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Tavis Smiley Discusses Poverty, The Consequences Of Obama, And Public Media At USC

Max Schwartz |
April 17, 2013 | 11:42 p.m. PDT

Staff Reporter

 

Tavis Smiley spoke at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism on Wednesday. (Graham Clark/Neon Tommy)
Tavis Smiley spoke at the USC Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism on Wednesday. (Graham Clark/Neon Tommy)
Public television and radio personality Tavis Smiley – host of the PBS show named after him– spoke at a roundtable discussion on Wednesday at the Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism. The talk, moderated by Neon Tommy director Marc Cooper, focused on poverty, but also branched into discussions about the Obama presidency. Smiley gave brief remarks and then answered questions asked by Cooper and members of the audience.

Smiley believes that poverty is an issue that is not discussed enough in society and that it is not mentioned enough in the privately owned media. This is one reason why he enjoys being on public television and radio, because he can discuss whatever he wishes to discuss. He cited the statistic that “one out of every two Americans is in or near the poverty line.” He called poverty an “American catastrophe” and said that the 400 people at the top of the wealth scale own the same amount of wealth as the 150 million people at the bottom of the scale.

Smiley added that President Lyndon Johnson was the most aggressive president in history on fighting poverty. President Obama, he said, did not take on the issue during his first term. He noted that only in his most recent State of the Union Address did the president mention poverty.

Smiley believes that this is because politicians do not have the “courage” to discuss this important issue. He emphasized the poverty statistics and made it clear that the numbers prove that race has nothing do to with being poor. Smiley restated the quote, “Poverty is threatening our very democracy,” as a way to underscore that a country cannot have the poverty levels that the United States has and maintain its democracy. Smiley also said that philanthropy and justice are two different things.

Smiley made it clear that the politicians’ lack of courage stems from their unwillingness to face the facts and because the poor population does not take their concerns to the ballot box. He cited the statistics that poor people vote less than people who are wealthier and that poor people do not have lobbyists in Washington, like other issues do. The TV host said, “Poverty can be cut in half in ten years,” and then added, “It takes someone making the eradication of poverty a priority."

Smiley also discussed why he believes an African American president is not sufficiently restorative for the African American communities of this country. He mentioned that the African American leaders of this country are not bringing up the issues to Obama because they do not want to put the president in a tight position. He did praise the president, however, for his plan to make early education accessible to everyone.

On the note of public media, Smiley said he enjoys being on PBS because he gets to own his work, but he also said that that also makes things difficult. He acknowledged that he is responsible for raising his own funds to keep his program on the air and to ensure his staff gets a paycheck, so their families can eat.

 

 

Reach Staff Reporter Max Schwartz here; follow on Twitter here.



 

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