I would take all those billions of dollars being wasted right now on at the corporations, and i would put that money into three full years of the best preschool education in the entire world. If they cannot afford to do that, talk about 30 billion if we cannot afford to do that, i do not see what help we have upholding any sense of dignity, pretense of democracy, in the eyes of people in the rest of the world. [applause] i just have to add one thing to that one point i will add, to deny this to children is an act of thievery, but it is worse than stealing a car. This is an irreversible theft. You never get to live the second year of your life again. Thatthis is it you get it once. Then it is gone forever. I think the president fails to act on this aggressively, that dramatically, prophetically, to get this for us quickly i think is not just a budgetary issue. I think it is a theological abomination, a crime against the innocent. I agree. [applause] i say all the time, quoting the conversation could not be more timely. I sell the time, quoting dr. King, that budgets are moral documents. You can say what you say, but you are what you are. We know who you are when you put your budget on the table. We can see what your Budget Priorities are. Could not be more timely. We are days away it will be a big party on monday, but after monday as we move toward the debt ceiling conversations and the spending cuts get placed on the table, the poor are likely to take it on the chin. That is why we are here with in washington tonight having this conversation. Our hashtag is povertymustend. Our website is afuturewithoutpoverty. Com. Youll find a letter on that website you can electronically sign it asking the president to give a major Public Policy address on poverty sooner than later, and second to convene a white house conference on the eradication of poverty to bring experts to get into crafting National Plan to cut poverty in half and eradicate it in the richest nation in the world. It is not a skill problem, it is via upawe have the will to the poverty a priority with in this country . You have to have the real economy. But we have now . I am amazed you could talk about public education, we could talk about health care. Everyone knows that a Single Payer Health care system would insurance would cover everyone. Insurance companies would be gone. Cost, quality, access would be at a premium in terms of our ability to be a Civil Society if we had a Single Payer Health care system. We could generate almost 3 million jobs, which would serve to stimulate the rest of the economy when you are building and actually taking care of the people. They know that in washington. Viable. Valuable. They just want to privatize it. I think you all doing a beautiful job the nurses appreciate you so deeply. Honestly, the progressive caucus, the black caucus but one of the things that you said, and i completely agree, is that you have got to push. We have got to treat a movement in this country occupy was a moment. It needs to start up and keep going it needs to bring millions of people with it. The robin hood tax, the campaign the nurses have 350 billion a year from wall street for a minimum tax. You know what one of the legislator said to one of our nurses going to the capitol and talking about the wall street tax . She said, you nurses need to lower your expectations. The nurse looked at her and said, would you like for me to say that to you when i am prepare you for surgery . The true story. I mean, honestly, literally, it is a disgrace lower your expectations . I see what is happening out here every day. Were not going to lower our expectations. Were going to fight for a real economy. Our economy has been hijacked we can talk about all the problems, talk endlessly about what i heard yesterday i heard about a woman yesterday. We heard about a real woman yesterday from michigan who actually chose to have her leg amputated because she could not afford the antibiotics in terms of taking care of her leg. She had her leg amputated because of money, because of money, because we do not have a health care system. It is a disgrace. The robin hood tax can generate 350 billion they have bipartisanship. Theyre keeping everything off the agenda that is important to us. They have bipartisanship on that. We cannot compromise our principles. We can compromise on taxes, the people have to say, line in the sand. Learn that from the labor movement. Say, this is a line that you do not cross. We want their jobs back. We want our pensions. We want to raise standards for everyone in america. Nurses do not want to discriminate. We want a Civil Society. We want a society where is win in[applause] let me ask you roseann said something that got my attention a few seconds ago. It is the notion of whether or not as a society has the demos, have we lowered our expectations . Police say to the citizens who in fact have lowered what we say to the citizens who have lowered their expectations theres always debate about what the proper role of government ought to be. I suspect it will have more of that in the coming days about what the proper role government should be what are our expectations . Are they too low . Some of my friends on the right will see the opposite the expectations of government are too high. Talk to me about expectations what do we have a right to the world . I think it is important what they were saying about what should be done it is not theory, it is actually being done in countries around the world with demonstrated, proven results. Every child in many countries in europe start out with that preschool. The results are that unlike this country, there is not hereditary poverty. It is proven this is not a theory. What you are saying about the Health System is completely proven. Our Health System costs an extra 750 billion a year for exactly the same services that you would get in other countries. At the institute of medicine issued a report that the waste and fraud that comes from this forprofit system is 5 of national income, wasted. That sector owns washington. It is not clear that is