As has always been the case for as long as the human race has walked the earth, our problems can be directly linked to our own moral failings or the failings of others. The United States (aka the Sinking Eagle) is in danger of collapse as a result of these four sentiments running loose in the world. All trace of shame at these personal vices is vanishing. The laws that were meant to discourage these vices, or protect people from these failings in others, are being systematically weakened in favor of laws which enable them.
From a financial viewpoint greed is the chief problem facing us. There are millions of people who believe that getting value without offering value in return is an acceptable way to live, and the Democratic party has pandered to this vice for longer than I have been alive, offering rationalizations about oppression and directly appealing to envy at every turn.
The Democrat's denunciations of poor people and of big business are nothing but hot air; the very moment they are off of the campaign trail they are scooping up donations from the very classes they denounce. If you want to see how much a Democratic Congressman really wants to sock it to big business, ask them to support a Constutional Amendment that bans bailouts, subsidies, and all of the other stuff that our government does to protect businesses from competition. You will hear a different tune, because it never was about socking it to big business. It was about getting elected.
The situation with public employee benefits is another instance of greed. What else motivates the many thousands of unionized public sector employees to state, without shame, that they are entitled to pension benefits that exceed the take-home pay of many thousands of people who are still working, merely because they have achieved retirement age, other than greed?
The demand for a generous welfare state is just another manifestation of human greed. An entire sector of our nation thinks that they are entitled to live at the expense of others and owe nothing in return. The rationalizations are plentiful, but they are rationalizations. The only argument that the welfare crowd has offered to justify the benefits is that they will throw some form of temper tantrum if their demands are not met.
To put it in short: Our present financial trouble is caused by the policies put in place at the urging of the Democratic party. Take away every form of welfare--both personal and corporate--and our financial troubles go away.
