It shows that poverty went from 19.5% to 12.6% during that period. It was 22.2% in 1960. So for starters, the drop is not as big as he says it was.
His 13.3% is as of the end of 1997, which may have been the latest available at the time. At the end of 2001 (latest available now) it's 11.7% (after 5 years of welfare reform-guess hordes weren't thrown out into the streets after all, were they?).
Still, a roughly 35% drop in poverty looks from 1963 to 1970 looks impressive, doesn't it? Not so fast, for at least four reasons:
1. The Kennedy tax cut, which took marginal rates from as high as 92% down to 70%, unleashed a torrent of capital that caused a rising tide to lift all boats.
2. Many poor kids got themselves and their families out of poverty by serving in Vietnam.
3. The general prosperity of the 60s, much of which would have occurred even without the tax cut, lifted up a lot of people.
4. The quick reduction in poverty was purchased at a very steep long-term price. A later section of the web page shows that female-headed households, which have poverty rates about triple the average, grew from about 16 million to about 20 million from 1965-1970 (it's pushing 40 million now). After an initial drop in 1966, this group's poverty rate remained static for years, while the number of such households grew much more rapidly than the overall population.This proves the conservatives' point that The Great Society broke up families and helped create a single-mom culture that entrenched poverty-causing lifestyles.
The shame of all of this is that the tax cut, favorable economic conditions, and Civil Rights Act (supported by a majority of Republicans and bitterly opposed by a significant plurality of Democrats), set the stage for what could have been a near-elimination of poverty. The Great Society ruined the chance of that happening. Case closed.
By the way, if someone knows how to post the detail from the web page, have at it.