what other countries do. We are just not normal. Our politics got hijacked. But we are the greatest nation in the world is that notion of american exceptionalism. How can this be happening elsewhere and not be happening in the greatest nation in the world . One of the things the greatest nation in the world refuses to do is look at any other nation. Exactly. I [applause] and to see what it is doing. You know, the turning point of this country was 32 years ago, almost to the day, when Ronald Reagan made a statement in his inaugural address that the solution to the government the government is not the solution to our problems, government is the problem. If you believe that, do not the president , for heavens sake. You had a president who was inveighing against government. President s of both parties have basically continued this policy. We have no active programs to solve any of these problems. We know what the solutions are were not going to pay for any of them. Im telling you, sadly, it is getting worse. No matter what the agreement is in two months. We are squeezing the rich have gotten their way. The corporate sector has gotten their way. They do not pay. There is no money for this preschool. All the sectors alone and own and operate the congress, so we have overpriced systems, exactly what you say, schools that do not work. We have the least social mobility of any highincome country in the world now. We havewe have kids locked into poverty like no other high Income Countries in the whole world. Because you cannot get out of it for exactly the reason jonathan said. By the time theyre six years old is so stark in the evidence. As jeffreys talking now you recall last year when we had a wonderful panel about poverty. A wonderful panel last year. A great line last year there is a highway into poverty but not even a sidewalk out. There is a highway into poverty but not even a sidewalk out. That is the point it is so did, hard to get out. Poverty is no longer color coded this is not a black thing, not a brown thing this is an american catastrophe that is about dr. West and i, said the new poor in this country are the former middle class. And that ofthat is what is happening in our society. Thank you very much. It is such a rich conversation. I am glad to be a part of it. Where to begin . No matter what your leanings are and whether you know about education or not, lets turn to some of the language you are talking about. Ebb that theinvesting in very Young Children is the best investment you can make. It has the greatest return on that and the investment. We know that because the first years of life are the most important for cognitive, social, it and emotional development. You are only two years old ones. Once. That is the most significant window of time. Which brings me to the next point, yes, we have class warfare. Those who are poor are completely left out of the National Dialogue on poverty and take it hunger. That is a bipartisan effort, to keep people who are poor out of the National Dialogue. That is why i work with low income women to be able to take photographs and provide direct testimony on their experiences with raising children in poverty, how to break cycles with poverty, and there are so many conversations happening. This concept of violence and betrayal. People have been silenced for so many years. Poverty is solvable. They and expect nothing less. They are raising their children and they expect their child to in a be the president of the United States, a lawyer, a doctor, and they want the best education, the best type of food, a safe and affordable home to live. The women we work with are investing so much into their children. They are having to trade off paying for rent and paying for food, and trade off for whether they keep the lights on and pay for food. That is unconscionable. [applause] thank you. All of us can expect more. Low income women should be included in the National Dialogue. The women i have spoken with our genius. Are genius. They are brilliant to survive in the United States today. They are so fantastic entrepreneurs. They are wise. They have a lot of grit. They are stronger than any of us on stage. It is a brain trust in america we are not utilizing. They should be part of the National Dialogue at a part of the stage and being listened to in congress. Not just the special interest lobbyists. [applause] we are going into the last hour of the program. We want to highlight the fight back. There are people in this country who are succeeding against the odds every day as they struggle with poverty. There are persons who will join us on the front row. They are already here. I will get off the stage and talk to them so we can hear from citizens, who are in this fight every day. We want to put a face on poverty. While you are talking, talk to me about what you make of the fact that the new poor are in fact the former middleclass. They make up every race, every ethnicity. When we talk about poverty, people think as the poor as those people. They are increasingly becoming us. People are losing their jobs, their 401k. We are in the middle of an economic disaster. Andit is crushing people. It is very dangerous. It can zap their capacity. This is a big threat to the country. We underestimate the danger. Jeffrey knows the story dramatically better than i do. Loaning small amounts of money only to women in order to create who micro entrepreneurs. There are ways in which we say to people, the passive. Be passive. We ought to be saying, if we could wave a magic wand and tomorrow have 6 million Small Businesses, one of the things we should seriously look at with tax reform is how do you replace the antipoor, anti Small Business tax. It is the first big hurdle to create a job. How could you design the equivalent for starting your own business . Trying to reach out here and realize, every american could be an entrepreneur. Passing so many laws and regulations and taxes that they kill the start up businesses in ways that are crazy. I have to jump in. Thank you so much for talking about entrepreneurship. You were there, you were a