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Transcript

Social Services Part 2 · Check with Chip

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Check with Chip, brought to you by Operation
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  Speaker 1: Blue Dot Red, turning the blue dot red one podcast
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  Speaker 1: at a time. Today I follow up on the assertion
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  Speaker 1: that a Christian must say yes to all manner of
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  Speaker 1: social services funded and administered by the government. Otherwise, Jesus
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  Speaker 1: will say to you, when I was hungry or sick
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  Speaker 1: or in need of shelter, you ignored or denied me.
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  Speaker 1: the left seems to argue that the moral thing to
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  Speaker 1: do is to jack the top income tax rate back
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  Speaker 1: up to 70% or more and have the government guarantee
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  Speaker 1: a certain standard of living for every citizen. If you
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  Speaker 1: question the advisability, never mind the legality or constitutionality, of
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  Speaker 1: having the federal government assume such a duty, you are
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  Speaker 1: accused of hating old people, children, and all of humanity.
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  Speaker 1: For example, The left says that without Obamacare, 30 million
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  Speaker 1: people won't get health care. But why should the federal
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  Speaker 1: government raise taxes and spend money to cover uninsured citizens?
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  Speaker 1: Just because the government can do something does not mean
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  Speaker 1: that it should do it. But someone might suffer or
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  Speaker 1: die if the federal government doesn't act, the left insists.
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  Speaker 1: This is where people ready to embrace limited government often
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  Speaker 1: lose their nerve. This is where former Massachusetts Governor Mitt
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  Speaker 1: Romney ran into heavy turbulence as a 2012 Republican presidential
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  Speaker 1: candidate when he said, My job is not to worry
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  Speaker 1: about the 47% of people dependent on the federal government.
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  Speaker 1: He meant worry about winning their votes. But the left
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  Speaker 1: spun it as, Romney saying that as president he would
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  Speaker 1: ignore the plight of the poor. Romney was more correct
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  Speaker 1: than he was willing to admit. He should have jammed
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  Speaker 1: it right back down the throat of the left and
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  Speaker 1: said it is not the job of the president to
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  Speaker 1: promise and deliver social services. What about people facing crises
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  Speaker 1: in health and other areas of life without the means
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  Speaker 1: to handle them? Leave them to suffer on their own?
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  Speaker 1: Of course not. The Constitution limits what the federal government
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  Speaker 1: can do. State and local governments can provide social services
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  Speaker 1: as authorized by state constitutions and state and local statutes.
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  Speaker 1: There are local, regional, and national non-government social service providers,
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  Speaker 1: religious and secular, that are better than government at providing
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  Speaker 1: cost-effective social services. And, of course, there is no limit
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  Speaker 1: to what individuals are free to do to help their
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  Speaker 1: fellow citizens. If you believe a problem needs immediate, major
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  Speaker 1: financial assistance, then you can engage in voluntary taxation. Donate
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  Speaker 1: money to a cause or form an organization to solicit
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  Speaker 1: donations for it. Appeal to a motion. Make a convincing case.
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  Speaker 1: Sell it. There's nothing wrong with a cause having to
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  Speaker 1: prove itself and earn support. Skeptics say the call for
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  Speaker 1: limited government is really a way for conservatives to absolve
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  Speaker 1: themselves of responsibility for helping the poor. The skeptics have
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  Speaker 1: it backwards. Limited government doesn't get the citizen off the
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  Speaker 1: moral hook. It puts the citizen on the moral hook.
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  Speaker 1: As I mentioned yesterday, some decline to give to charitable
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  Speaker 1: causes because they presume government is addressing the problem. Under
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  Speaker 1: limited government, You don't get to pass off to some
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  Speaker 1: government bureaucracy your duty to help fellow citizens. In his
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  Speaker 1: 2006 book, Who Really Cares? The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism,
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  Speaker 1: Arthur Brooks showed that conservatives earn less income than liberals,
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  Speaker 1: yet give more to charity. Conservatives are frugal, yet generous.
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  Speaker 1: They embrace the responsibility of the prosperous to help the struggling.
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  Speaker 1: Individuals and societies that ignore this responsibility endanger themselves. The
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  Speaker 1: stability of society erodes if pockets of suffering and frustration
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  Speaker 1: fester and grow. Shirking this responsibility erodes the character of
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  Speaker 1: the shirkers. Willingness to contribute to the common good is
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  Speaker 1: necessary for a self-governing society to thrive. If the virtue
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  Speaker 1: of Americans is weak, and the prosperous ignore the struggling,
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  Speaker 1: then American society will die a deserved death. But big
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  Speaker 1: government is not the answer. Resorting to big government guarantees failure.
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  Speaker 1: We have examples all over the world, including American cities,
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  Speaker 1: under liberal progressive management for decades. The best way to
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  Speaker 1: care for the needy is to create conditions for prosperity
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  Speaker 1: and and generosity. I have worked enough in fundraising to
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  Speaker 1: know that Americans, of all political persuasions, are generous. Donors
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  Speaker 1: may require financial accountability and evidence of success, but they
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  Speaker 1: will rally to help people in need. If you want
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  Speaker 1: more reasons why expanding government is the wrong way to
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  Speaker 1: address social needs, fixitnowchip.com. That's where you go to get
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  Speaker 1: my books, including the one on fiscal policy that explains
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  Speaker 1: how we can have limited government and still care for
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  Speaker 1: those in need. FixItNowChip.com That's Check with Chip. I'm Chip Maxwell.
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  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening.