Star Parker - Uncle Sams Plantation: How Big Government Enslaves Americas Poor and What We Can Do about It

Acclaim for Star Parkers
Uncle Sams Plantation

Daniel Patrick Moynihans identification, in 1965, of the self-destructive roots of the Welfare State was prophetic. Star Parkers new book seizes on this theme, adds her personal sense been there and done that, and casts new light on the redemptive power of freedom.

RUSH LIMBAUGH

In Uncle Sams Plantation, Star Parker has written her declaration of independence from the grand illusions, slippery safety nets, and moral muddles of the Welfare State. In this compelling and Inspirational book, she presents a devastating critique of the socialist plans of the welfare bureaucrats and blasts into orbit her fireworks of faith, family, and freedom like an angelic avenger.

GEORGE GILDER,
fellow of the Discovery Institute and author of
Wealth and Poverty and Men and Marriage.

Star Parkers new book brings us back to eternal truthsfaith, family, love, and responsibility.

DR. LAURA SCHLESSINGER,
syndicated radio host and author of the New York Times bestseller,
Ten Stupid Things Couples Do To Mess Up Their Relationships

Star Parkers important new book helps advance the understandingcritical for all Americansthat prosperity does not come from government and politics but results from men and women of character and high moral fiber living and working in freedom.

LARRY KUDLOW,
economist, author, and co-host of CNBCs Kudlow and Cramer

I have known Star Parker for almost twenty years. Her background gives her the experience to challenge us to get off the fence and get involved in creating a better society for all. I admire her for speaking up and expressing her fresh and compelling ideas. She is not striving to be popular; she is striving to be right. We all should be open to read and to learn from Uncle Sams Plantation.

ROSEY GRIER,
football great, author, activist, humanitarian, and board member of
the Milken Family Foundation

Star Parker rocks the world. She is an iconoclast that must be listened to and reckoned with.

SEAN HANNITY,
syndicated radio host and co-host of Fox Newss Hannity & Colmes

Lots of tomes make theoretical points about welfare. This shooting star of a book shows the doleful experiences and one gutsy womans reaction to them. Look elsewhere for sociological accounts. Look here for the emotions of plantation life and escape.

MARVIN OLASKY,
editor-in-chief of World Magazine and author of
The Tragedy of American Compassion

The title of Star Parkers new book says it all. For a clear, balanced, and fair insight into the true nature and history of Americas Welfare-State dabblingand its effect upon those whom it is supposed to helpread this incisive and brilliant analysis of the problem by one who understands it through years of personal experience and dedicated study.

DR. D. JAMES KENNEDY,
pastor, author, and president of Coral Ridge Ministries

Like the North Star and Harriet Tubman, Star Parker is a living beacon to guide others to the freedom denied them by those who thrive on the backs of poor folks.

REV. JOHNNY M. HUNTER, DD,
president of Life Education and Resource Network
in Fayetteville, North Carolina

Star Parkers new book about the folly of government is an eye-opener. Her work to help improve the lives of ordinary women, men, and families who need a hand-up rather than a hand-out is exemplary.

DR. JULUETTE BARTLETT PACK,
executive director of Family Assistance Center in Houston, Texas

Every day, those of us who work in the trenches in Pregnancy Care Centers see the impact of the welfare system on the young women we serve. Thank God for Stars courage and insight as she eloquently puts words to what we face every day. I wish every one of our clients could have one hour with Star. Our work would be a lot easier!

DINAH MONAHAN,
founder and executive director of
Hope House Maternity Home in Show Low, Arizona

UNCLE SAMS
PLANTATION

HOW BIG GOVERNMENT
ENSLAVES AMERICAS POOR and WHAT
WE CAN DO ABOUT IT

STAR PARKER

Copyright 2003 by Star Parker

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or otherexcept for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson. Thomas Nelson is a trademark of Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Thomas Nelson, Inc. titles may be purchased in bulk for educational, business, fund-raising, or sales promotional use. For information, please e-mail SpecialMarkets@ThomasNelson.com.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Parker, Star.
Uncle Sams plantation : how big government enslaves Americas poor and what we can do about it / Star Parker.
p. cm.
ISBN 0-7852-6219-9 (HC)
ISBN 1-59555-015-1 (SC)
1. PoorGovernment policyUnited States. 2. Public welfareUnited States. 3. Dependency (Psychology) 4. LiberalismUnited States. 5. ConservatismUnited States. 6. African AmericansSocial conditions. I. Title.
HV95.P35 2003
362.5'561'0973dc22

2003018893

Printed in the United States of America
05 06 07 08 09 RRD 5 4 3 2 1

Dedicated in loving memory of
Gina (1968-2002) and Jonah (1989-2002)
whose short yet spirited dashes on earth
symbolized hope for the poor.

And to my Rachel Sarah...

Contents

What Is Poverty?

I t was a hot and sticky 1968 summer evening in South Carolina. The only breeze was the air coming through the car windows. But as we traveled down the narrow street that led to Grandma Warrenos house, it was not the heat or the humidity that had me in a tizzy. I hated visiting my grandmas house; hated the old porch with posts so rotten it looked as if it would fall over at any moment; hated the cardboard nailed up to cover the holes in the wall. Lord knows how much I hated using that outhouse toilet. The only running water was in the kitchen, so we bathed in the backyard with the chickens, the spiders, and the mosquitoes.

Saying times were tough does not begin to describe my dads life growing up. My grandpa died at a young age, leaving six adolescent sons to grow up in the Jim Crow segregated South with their widowed mother. It must not have occurred to my grandma that she needed anyone to alleviate her condition as she struggled to raise her boys without a husband and without complaint. Grandma pressed on without a dime from welfare. She grew her own food, trained her own kids, and paid her own way. All six grew to become professional and accomplished men.

It was not until Grandma Warreno was seventy-five years old that she looked to the government for help. She had been contributing Social Security and Medicare taxes all her working life believing the political promise that her retirement and medical needs would be met. That is when she discovered that the government did not do a very good job saving her money. The Social Security check she received was barely enough to retain the financial independence she struggled sixty-nine years to maintain. After her third stroke by age eighty-three, Medicaid put a lien on her four-thousand-dollar home to cover the housing expenses of the substandard nursing facility they had guaranteed.