Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Some highlights from our record of federal programs

  • The U.S. Post Service was established in 1775. The federal government has had had 234 years to get it right and it is broke.
  • Social Security was established in 1935. The federal government has had 74 years to get it right and it is broke.
  • Fannie Mae was established in 1938. The federal government has had 71 years to get it right and it is broke.
  • The War on Poverty started in 1964 under Lyndon B. Johnson. The federal government has had 45 years to get it right; $1 trillion of our money is garnered annually and transferred to "the poor" and the feds only want more.
  • Medicare and Medicaid were established in 1965. The federal government has had 44 years to get it right and they are broke.
  • Freddie Mac was established in 1970. The federal government has had 39 years to get it right and it is broke.
  • The Department of Energy was created in 1977 to lessen our dependence on foreign oil. It has ballooned to 16,000 employees with a budget of $24 billion a year and we import more oil than ever before. The federal government has had 32 years to get it right and it is an abysmal failure.
The federal government has implemented some high-minded ideas over the years, but it has FAILED in every "public service" it has presumed to provide while overspending our tax dollars at unconscionable levels. The present administration is asking Americans to believe it can be trusted with a government-run health care system. With its track record of dismal failures, not to mention the current administration's levels of spending and executive over-reaching within its first year, it's a wonder anyone can be so sanguine as to trust the government. The quarrel that the majority of American people have with their government is not over good health care, or the needed reform of the bloated health insurance systems. They have little trouble in principle with supporting that. Furthermore, they want health coverage not just for themselves but for everyone. Americans have been historically a generous people. The problem they have is not with reforming the health care system, but trusting their government bureaucracy to run it.

[Hat tip to J.S.]
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6 comments:

  1. Pertinacious Papist7:34 PM

    Unlike the earlier programs, the health care bill is the first program lacking any bi-partisan support. To think there is anything like a public 'mandate' here is simply silly.

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  2. Fr. Paul10:05 AM

    Why does our Federal Government have to interfere with our lives to such a degree that we have no freedom at all in matters that formerly would have been governed by our principles and by the teachings of the Church? The Church for 2000 years has cared for the poor, helped the destitute, cared for the sick and the orphan, provided for the widow and the needy. We can do it again. We may have to eliminate the CCHD, the USCCB, and a few other aspects of wasted money and energy but ultimately we can do it better and more charitably than the Federal Government could ever hope to do.
    Fr. Paul M. Hartley

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  3. Anonymous12:21 PM

    Apparently, the fight is not over whether the government should do these things, but which party controls/operates the program.

    When we are no longer having this debate, at what point does the pledge "to the republic for which it stands" mean anything?


    Benedict Arnold

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  4. Sheldon11:29 PM

    B.A.,

    I think it depends on who you mean. There are places where heated debates do occur between libertarians (who can range from minimal governmentists to philosophical anarchists) and neo-liberals (who can range from Fabian Socialists to Neo-Marxists).

    But the question you ask in your second paragraph is well-taken.

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  5. Anonymous12:21 PM

    Philip,

    Entirely apropos of this current line of reasoning, does the Hate Crime legislation mean that Master Cromwell is now correct, that the defendant may be presumed to have treasonous motives?

    Chris Garton-Zavesky

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  6. Pertinacious Papist4:35 PM

    Mr. Garton-Zavesky,

    Apparently so. Santayana said that those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it. In this case, those who are doomed to repeat history as the victims of their oppressors may well be those who, unlike their oppressors, know their history.

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