Newt Gingrich is engaging in class warfare when he suggests poor kids work as janitors

. I trust that his efforts will be recognized in the voting process. Refutation of argument #1 A. "Newt Gingrich is not engaging in class warfare, he is trying to ensure that it will not happen" See Definition of "Class warfare" Unless Mr. Gingrich were to included other classes of society (into the "program") other than just the poor for his proposal, he has singled out one segment (the poor) as being a detriment by excluding the others. B. How is suggesting job opportunity's for poverty stricken family's a cause of harm or damage? Non sequitur . This argument was not made, the argument that was made was that Class Warfare was being waged being as Mr. Gingrich only singled out the poor for these so called "Job opportunities" which were not framed as job opportunities but rather programs designed to teach poor children to "get accustomed to work" C. "looking for a realistic solution to decrease crime rates and provide an income for family's that may not have one is not engaging class warfare at all. " Reducing the crime rate is a commendable endeavor to partake, but to suggest that only one economic class of people are responsible for crime by excluding other classes of people from the same sort of "program" is implying that the other classes (middle class and affluent) have more integrity and don't commit crimes and therefore do not need the "program". Also, the focus of Mr. Gingrich's proposal is not to bring "income for family's that may not have one" but to "find a way for poor children to learn how to work and learn how to have money that they've earned honestly" (along with "stay all day", 'I do this and you give me cash,'etc. ) Refutation of argument #2 A. "Well statistically poverty stricken neighborhoods due in fact have a very low job rate. Further more they statistically also have a much higher crime rate. " Once again, correlation is not causation. There are places in this world where the per capita income is under $200 and their communities are virtually crime free. B. "So if the majority of people living in these areas do not have jobs nor a steady income and live in an area with a high crime rate, and need money to survive then yes statistically more then less create their own income by doing something illegal. " This suggests that if you do not have a job or steady income and others around you do not have integrity, that by default, you are statistically likely to have less integrity than you would if you had a job and steady income with neighbors that are not criminals. This is a false assumption, one's values, integrity, and sense of personal responsibility do not change with economic status or one's surroundings. The position that the criminal behavior in question is a result of "survival" strategies is not evident. Lets just face the facts, there are safety nets both private and public in place to insure children are able to survive. (Salvation Army, United way, church based groups, section 8 housing, food stamps, etc. ) C. "It should also be noted as well that the majority of these crimes or[sic] misdemeanor drug charges. " This argument alone clearly shows that the individuals in question do indeed know the principle of 'I do this and you give me cash,' and do not need the government to show them how this principle works. The fact that the product they are selling is illegal is a result of the government stepping in between two people who wish to engage in a business transaction and saying "no, you can't do that". Neither party steals, forces, or coerces the other into the transactions, leaving no rights violated. This is a case of the government stepping in to solve a problem it created. By this logic, if one were to remove the criminality of drugs, they would instantly solve the "majority of the misdemeanor" crime problem, and save the taxpayers untold millions (or Billions) in a government program designed to cut down crime in poor neighborhoods. D. "What if you paid them part-time in the afternoon to sit at the clerical office and greet people when they came in? What if you paid them to work as the assistant librarian? " My opponent argues "Newt was not being ignorant when he said underprivileged kids should work as janitors. He also suggest other jobs such as assistant librarian, clerical office greeter. He was suggesting a solution to the staggering amount over criminal activity in these extremely underprivileged neighborhoods. ' My esteemed colleague steve221 has failed to address that the solution of finding "a way for poor children to learn how to work and learn how to have money that they've earned honestly" in an effort to reduce crime, is one that is aimed at "poor children" and not all children. as if it were only the poor that (in his own words) don't understand the concept of 'I do this and you give me cash,' and not any child that hasn't had the value of integrity ingrained upon him/her from within the family. Rebutal: Lack of integrity is not a product of economic status. It is just as likely that a child of affluence has as little clue about the value of work as a child born and raised in poverty. Whats the likelihood that Paris Hilton has ever broken a sweat in the labor of scrubbing a toilet for $5.75 an hour? The simple truth is there are thousands (perhaps tens of thousands) or more Paris Hilton's (or male equivalent) out there and the likelihood that they have the foggiest notion of what its like to have to endure physical labor and sweat to "earn money by working" and then have to survive only on the money they have worked for is a foreign concept to them. Nor does being born in a middle class or affluent family insure one will have integrity. Source #1 Take for instance Morgan Grams, son of Senator Rod Grams who has a history of stealing cars, Silver, antique coins,(all while toting around a stolen firearm), forging checks, fraudulent use of credit cards, and marijuana possession (10 bags, which for me or you would warrant a felony charge of possession with intent to distribute, but somehow he got out with a misdemeanor). Mr. Grams is not an isolated incident. the children of the middle class and affluent commit crimes as well. And don't get me started on the Bernie Madoff's, Ivan Boesky's , Ken Lay's [source #2], and long list of others in this world who's crimes have caused tens of thousands of people their jobs and/or life savings, (unlike the poor who only manage to rack up one victim at a time If there even is a victim in a drug crime) These are people that do not have poverty as an excuse for their lack of integrity. Nor did they gain any integrity by delivering newspapers and mowing lawns as Ken lay claims to of done. There is nothing to suggest that the affluent are any less likely to be criminals than poor people, they just commit different kinds of crimes, the kinds of crimes where it is less likely to get caught at, and the kind of crimes that destroy hopes and dreams of innocent victims on a grand scale. An Affluent neighborhood like the Hamptons is not immune from having any of its citizenry engage in insider trading, fraud, money laundering , fill in the financial crime of your choice here. The difference is the type of crime the affluent are more likely to commit is done behind closed doors. "White Collar" crime is no less harmful to society as a whole than street crime. and the the little old lady who gets shot in a robbery is just as dead as she is when she starves to death after her late husbands pension disappears into an overseas bank account of a white collar criminal. Conclusion: Teach the same values to the Affluent as well, their no less likely to be criminals than the poor. Source #1 : . http://abcnews.go.com... Source #2 : . http://wikimedia.org...