Obama: ‘Cynicism’ to Buy the Idea There Will Always Be Poverty

Tuesday at Georgetown University while discussing poverty at the Catholic-Evangelical Leadership Summit, President Barack Obama said, “It’s important for us to guard against cynicism and not buy the idea that the poor will always be with us.”

“One of the things I’m always concerned about is cynicism,” Obama said. “My chief of staff, Denis McDonough, we take walks around the South Lawn, usually when the weather is good. And a lot of it is policy talk, sometimes it’s just talk about values. And one of our favorite sayings is our job is to guard against cynicism, particularly in this town. And I think it’s important for us to guard against cynicism and not buy the idea that the poor will always be with us and there’s nothing we can do, because there’s a lot we can do. The question is, do we have the political will, the communal will to do something about it.”

Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN