Republicans in Congress Betray The Tea Party & GOP Principles

We, in the heartland have long lamented that the GOP's "elite leadership" in Washington are clueless imbeciles, who regularly "go along to get along."  But as they say, the proof is in the pudding.  Very nearly all the current membership of Congress has spent the vast majority of their political careers as a minority party in either their state house, or in Congress.

Once upon a time, the GOP stood for things like keeping down taxation, regulation and the reducing the size of blouted federal government.  But  like all things political, GOP politicians who said they were for this, were only paying lip-service for the masses. Most recently, GOP opposition to ObamaCare was that it was beyond the purview of the federal government both in the Commerce Clause as well as the 10th amendment, which limits the scope of the federal government.  Then came politics...

Among other things, S.197 sets a statute of limitations for claims, caps damages and creates standards for expert witnesses. These may sound like great ideas, but they are not within the constitutional powers granted to the federal government for the very same reasons Obamacare is not.

The law’s own justification for its constitutional authority should be chilling to anyone committed to limited federal power. The bill’s findings state that health care and health insurance are industries that “affect interstate commerce,” and conclude that Congress therefore has Commerce Clause power to regulate them — even when it involves an in-state transaction between a doctor and patient, governed by in-state medical malpractice laws. Is there any industry that couldn’t be found to have an effect on interstate commerce? The agriculture and manufacturing industries, long considered the paradigmatic areas not covered by the Commerce Clause, certainly fall under federal power under this broad analysis.

Now, the Senate GOP is for big government, because it's something that they want...for political jockeying. So, which is it? They have no principles that matter, and should adhere to, or they're just political hacks who say one thing one day, and something diametrically opposite the other? This is hypocrisy that is often laid at the feet of Congressional [Social] Democats...and a bat that should be used to beat the GOP political leadership.

No wonder Rush Limbaugh took to the airwaves at the close of last week, an advance copy of this article in his hand, to say in essence -- and sadly -- that he was coming to the conclusion that in fact there were a number of Republicans who were on the other side -- as in those who once supported the conservative argument having jumped the fence to play in some fashion for Clark Clifford's old team

Making them, as we will call them here, "Clark Clifford Republicans."

"Clark Clifford Republicans" defined as those who really don't believe in the Reagan/Coolidge view -- the conservative view and once upon a time the Republican view -- of the world at all. Even if they give good lip service to the idea in public, it is clear from this piece that in the quiet corners of this or that Washington bistro they are muttering their equivalent derogations for Tea Partiers that match in some fashion Clifford's "amiable dunce" derisive. Although, it appears, they have dropped the "amiable."

It's not simply that they have a Thomas E. Dewey/Nelson Rockefeller view of the world or, to use Barry Goldwater's pithy description, they favor a "dime store New Deal."

The real problem here is that all of Clark Clifford's friends across the decades have so rooted Big Government in the psychology of Washington that "Republican Elites" have elected to accept the whole premise -- and for reasons having to do with self-preservation simply cannot bring themselves to get seriously Reaganesque or Coolidge-like because to do so gnaws at their own economic vitals and capacity for influence. Both now hopelessly entangled with the concrete boxes of bureaucracy that literally litter the Washington landscape. [Emphasis is mine, Ed.]

This is a bad bill and should never have been written this way.  You can't scream about a massive government over-reach in one minute...then try and extend the reach of government in another.  This is what DEMOCRATS DO...and is a gross betrayal of core principles of the Republican Party.

GOP Leadership Betrays The Base

As I predicted last year, the GOP leadership in Congress has betrayed not just the Tea Party that gave them a huge historic victory, but the entire Republican Party.  Mr. Bohner, et al, have prized collegiality above principles.  We were promised $100B in cuts on THIS YEARS budget, what we got? Less than 0.38% of that figure.

"Meaningful cuts" was, after all, the GOP mantra going into the talks -- but what they came away with was a handful of sand. The Congressional Budget Office reported yesterday that the deal ac tually trims just $352 million from this year's outlays instead of the advertised $38.5 billion.

I don't think the corrupt GOP leadership understands that they were given one chance to get it right...and they've blown it.  We The People will remember in 2012 what you've done to our country, our party and those principles you claimed to hold dear.  We will elect a new slate and you'll be kicked to the curb.

HT Instapundit

UPDATE:  Instalanche!  Thanks Glenn.

Here's a link  that shows just who voted for the "deal" that screws America.  Boehner blew it.  He had a chance to do the right thing...and blinked.  I hope that next year, someone will have the courage to give him a real primary challenge.  Remember, for anyone to challenge an incumbent takes time and money...contribute freely to their opponents with both.  It's the only way to show the leaders of the Republican Party, that We The People meant what we said at the ballot box last year.

UPDATE II:  Percentage corrected per a commenter.  Thanks!

Goliath Meets the Tea Partier

Without the Tea Party's intervention, this bill would have quietly sailed through both houses of Congress.  Now, with the GOP leaders in the Senate finally understanding that they must pay more than lipservice to the GOP platform of reduced government spending, but they actually have to follow through with it.  With the defeat in the primaries this year of just about every single "annointed" GOP candidate of the national party by upstart Tea Party candidates, the GOP leadership might just begin to understand that We The People won't stand for wasteful spending any more.  It has to stop now.

Don Surber's blog, via InstaPundit

Omnibus Spending Bill

Show to just how tone deaf the Democratic leadership in Congress, they have introduced an Omnibus spending bill the fund the federal government until October of 2011 (Fiscal 2011) that shoots past $1,200,000,000,000.00.  All of which will be funded...by bonds, you've got it, we'll have to BORROW the money!  Included in that bill are 6488 earmarks used as payoffs by corrupt politicians that total $8.3 billion dollars.  While that's basically chump change, it's corrupt chump change in a time we should be looking at fiscal austerity.

This is the bill that Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid refused to bring to floor before the election because they feared what the public's reaction would be...as if losing 7 seats in the Senate, and 64 in the House weren't bad enough.  They were afraid that the tsunami would have been worse if the public had been able to peruse this bill before hitting the polling booth.

The $1.2 trillion bill, released on Tuesday, includes more than 6,000 earmarks totaling $8 billion, an amount that many lawmakers decried as an irresponsible binge following a midterm election in which many voters demanded that the government cut spending.
"The American people said just 42 days ago, 'Enough!' . . . Are we tone deaf? Are we stricken with amnesia?" Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a leading earmark critic, said on the Senate floor, flipping through the 1,924-page bill as he pounded his desk.

The bill includes $18 million for two nonprofits associated with deceased Democrats, the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and Rep. John P. Murtha; $349,000 for swine waste management in North Carolina; and $6 million for a rural Iowa school program named after Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).

 While Mitch McConnell has agreed to a moritorium on earmarks...

the legislation includes provisions requested this year by McConnell, including $650,000 for a genetic technology center at the University of Kentucky, according to an analysis of the bill by Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog.

That's the height of hypocrisy...even for a jaded GOP leadership that no one in this country trusts.  On the plus side, John Boehner did release this: 

"If President Obama is truly serious about ending earmarks, he should oppose Senate Democrats' pork-laden omnibus spending bill and announce he will veto it if necessary. This bill represents exactly what the American people have rejected: more spending, more earmarks, and more big government. Republicans strongly oppose this last-ditch spending spree, a smack in the face to taxpayers at a time when we're borrowing 40 cents of every dollar we spend. Senate Democrats even go so far as to plow more than $1 billion into implementing ObamaCare, despite a growing national revolt against this job-killing health care law. . . .Senate Democrats should stand down so we can get to work on cleaning up Washington's fiscal mess"

The need to stop Washington’s job-killing spending binge may be lost on Senate Democrats, but it will be a top priority for the new Republican majority in the House. We have already banned earmarks and made a pledge to America to end the practice of omnibus bills like this disgrace and cut spending to pre-‘stimulus,’ pre-bailout levels. Instead of making reckless spending decisions in the waning days of the lame-duck session, Senate Democrats should stand down so we can get to work on cleaning up Washington’s fiscal mess.

