When I decided to write this I did a lot of research on how much we spend on various things. How much it costs us to accomplish certain things. Is our generosity of spirit cost effective? My research confirmed my thoughts. Hopefully, I won't go to hell for having just that formulation of thought. The more I think about it the more I find it to be shameful and I'm sorry to have ever had such a thought. A cost effective generosity of spirit, Gawd!
I do believe we have a responsibility to limit our generosity thru the government to that which benefits all of us since we expect all of us to pay for it. Charity and the operation of government is and should be two different things. I think how we are known to posterity is a huge component of providing for the general welfare. You may feel, as I do, that how we are known to Providence is a big portion of OUR welfare. What will you say to St Peter? But if you don't feel that way, all of us still have to answer to the future. We have to answer to our children and their children. We owe them a future with simple kindness as a huge component. History has taught us that. We are direct beneficiaries of our parents and their parents knowing that. It's a powerful American Value.
I think you can say both the Germans and the Japanese tried to build world orders that discounted simple human decency and we did beat hell out of them for trying it. We could also say both attempts fell of their own weight but we did beat hell outta them. We kinda killed them for the sake of kindness. There's a thought.
I think it's shameful that we went, in a few short years from making war on poverty to making it fashionable to look askance at the poor. How we abandoned our values to embrace that message is a mystery to me.
I could go on forever but it boils down to this: There are two kinds of people in this world. There are those who are proud to contribute to and live in a society that can easily provide for even the most despicable among us and insure to the limits of our abilities their children don't go hungry or go without health care or education or go without the simplest of comforts. Then there are those who those facts just fill with resentment and envy. Which are you? Who are you?
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