POLITICIANS AND MISINFORMATION
1. The decline in manufacturing employment is no more troublesome than was the decline in agricultural employment. Do you think that we’d be wealthier today had past generations panicked over falling agricultural employment and acted to obstruct the forces that enabled tens of millions of Americans to escape farms and move to cities, and all the while enjoy ever-fuller bellies? If not, then why do you lament tens of millions of today’s Americans escaping from factories into jobs that generally pay better and are more interesting?
2. Mark Steyn’s “Our Own Greek Tragedy” is a masterpiece of prose and wisdom. To whet your appetite:
We hard-hearted, small-government guys are often damned as selfish types who care nothing for the general welfare. But, as the Greek protests make plain, nothing makes an individual more selfish than the socially equitable communitarianism of big government. Once a chap’s enjoying the fruits of government health care, government-paid vacation, government-funded early retirement, and all the rest, he couldn’t give a hoot about the general societal interest. He’s got his, and to hell with everyone else. People’s sense of entitlement endures long after the entitlement has ceased to make sense.
3. GOVERNMENTS ROLE: The answer is, nothing. We can, and should, ease the pain of those who lose jobs. But the government can't find you a job any more than it can find you a spouse or a hobby. The process of matching individuals to employers can only be done by individuals.
4. I think it’s safe to say that in America, everyone loves freedom. Liberals, conservatives — we all love freedom. We just often have different ideas about what that is. Liberals, for the most part, favor the child concept of freedom, and conservatives lean more towards the adult concept of freedom — and each looks on the other’s ideas as scary and oppressive.
The liberals wonder, if you don’t have health care or food or a place to live — and if some privately held company can fire you at any moment and remove your livelihood — how can you be free? And they wonder why we would let ourselves be oppressed by such worries when we have the means and the government to take care of them. Conservatives, on the other hand, look at liberal ideas with great fear, knowing such guarantees by the government will come with restrictions, and if the government fails to deliver what it promises or does it poorly, there’s nothing to be done about it, because there are no other options. How can you be free if the government controls so much of your life and limits the choices available to you?
5. Liberal freedom is freedom from responsibility. Conservative freedom is guaranteed by responsibility.
6. Liberals may love their freedom – but they’re not so crazy about yours.
7. Liberalism: like being parented by Michael Jackson, and The Great Santini. No matter what it looks like on the outside, it is strange and abusive behind the closed doors of the committee rooms.
1. The decline in manufacturing employment is no more troublesome than was the decline in agricultural employment. Do you think that we’d be wealthier today had past generations panicked over falling agricultural employment and acted to obstruct the forces that enabled tens of millions of Americans to escape farms and move to cities, and all the while enjoy ever-fuller bellies? If not, then why do you lament tens of millions of today’s Americans escaping from factories into jobs that generally pay better and are more interesting?
2. Mark Steyn’s “Our Own Greek Tragedy” is a masterpiece of prose and wisdom. To whet your appetite:
We hard-hearted, small-government guys are often damned as selfish types who care nothing for the general welfare. But, as the Greek protests make plain, nothing makes an individual more selfish than the socially equitable communitarianism of big government. Once a chap’s enjoying the fruits of government health care, government-paid vacation, government-funded early retirement, and all the rest, he couldn’t give a hoot about the general societal interest. He’s got his, and to hell with everyone else. People’s sense of entitlement endures long after the entitlement has ceased to make sense.
3. GOVERNMENTS ROLE: The answer is, nothing. We can, and should, ease the pain of those who lose jobs. But the government can't find you a job any more than it can find you a spouse or a hobby. The process of matching individuals to employers can only be done by individuals.
4. I think it’s safe to say that in America, everyone loves freedom. Liberals, conservatives — we all love freedom. We just often have different ideas about what that is. Liberals, for the most part, favor the child concept of freedom, and conservatives lean more towards the adult concept of freedom — and each looks on the other’s ideas as scary and oppressive.
The liberals wonder, if you don’t have health care or food or a place to live — and if some privately held company can fire you at any moment and remove your livelihood — how can you be free? And they wonder why we would let ourselves be oppressed by such worries when we have the means and the government to take care of them. Conservatives, on the other hand, look at liberal ideas with great fear, knowing such guarantees by the government will come with restrictions, and if the government fails to deliver what it promises or does it poorly, there’s nothing to be done about it, because there are no other options. How can you be free if the government controls so much of your life and limits the choices available to you?
5. Liberal freedom is freedom from responsibility. Conservative freedom is guaranteed by responsibility.
6. Liberals may love their freedom – but they’re not so crazy about yours.
7. Liberalism: like being parented by Michael Jackson, and The Great Santini. No matter what it looks like on the outside, it is strange and abusive behind the closed doors of the committee rooms.
posted by CAROLYN at 3:42 PM
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