What the GOP leadership must emphatically remember, the country didn't choose the Republican Party because we like an trust them, they were chosen because "they suck a little bit less" than the Democrats.  Here's some of the pork in the Senate version

• $247,000 - Virus free grapes in Washington State
• $413,000 - Peanut research in Alabama
• $125,000 - Fishery equipment for the Guam Fisherman’s Cooperative Association
• $349,000 - Swine waste management in North Carolina
• $277,000 - Potato pest management in wisconsin
• $246,000 - Bovine tuberculosis treatment in Michigan and Minnesota
• $522,000 - Cranberry and blueberry disease and breeding in New Jersey
• $500,000 - Oyster safety in Florida
• $400,000 - Solar parking canopies and plug-in electric stations in Kansas
• $165,000 - Maple syrup research in Vermont

Here's John McCain on the floor of the Senate, commenting about this bill.

 

 Basically, what it comes down to is this Democratically led Congress is telling America, and the just past election results, a resounding "fuck you."  They obviously haven't been listening, much less paying attention to what We The People want out elected representatives to do.

It's well past time to put an end to "lame duck" sessions, unless there is a pressing national emergency.  It's only been in the past 30 or so years that lame duck sessions have become the norm, and that norm has only been in the past 12 or so years.  Prior to the early 1980's, lame duck sessions were only called when pressing issues needed attention.  This Congress, and it's leadership, has ignored the will of the people long enough.  I believe that they don't think that we will remember what they've done in two years.  I don't think that they are taking the Tea Party movement seriously enough.  2012 is coming, and we WILL remember.

H/T Instapundit as always

UPDATE:  Congressman John Sarbanes answered with this:

Thank you for contacting me about deficits and the national debt. The national debt is a serious problem that requires our attention; I agree that we must act decisively to right our present fiscal course.

The irresponsible fiscal policies of the last decade left our nation on precarious fiscal footing as we slid into the worst recession in a generation. The impact of these policies cannot be reversed immediately and, without sustained economic growth, draconian spending cuts and tax increases will be required. That is why there has been general consensus among economists and policy experts that in the near term, as a response to the recession, targeted tax cuts and government spending are a desirable form of economic stimulus. Although balanced budgets must be an essential piece of any long-term economic strategy, the responsible use of short-term stimulus provides a much-needed "shot in the arm" for our struggling economy.

As the economy returns to sustainable growth, and once we have pushed closer to full employment, we must take a serious look at all elements of spending and tax revenue in order to return to fiscal responsibility. Last year, we made progress by enacting a statutory Pay-As-You-Go law to ensure that non-emergency spending or tax cuts are fully paid for elsewhere in budget. Pay-Go was applied during the 1990s and, along with strong economic growth, helped us achieve the budget surpluses of that decade. But the law was allowed to expire in 2002. I am also encouraged by the President's decision to create a national commission to make independent recommendations to the Congress about policies to get our fiscal house in order. The Commission's recommendations include tough choices about entitlements, tax revenue, and discretionary spending. Although I do not agree with every aspect of this proposal, these recommendations serve as a starting point as we begin to debate a comprehensive deficit-reduction package in the coming months. Make no mistake, enacting measures that will truly improve our fiscal condition will require shared sacrifice and real tradeoffs between government services and tax policy. I will come to this debate with the perspective that our budget policies should reflect our nation's values— ensuring opportunity and strengthening communities, promoting private enterprise and innovation, and sharing the costs of government equitably. I look forward to your continued input on this issue and I will keep your views in mind when the Congress considers relevant measures.

Again, I appreciate hearing from you. Please do not hesitate to contact me about other issues of concern to you in the future.

Sincerely,

John Sarbanes
Member of Congress

and I...being an angry Tea Partier answered him thusly: 
message dated 12/15/2010 6:01:44 P.M. Eastern Standard Time, md03ima@mail.house.gov writes:

"The irresponsible fiscal policies of the last decade left our nation on precarious fiscal footing as we slid into the worst recession in a generation. The impact of these policies cannot be reversed immediately and, without sustained economic growth, draconian spending cuts and tax increases will be required."

