Policy

Now that the election is over and we know who will be sitting in the Oval Office for the next four years, it seems like a good time to take a look at a letter President Obama wrote in response to this question:

What will you pledge to do in your first 100 days to address childhood poverty?

On these pages and others it hasn't escaped notice that outside of Big Bird's star turn, issues like poverty and education haven't gotten much attention this election cycle.

Did those issues end up being important to you as you stepped inside your voting booth today?

There has been very little talk about poverty in this election. Just how little, you ask? So little there was an entire #talkpoverty twitter campaign to try to get the topic front and center at the three presidential debates. No such luck. 

Lots of people are talking about how if Congress fails to reach a bipartisan budget agreement by the start of the New Year, $1.2 trillion worth of automatic spending cuts will go into effect.

President Obama and Mitt Romney debated a variety of domestic issues last night, but poverty wasn’t one of them.

Other than Romney’s closing remarks in which he briefly mentioned the one-in-six Americans living in poverty and Obama’s touting of his education reform, both candidates largely stayed away from the topic.

The pressure for both candidates to successfully convey their messages to the American public in tonight's Presidential debate is high.

Fox News reporter Bill O’Reilly wants Romney to ‘smack the president' – figuratively of course. Obama’s team wants the president to be clear and concise. But it seems some Americans want more.