Brianne Murphy, a lawyer in Syracuse, is a Democratic candidate for the 25th Congressional District seat. She writes about how Newt Gingrich's recent comments about poor children are inaccurate and offensive in the Readers' Page of today's Syracuse Post-Standard.
Education, not manual labor, is the only way to break the cycle of poverty. Investing in education, offering students assistance and supporting programs like Say Yes to Education will create a more educated work force and level the playing field, just a little bit, for poor kids like me that want to do better than their parents. As a child of limited means, I was able to work my way through George Washington University and Brooklyn Law School, with the help of federal programs and hard work. As a server at Morton’s Steakhouse in Georgetown, every day was a choice between working and studying, and my need to pay rent often outweighed the importance of grades. Many nights I waited on my more affluent classmates. During college, I spent a year living on a friend’s couch and I graduated in three and a half years to save money. It was not easy, but it was worth it.
So to Gingrich, I would say: Poor kids work harder; their very survival often depends on it. Our children are not simply a source of cheap labor and method of cost-cutting for corporations; they are the future of this country. Instead of a broom, give them a book.
You can read her full comments here:
http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2011/12/opinion_today_give_poor_studen.html
Planet of the Blind 
That story of Mr. Gingrich’s early years seems so Nixon-esque. I hear in it the same inevitable dog-eat-dog hatred and distain that permeated Nixon’s soul for anyone, everyone. Can a person like this ever manage to respect and love even his fellow comrades who, like him, broke their backs and souls to ascend above the lazy swine below? No, everyone ends up as a competitor, a nemesis who is somehow responsible for the suffering that Mr. G has endured. No, thank you. Been there, done that as a nation, with Nixon. Not again, please.
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