Yes, they're serious about killing child labor laws
by David Atkins
In case you thought they were kidding:
Donald Trump said he's creating a program similar to "The Apprentice" for poor New York City schoolchildren, an idea he credited to Newt Gingrich.
While Gingrich might not have snagged an endorsement from Trump following a meeting at the real estate mogul and reality TV star's Manhattan office, it appears the former House Speaker struck a different sort of deal to create the new program.
"As a number of you know, I've been making the case that we need to work very hard to help poor children in poor neighborhoods acquire opportunities to work," Gingrich said following the pair's meeting. "And I've asked him to take one of the poorest schools in New York, and basically offer at least 10 apprenticeships to kids from those schools, to get them into the world of work and get them into an opportunity to earn money, and get them into a habit of showing up and realizing that hard work gets rewarded and that America's all about the work ethic."
It's not clear whether the new program would be developed into a television program like Trump's "The Apprentice" on NBC, which has gone through several iterations since its 2004 premiere.
If nothing else, the plan would appear to keep promoting Gingrich's somewhat controversial push to encourage more relaxed child labor standards, especially in poorer communities.
Because nothing says "serious intellectual Newt Gingrich" than promoting a reality show where kids compete for a chance to work as janitors. Perhaps Ebenezer Scooge's true calling in life should have been the entertainment industry. And why does Gingrich think this is such a great idea?
"Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits for working and have nobody around them who works. So they literally have no habit of showing up on Monday. They have no habit of staying all day. They have no habit of I do this and you give me cash unless it's illegal," he explained last week in Des Moines.
If there were ever a better encapsulation of racist white privilege, out-of-touch elitism and asshole objectivism, I've yet to see it.
The hack in me desperately wants this guy to be the nominee so that millions of hard-working poor and middle-class urban Americans can deliver him the electoral spanking he so richly deserves. But the American citizen in me wants this guy as far away from even the possibility of gaining the presidency as possible.
And that's the whole point. Gingrich is the frontrunner precisely because he gives liberals convulsions. So expect even more of this stuff in the near future.
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