Ted Kennedy's Big, Fat Lie: '36 Million Americans Go To Bed Hungry Every Night'

Fox News Sunday/NewsBusters ^ | Mark Finkelstein

[governsleastgovernsbest]

Chris Wallace had Ted Kennedy cornered. The Fox News Sunday host displayed Kennedy's 1995 bitter condemnation of welfare reform: "legislative child abuse . . . let them eat cake." It should be noted that as Wallace began to reference the statement, Kennedy objected, blustering that "this is 2006" - as if his past misjudgments are irrelevant even though he would he has apparently learned nothing from them.

Wallace went on to make the point that the employment rate among unmarried women has soared and the child poverty rate has dropped. He put it to Kennedy: "hasn't welfare reform worked?" Fighting back, the senior senator from Massachusetts claimed that Wallace's numbers on child poverty "are absolutely wrong," asserting there has been an increase in the number of children living in poverty in the United States. He then dropped this bomb:

"We have 36 million Americans that are going to bed hungry every night. 36 million Americans! And 12 million of those are children!"

View video of Kennedy's 36-million claim here.

Kennedy's claim is flatly false. According to the USDA, 13 million households, containing 36 million people, reported that at least one household member was food insecure in a recent year. “Food insecure” means that “, such households at some time during the year were uncertain of having, or unable to acquire, enough food for all their members because they had insufficient money or other resources."

Yet Kennedy counted every person who might have been "uncertain" of having enough money to get food - at any time during the year - as "going to bed hungry every night."

As has been widely noted, the major food-related problem for poor children isn't hunger - it's obesity.Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation is an expert on these issues. Here's what he recently wrote on the subject:

"While hunger due to a lack of financial re-sources does occur in the United States, it is limited in scope and duration. According to the USDA, on a typical day, fewer than one American in 200 will experience hunger due to a lack of money to buy food."

In a country of 300 million, that means something less than 1.5 million people.

It's a shame Chris Wallace didn't have these facts handy. But on thing is clear: Kennedy's claim that 36 million go to bed hungry every night is nothing short of . . .a big, fat lie.

Contact Mark at mark@gunhill.net

[governsleastgovernsbest]

Kennedy big-fat-lie ping to Today show list.

[Unicorn]

BTTT

[19th LA Inf]

Seems to me that JFK made the same claim. It turned out that his statement was true, as that was roughly the number of Americans who were on diets trying to lose weight (LOL).

[tkathy]

I thought they were all obese, and going to bed fat because of fast food.

[Uncle Ike]

" "We have 36 million Americans that are going to bed hungry every night. "

Well, if we add in all of the weight-obsessed, live-forever vegetarians (Dems, all), that number might be pretty close to accurate....

'~)

[rwgal]

Once again, Big Ted speaks out of the wrong orifice.....

Meadow Muffin

[Indy Pendance]

Maybe he should feed some of those people.

[Long Island Pete]

Did Kennedy point and jab his finger at Chris Wallace?

[Diogenesis]

“If she had lived, Mary Jo Kopechne would be 65 years old
and she would have agreed with every aspect of his tireless work
as a legislator for illegal aliens and terrorists.”

Charles Pierce, Boston Globe, Boston, Bizarroworld

[glennshepard]

36 million Americans go to bed hungry and I have enough food to look like this!!!

[unixfox]

I went to bed hungry last night too Ted, but it was because I left the steak out too long while I was out all day.

[digger48]

It's amazing, how prescient one can be, while staring at the bottom of an upturned highball glass

[operation clinton cleanup]

I went to bed hungry last night.... I was to lazy to go to the kitchen and make a sandwich.

[Loud Mime]

Kennedy also said that we needed Day Care and Health Care for every American.

Let's open the borders, provide day care and health care and see what happens.

[Txsleuth]

This is too easy...

It is obvious that Teddy hasn't gone to bed hungry even one day in his whole life....and he NEEDS to.

[Elle Bee]

But does any Kennedy ever go to bed thirsty?

.

[Disambiguator]

What he meant to say is that Americans with $36 million wake up hungover every day. He is, of course, referring to himself.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Gee, I dunno, there are so many "food banks" and soup kitchens, it must take extraordinary exertion to go hungry in this country. I suspect that if a child goes hungry it's because Mommy is too doped up to waddle her fat ass down to the local "food pantry" for some free Cheerios.

[samtheman]

This just goes to prove that fat, limousine-socialist, alcoholics don't know how to read.