part of that. There has been so much destruction to the assistance program. Talk about rules and regulations. Those are things your administration, when you were the speaker of the house, so many of those types of rules and regulations were built into the program, so much that they have not responded to the recession. It is only able to reach about 30 of the children who are poor in this country. An incredible increase in Child Poverty been. Micro finance would may be a great way to insert into the system. If a woman is receiving cash assistance or food stamps and she happens to, may be working on the side doing hair and nails, housekeeping, child care. Fantastic things. That 50 or 100 she makes on the weekend, god forbid she reported to the case manager because she would be criminalized for something that would be celebrated in this country. [applause] i agree with you. I want to tell you that would have been lovely if you could have thought of that 17 years ago. [applause] i wish i had. Think of the damage done. He said i wish i had. He did say that. I have got you on the microphone. What you have just said now is wonderful. The fact she is agreeing with you is amazing to me. But hiphop shocking. You were in the media almost immediately when this fiscal cliff deal was reached. You were in the media almost immediately, you were very disappointed, very upset at this deal that was struck. I got the sense you were spanking your fellow republicans for getting their clocks cleaned by mr. Obama in that debate. Tell me what you are upset about and is there some revenge exacted . We have very severe long term fiscal problems. I think there is a lot more that is at the big banks door and the federal reserves door. It is amazing Neither Party has been willing to look at the problems. We are faced with enormous longterm challenges on the fiscal side. I thought the whole process was wrong. I have a bias. I was speaker of the house. The idea that the senate at the last minute would write an entire bill, put whatever they wanted into it, send it over, and say, pass it as we wrote it. We will not touch it again. And the house said, ok. Crazy. Nobody read that bill. It violated everything republicans complained about with the stimulus. The minimum they could have done was brought it up, actually read it, maybe had a hearing to find out what was in it and what did it mean. There were millions of dollars willi understand why the president wants to take care of its friends. What did that have to do with the bill . A goody here and a few other goodies there. Notrepublican senators wrote what they wanted. It is a bad way to run free society. We just passed a farm bill. My colleagues and i will call them that because i am in public voted to cut 16. 50 billion over the next years. I voted against it because i thought it was outrageous. They voted against it because they did not think it was enough. We have people who literally work in the house of representatives who do not believe they are in poverty in this country. Any of them, i want you to go to the other side of town to wherever it is you live. People believe if you do not work, you are lazy. These are the craziest people i have ever seen in my life. Absolutely nuts. [applause] if we continue to send people to congress who do not understand what their job is, then we are never going anywhere as a country. These people are evil and mean. They cared nothing about anybody but themselves. [applause] let me ask you, though. I am really feeling sorry for you. I will push you higher up on my prayer list tonight. There are people who are entrenched in congress, they come from districts where this is not their priority, not their issue, so congress is polarized around the issue of poverty. There is a consensus poverty does not matter. Congress is polarized on this issue. How do we ever imagine that the plot of the poor will get addressed. Class getting these little blurbs. Make them sit down, convene a group of people to address the issues of poverty. People out there have to stop being silent. Anytime i get a phone call in my office, i believe at least 50 of my constituents believe the exact same thing. If you start calling your Congress People and your senators and say to them, you want them to address poverty, trust that they listened very do not assume or be angry when you turn on the news at night and tourism at your television. It cannot talk to us. You have to do it yourself. If you dont, once again, every year, one of us takes the food stamp challenge. People get the news. Until we get more voices, until more people understand how important and significant it is for us, they are going to continue to pat us on the head and say, your food stamp challenge week. Until they see hungry people, until they see babies who do not eat every day, until they realize the fastestgrowing group of children in schools today is hungry and homeless children, until we can make them see it, they will not believe it. That is a perfect segway. Segue. For those who just tuned in, this is our hastag. Povertymustend. Our website is afuturewithoutpoverty. Com. You will find a letter. It is already written for you. Encouraging the president to do things quickly. Deliver a major Public Policy address on the eradication of poverty. We have been told over and over he is an organizer. It is time for the community to get organized and let the president know we want to hear we will from him, we want him to deliver a major Public Policy address on poverty. We can do this every day. This is no comparison between what we are doing and what would happen if the president of the United States gave a major policy speech on what he will do to eradicate poverty. And then he gave us an assignment to do to help him get it done. He ought to give a major Public Policy address. Bring the experts together. I will not be in that meeting. I am not an expert. I am just a broadcaster to open up a whole for the experts to run through. A plan to cut poverty in half in the short run, eradicate it in the long run. If the president wants a legacy in which he and we can