Fifty years have passed since Lyndon Johnson declared war on poverty. And a funny thing happened on the way to this anniversary. Suddenly, or so it seems, progressives have stopped apologizing for their efforts on behalf of the poor and have started trumpeting them instead. And conservatives find themselves on the defensive.
It wasn't supposed to be this way. For a long time, everyone knew - or, more accurately, "knew" - that the war of poverty had been an abject failure. And they knew why: It was the fault of the poor themselves. But what everyone knew wasn't true, and the public seems to have caught on.
The narrative went like this: Anti-poverty programs hadn't actually reduced poverty, because poverty in America was basically a social problem - a problem of broken families, crime and a culture of dependence that was only reinforced by government aid. And because this narrative was so widely accepted, bashing the poor was good politics, enthusiastically embraced by ..
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