From an e-friend:
“What do you think of this? I think it is true."
“----- Original Message -----
“Subject: Fw: Interesting thought
“ What a profound short little paragraph that says it all!!!
“*”You cannot legislate the poor into prosperity by legislating the wealthy out of prosperity. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is the beginning of the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”*
“* Adrian Rogers, 1931*”
His response
Well, Adrian Rogers was a far right-wing Baptist preacher who was born in 1931, died in 2005, and was a wildly popular, Southern Baptist evangelist (yeah, one of those guys on the radio who asked little old ladies for donations). He was president of the Southern Baptist Convention for three terms, and during his tenure, he fired all moderate and liberal faculty members at Southern Baptist seminaries, and forced all employees of all Southern Baptist schools and organizations to sign loyalty oaths. He was a bigoted clergyman who was absolutely persuaded that his own interpretation of the Bible was correct, and anyone who believed otherwise was damned out-of-hand. He particularly hated Lutherans, Episcopalians, and Calvinists (Presbyterians and Congregationalists, among others). He also advocated that pastors have an absolute responsibility to influence their parishioners’ political choices. CHARMING person.
If you think Rush Limbaugh is a brilliant political philosopher—and not a college dropout (his MOTHER said, “He flunked everything, even Modern Ballroom Dancing!”), a drug addict, and a blowhard one-trick pony on the radio—then you’ll buy this big-time.
Personally, I think it’s horse…ummm …“hockey.”
Of COURSE you can’t “legislate the poor into prosperity.” NEITHER, however, can you “legislate the wealthy OUT of prosperity”—unless, that is, you tax them at 100% and seize all of their property. That contention, then, is sheer crap.
Second, “what one person receives without working for” just MIGHT be the dollar you put into the collection plate at church last week. That “non-working person” might not be ABLE to work. Ever try to be a paraplegic and earn a living? A person dying of cancer? How about a person who’s been fired, and has six children to support with no money coming in? On and on. So this one is crap too.
“The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else.”
Yup, that’s how government works, and the money the government gets is called “taxes.”
So, for instance, the government spent somebody’s money and gave us I-80. Did YOU pay for it? ALL of it, I mean? Do you ever USE I-80? Who DID buy it if you didn’t? WHAT gives you the right to drive on it, anyway? Does somebody who pays more in taxes than you do have the right to drive on I-80 more than you do? Do YOU have the right to drive on I-80 more than somebody who pays less in taxes than you do? More crap, of the purest sort.
“When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is the beginning of the end of any nation.”
Absolute, unadulterated, chin-deep horse diarrhea. MANY of the “people who do not work” in the U.S. today ARE THE RICHEST PEOPLE IN THE COUNTRY!
Of those, the few who DO work are the ones who screwed us over in this economy by their sheer incompetence!
AND, far from denying them more money, the Bush administration GAVE THEM BILLIONS OF DOLLARS WITHOUT EVEN ASKING THEM TO ACCOUNT FOR THE MONEY!!! Naturally, the filthy-rich swine paid themselves millions of dollars off the top!
The WORKING people—you, and me, and your employees, and everybody with a normal job—PAID TAXES TO GIVE BILLIONS TO THOSE B**TARDS FOR MESSING US ALL UP! THAT, my friend, is how it works in the real world, and that is right-wing, neoconservative-led law giving at its most basic and working level.
That is the nirvana of Richard Nixon, the slobbering idiot Ronald Reagan, and both foolish Bushes, father and son. THIS IS THE GOLDEN AGE THEY GAVE US! BASK IN IT!
And THEN their pygmy intellectual descendants have the COJONES to try to destroy the people who are trying to clean up THEIR mess! What contemptible creatures they all are!
“You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”
Oh, C’MON!!! “Dividing it” is the ONLY way to multiply wealth effectively!
If you have money, you invest some in stocks. Some goes into bonds. Some into taxable investments. Some into tax-free investments. Some goes into CDs. Some goes into a bank account as cash.
In other words, if a wealthy person wants to make MORE money, he or she splits up the wealth fourteen ways from Sunday, and puts it into ALL kinds of money-making investments. Of COURSE the money is divided! The very first sentence in EVERY book on investment contains some version of the word “diversify.”
This old fart may have been a fine man and a good preacher (though I’d have had real “issues” with him).
He was a real toilet-licking ignoramus as an economist.
“A profound little paragraph,” my Aunt Fanny’s Off Hind Foot! It is one of the most ignorant things I’ve ever read.
Moreover, YOU don’t believe it, either. Not for an instant, if you really think about what it means.
THAT is what I think. In fact, that’s only the tip of the iceberg of the contempt I feel for these kinds of foolish statements.
One last little tidbit: That Cadillac-driving welfare queen you hate so much? NEWS FLASH! She never existed! She was invented—MADE UP—by RONALD REAGAN, who didn’t think this country owed anything to anybody. He wanted to do away with Social Security, veterans’ benefits, job-finding benefits, food stamps for poor people. He LOVED giving benefits to really, really rich people by making it possible for them to pay NO taxes (that was his goal).
So don’t BEGIN to tell me that your version of welfare is evil. It doesn’t even EXIST!
Now. Want to know what I REALLY think?
1 comment:
Excellent piece, Jay.
We have only just entered a recession but in England we already have statistics showing an increase in crime correlating to the increase in redundancies. I think this shows that people are happy to keep the rules of society as long as they are able to provide for their families and themselves. You take that opportunity away from them and they will act as any creature would act.
The problem we have in England is that the basic wage is so low (kept that way by bringing in cheap labour from abroad) that, for many poor people, welfare and/or low level crime is a better option than working for a living. The answer to this, which would be good for the poor and society in general, is to encourage attractive wages for traditionally low paid jobs. However, if the rich want to protect their interests (and that is what low wages are all about) then they have to be prepared to pay a much higher welfare bill. Of course, as their wealth normally protects them from having to live with the results of low wages, they aren't interested in doing this. It is the lower middle classes that take the brunt of the resulting criminality.
Almost everybody wants to work for their living. A small minority needs help getting into the workplace. The incredibly small percentage of people who are inherently "scroungers" should be treated with sympathy and given welfare. This would cost little, protect society and be the civilised thing to do.
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