Entitlement 01 May 2014
The sense of entitlement which has permeated our culture is rotting it to the core. I was taught no one owes me anything other than the respect one would show to another human being. I am not owed a job, internet access, health care, capital, a place to live, education, food, or a laundry list of other things we all think we are somehow owed.
What we fail to realize is, if we don't earn it ourselves it has to come out of what someone else has earned; which means, it is either given freely by that individual or is being coerced from them in some other way. If it is being coerced, it isn't being given freely; so, it is being stolen. I know that goes against everything we seem believe in the world today, but it is simply truth. Oh, and one thing to remember, the list of items I mention above aren't covered by the Constitution of the United States.
I want you to think about the mindset of the people who migrated or immigrated to this country back during the several hundred years before the revolution which led to the birth of the United States. They were coming to a largely unsettled land; they either had to earn passage through hard work or indenture themselves as servants for a period of time. There were some wealthy individuals who saw an opportunity to increase their wealth and take the risk of coming to the untamed land and carve out a business for themselves. Very entrepreneurial don't you think?
They settled this country through hard work, risk, and delayed gratification. The mindset of people was one in which this land was worth the cost to have the chance at freedom in one of the many forms it takes; be it religious, political, or entrepreneurial. These people believed in earning it for themselves and their descendants because it wasn't going to be given to them.
They had lived under a government which had grown large and corrupt. They had lived through religious persecution and understood the problems with a rigid stratification of society. They wanted out of that type of existence. It is the reason they found ways to leave wherever it was they came from to have the chance at a new life with freedom to either succeed or fail in a very harsh environment. These are our ancestors and what they bequeathed to us was a representative republic with a constitution which embodied those principles they struggled so mightily for.
We are throwing it away. We are allowing ourselves to forget they wanted all to have to a chance and be accountable to the law with freedom to pursue their individuals goals. We aren't groups in this country, we are individuals who can choose to stay in their perceived groups or try a new one (freedom of association). We can choose to leave the faith of our families and choose a new one (freedom of religion). We can own a firearm and protect ourselves and our community (2nd Amendment). We are safe from government intrusion into our homes without showing cause to a magistrate (4th Amendment). These are things they understood were needed by experience.
We have seen our country grow into the most powerful nation on earth because the of the freedoms they guaranteed us in the Constitution. We are throwing those things away by allowing the undermining of that very same document.
We think those which have accumulated wealth should have to give it to those less fortunate; so, we created a way to force them to do so through a graduated tax structure and the various social programs we have instituted. By doing so, we created a lucrative tax evasion industry in the form of lobbyists to create tax loopholes, accountants to come up with unique ways to write off “expenses” and a bloated government agency with extra-constitutional power in the IRS. Oh, I almost forgot the corrupt politicians who are in the pockets of the lobbyists to write the loopholes into law. All this is the product of envy and greed.
That is enough for today. I will pick this up again tomorrow.
