing urgency for her, at the start of her Senate career, to separate herself from the unrestrained fund-raising practices identified with her husband." Again, punishing a woman politician for her husband's misdeeds seems like a stay-home-and-bake-cookies approach inconsistent with the Times' professed belief in the rights of women to have independent careers. There's nothing inherently corrupt about raising money to be spent on political speech in a democracy. It's corrupt to raise money from Chinese Communist agents in return for softening restrictions on arms transfers, but there's nothing inherently corrupt about raising money from Americans who want to speak out on issues they care about.
One-Sided on the Estate Tax: Today's New York Times runs an article about Bush aide John DiIulio Jr.'s opposition to the estate tax. The article quotes five sources who favor the estate tax and one who opposes it. It's an amazingly one-sided dispatch.