But when Nancy Pelosi took up the Speaker's gavel in 2006, she said she would be a good steward of "The Peoples" money...yet on her watch, and yours, you have added 1/3 to the national debt, with over $4 trillion dollars added in the past 23 months. How can you justify wasted 1 trillion on 'stimulus' that was now acknowledged by the White House to be an abject failure? How can you justify a two year average deficit of $1.4 trillion dollars per year? Answer that, without political wishy washyness and explain in simple language how...

Richard A. Vail
Pikesville, MD 21208
ravail136@aol.com
http://thevailspot.blogspot.com/

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.--Thomas Jefferson

 

It's time to find a candidate who can oppose this sort of political corruption and do so while not being "captured" by the corrupt Washinton DC system.

Why The GOP Will Screw Up Next Year...

This is why I have no faith in the GOP leadership inside the Washington DC beltway.  Here's a bit from Instapundit...the bold is exactly why I don't think that the GOP has what it takes to turn this country around.  In fact, I'd go so far as to say that the leadership of the party in Congress IS PART OF THE PROBLEM!

UNEMPLOYMENT: “The jobs lost in the 2000-2001 recession don’t seem to have ever come back. The percentage of people in the workforce stabilized, but never recovered. This time, it looks like the re-employment picture will be even worse. . . . The Boomers are not retiring. Their workforce participation rate is well above forecast. Have you looked at your 401(k)?” Understandable, but of course that means fewer new jobs will open up.


Plus, from the comments: “The USA is increasingly not a good place to do business. We need a stiff broom. I worry that the GOP won’t do what it takes.” So do I. I was on Hugh Hewitt’s show last night, and he said that when he talks to Beltway GOP insiders he’s amazed at how out of touch they are. They’re not even sure about passing a ban on earmarks if they take the majority, much less more significant change. If they get the majority back, and blow it, they’ll be looking at a third-party challenge in 2012, and not just at the Presidential level.

The so called "elite leaders" of the party are actively blocking the necessary reforms that we as a nation need in order to remain economically viable.  Perhaps it's time to form that 3rd party and cast aside the corrupt GOP leadership.

Reagan insider: 'GOP destroyed U.S. economy

A very good friend sent me the article below...here's his comment on it.

I think many voters realize how bad the past GOP was fiscally hence why they lost the presidency and congress. This also explains the distaste for DC Republican incumbents now. Interesting article and I could not disagree with most of it.

How: Gold. Tax cuts. Debts. Wars. Fat Cats. Class gap. No fiscal discipline

By Paul B. Farrell, MarketWatch

ARROYO GRANDE, Calif. (MarketWatch) -- "How my G.O.P. destroyed the U.S. economy." Yes, that is exactly what David Stockman, President Ronald Reagan's director of the Office of Management and Budget, wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed piece, "Four Deformations of the Apocalypse."

Get it? Not "destroying." The GOP has already "destroyed" the U.S. economy, setting up an "American Apocalypse."

Yes, Stockman is equally damning of the Democrats' Keynesian policies. But what this indictment by a party insider -- someone so close to the development of the Reaganomics ideology -- says about America, helps all of us better understand how America's toxic partisan-politics "holy war" is destroying not just the economy and capitalism, but the America dream. And unless this war stops soon, both parties will succeed in their collective death wish.

But why focus on Stockman's message? It's already lost in the 24/7 news cycle. Why? We need some introspection. Ask yourself: How did the great nation of America lose its moral compass and drift so far off course, to where our very survival is threatened?

We've arrived at a historic turning point as a nation that no longer needs outside enemies to destroy us, we are committing suicide. Democracy. Capitalism. The American dream. All dying. Why? Because of the economic decisions of the GOP the past 40 years, says this leading Reagan Republican.

