Paul Krugman’s Welfare Lie

Yes, “Ferret-face” Krugman is at it again.  And this time he’s playing historical revisionist when it comes to Reagan’s legacy.

Recently, Ferret-face is resurrecting his “Republicans are all racist” matra, with the claim that Ronald Reagan was the poster-boy for the KKK.  IN 2007, mister “Conscience of a Ferret-faced liberal” wrote the following article:

Indeed, you do really have to feel sorry for Reagan. He just kept making those innocent mistakes.

When he went on about the welfare queen driving her Cadillac, and kept repeating the story years after it had been debunked, some people thought he was engaging in race-baiting. But it was all just an innocent mistake.

Recently, Ferret-face reiterated (and in some cases, expanded upon) the line at a New Rules Project gathering:

Which later on – In the 1970s, Reagan was best known for talking about the Welfare Queen driving her Cadillac – uh – which was, of course, made up…and…he never said what color she was, but he never had to.

Let’s ignore the fact, for the time being, that Ferret-face has to admit that Reagan never mentions the color of the welfare queen in question, thereby undercutting his own argument.  Ferret-face must assume that Reagan had these special “mind powers” that created an image in the mind of the listener in a Svenghalli-style fashion.  However, I digress…

The whole problem with Ferret-face’s assertion is…well…he’s lying through his teeth.

Yep.  Ferret-face is essentially a liar.  And he keeps repeating the same lie over, and over…and over again.

It is a lie that can be easily dispelled by spending about 5 minutes in front of Google.  The person that Reagan was describing when he used the title “Welfare Queen?”  Well, that depends on who you ask.  If you ask Dorothy Woods, she’ll be emphatic in telling you that SHE is the true Welfare Queen.  In fact, she was in the papers some time back:

“Welfare Queen” Dorothy Woods, who was convicted four years ago of perpetrating what was said to be the largest welfare fraud in U.S. history, is back behind bars–less than a year after being paroled from state prison.

This time she is accused of defrauding the welfare system of nearly $700 by collecting several weeks of aid for a teen-age son who did not live with her, as well as perjury and forgery, according to a spokesman for the Los Angeles County district attorney’s office. Trial is set for June 5 in Pasadena Superior Court.

Woods, 45, was convicted in 1983 of bilking the county out of $377,000 in welfare payments between 1974 and 1980 by posing as a dozen impoverished women with a total of 49 dependent children, while she was actually living in splendor in Pasadena–in a mansion with a live-in housekeeper, several luxury cars, mink coats and a swimming pool. She had been in custody since her arrest in 1981, but was paroled last June.

Earlier this year, authorities received an anonymous tip that Woods was carrying out another fraud. Investigators found she had continued to receive funds from the Aid to Families with Dependent Children program during a six-week period in which her 14-year-old son was living with his elder brother in San Gabriel while Woods was living in a rented room in Pasadena.

 Apparently, getting busted once for welfare / benefits fraud wasn’t enough.  Dorothy had to show she had the stamina and the “gravitas” to take the throne.

Oh, as for the Cadillac, if memory serves me correctly, there is a picture of Dorothy standing in front of a customized Cadillac with a big smile on her face.  I know this because I’ve seen it once already.

If there is any question as to whether Madame Woods is or is not the Welfare Queen, you might want to pick up the book she wrote that used that name in the title.  Or maybe watch the upcoming movie, supposedly starring Queen Latifa? 

Dorothy is able to usurp the title of Welfare Queen, because the other contender – Linda Taylor – has been keeping a much lower profile since her glory days:

CHICAGO, Feb. 28 (UPI) Linda Taylor, who came to notice when Ronald Reagan, in his Presidential campaign, cited her as an example of an alleged welfare abuser, has had her Cadillac limousine seized by the police here.

And then there were the inspired hopefuls: Esther Johnson (defrauded the welfare system for $240,000.00) and Arlens Otis (defrauded the government for about $150,000.00).  Each of them might describe themselves as bona-fide Welfare Queens.

Mind you, the median income for a family of four back in the mid- to late-Seventies was about $17,000.00 per year.  That places the annual income of the aforementioned individuals at around $30,000.00 and above.

But hey, let’s not let facts and historical documentation get in the way of Ferret-face’s arguments.

Now, mind you, Ferret-face Krugman has a PhD, and is a professor of Economics.  This idiot managed to get through a graduate program, and is teaching the young-and-dumb with this type of slip-shod, agenda-driven “research.”  You know, the type of research that completely ignores press reports published by the Los Angeles Times, The Associated Press, and Ferret-face’s own employer: the New York Times.  Obviously, when you get to be as prestigious as Ferret-face, you don’t actually need to fact-check your work.  You can just make it up as you go along.

Mind you, much of the information I’ve presented here can be found by using Google.  It doesn’t requite the mad, “intellectual” skillz that The Ferret owns, yo!

Of course, if anyone less “prestigious” does this type of disingenuous propagandizing, it is called “lying.”  Or, at the very least they call you stupid for either being an intellectual slob, for being so dumb in telling a lie that can easily be proven wrong.

Either way, none of this reflects well on Ferret-face, or his keen, intellectual “insight.”

Maybe that’s what the term “Conscience of the Liberal” actually describes?  Something that has no qualms with publishing lies, and gross distortions…just so long as your agenda gets passed.