Stumptalk: Elitists believe the American ideal of liberty is wrong

Opinion

March 21, 2013

Stumptalk: Elitists believe the American ideal of liberty is wrong

By Jerry McDonough Chronicle contributor The Crossville Chronicle Thu Mar 21, 2013, 11:54 AM CDT

CROSSVILLE — Until recently only libertarians have been arguing that Americans are insufficiently free while some conservatives argue that perhaps Americans have too much freedom in some instances. But thanks to today’s elitist liberals' barely concealed hostility of the free market, their love for Obamacare and the threat they pose to religious liberty and economic freedom conservatives having reassessed their position are assuming the libertarian beliefs although in a lesser form.

The liberal policy is not all that concerned with liberty, but they are concerned about economic equality as in America needs to “spread the wealth.” Of course, the true elite liberal wants to spread someone else’s wealth and not their own because many elite liberals believe they are owed their wealth and position by birthright and education. In 1976 Patrick Moynihan during a speech at the UN said,”…those nations who have put liberty ahead of equality have ended up doing better by equality than those with the reverse priority…..”

But, let’s not confuse the elite liberal mindset and their socialist views with facts and logic. The obvious split in America today is between the Republicans being the party of liberty and the Democrats being the party of redistribution. The Democrats never seem to tire of claiming that the rich are failing to pay their fair share of taxes to which Walter Williams, a renowned economics professor at George Mason University, asks, “What standard of fairness dictates that the top ten percent of wage earners pay 71 percent of federal income taxes while 47 percent of Americans pay absolutely nothing?” The Democrat party, which is the party of “spreading the wealth,” assumes the gap between achievers and non-achievers is a violation of social justice. Of course, this assumption diminishes the role played by talent, ambition, daring, character, initiative, work and spirit producing unequal outcomes in the God given right of “Pursuit of Happiness” as guaranteed by the 1787 Constitution.

Study after study as well as the recent collapse of the Occupy Walls Street movement has confirmed that Americans do not hate the rich nor do they have a passion for “spreading the wealth” that has spread failed socialism in the rest of the world — can we spell Europe? This concept totally escapes the mental grasp of the elite socialists. What clearly explains this lack of passion for “spreading the wealth” is the opportunities American liberty has provided countless millions of achievers who take advantage of that liberty and better their lot. Liberty also explains how unprecedented and unmatched levels of prosperity have been created in America and shared more widely in America than in any other country in the world. As Tocqueville wrote in the 1800s, “The word poor is used here in a relative, not an absolute sense. Poor men in America would often appear rich in comparison with the poor of Europe.” Some things just never change.

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