Please listen with an open mind, no matter your party affiliation: This makes for a powerful history lesson, because it exposes how both parties are responsible for destroying the U.S. economy. Listen closely:

Reagan Republican: the GOP should file for bankruptcy

Stockman rushes into the ring swinging like a boxer: "If there were such a thing as Chapter 11 for politicians, the Republican push to extend the unaffordable Bush tax cuts would amount to a bankruptcy filing. The nation's public debt ... will soon reach $18 trillion." It screams "out for austerity and sacrifice." But instead, the GOP insists "that the nation's wealthiest taxpayers be spared even a three-percentage-point rate increase."

In the past 40 years Republican ideology has gone from solid principles to hype and slogans. Stockman says: "Republicans used to believe that prosperity depended upon the regular balancing of accounts -- in government, in international trade, on the ledgers of central banks and in the financial affairs of private households and businesses too."

No more. Today there's a "new catechism" that's "little more than money printing and deficit finance, vulgar Keynesianism robed in the ideological vestments of the prosperous classes" making a mockery of GOP ideals. Worse, it has resulted in "serial financial bubbles and Wall Street depredations that have crippled our economy." Yes, GOP ideals backfired, crippling our economy.

Stockman's indictment warns that the Republican party's "new policy doctrines have caused four great deformations of the national economy, and modern Republicans have turned a blind eye to each one:"

Stage 1. Nixon irresponsible, dumps gold, U.S starts spending binge

Richard Nixon's gold policies get Stockman's first assault, for defaulting "on American obligations under the 1944 Bretton Woods agreement to balance our accounts with the world." So for the past 40 years, America's been living "beyond our means as a nation" on "borrowed prosperity on an epic scale ... an outcome that Milton Friedman said could never happen when, in 1971, he persuaded President Nixon to unleash on the world paper dollars no longer redeemable in gold or other fixed monetary reserves."

Remember Friedman: "Just let the free market set currency exchange rates, he said, and trade deficits will self-correct." Friedman was wrong by trillions. And unfortunately "once relieved of the discipline of defending a fixed value for their currencies, politicians the world over were free to cheapen their money and disregard their neighbors. And without discipline America was also encouraging "global monetary chaos as foreign central banks run their own printing presses at ever faster speeds to sop up the tidal wave of dollars coming from the Federal Reserve." Yes, the road to the coming apocalypse began with a Republican president listening to a misguided Nobel economist's advice

Stage 2. Crushing debts from domestic excesses, war mongering

Stockman says "the second unhappy change in the American economy has been the extraordinary growth of our public debt. In 1970 it was just 40% of gross domestic product, or about $425 billion. When it reaches $18 trillion, it will be 40 times greater than in 1970." Who's to blame? Not big-spending Dems, says Stockman, but "from the Republican Party's embrace, about three decades ago, of the insidious doctrine that deficits don't matter if they result from tax cuts."

Back "in 1981, traditional Republicans supported tax cuts," but Stockman makes clear, they had to be "matched by spending cuts, to offset the way inflation was pushing many taxpayers into higher brackets and to spur investment. The Reagan administration's hastily prepared fiscal blueprint, however, was no match for the primordial forces -- the welfare state and the warfare state -- that drive the federal spending machine."

OK, stop a minute. As you absorb Stockman's indictment of how his Republican party has "destroyed the U.S. economy," you're probably asking yourself why anyone should believe a traitor to the Reagan legacy. I believe party affiliation is irrelevant here. This is a crucial subject that must be explored because it further exposes a dangerous historical trend where politics is so partisan it's having huge negative consequences.

Yes, the GOP does have a welfare-warfare state: Stockman says "the neocons were pushing the military budget skyward. And the Republicans on Capitol Hill who were supposed to cut spending, exempted from the knife most of the domestic budget -- entitlements, farm subsidies, education, water projects. But in the end it was a new cadre of ideological tax-cutters who killed the Republicans' fiscal religion."

When Fed chief Paul Volcker "crushed inflation" in the '80s we got a "solid economic rebound." But then "the new tax-cutters not only claimed victory for their supply-side strategy but hooked Republicans for good on the delusion that the economy will outgrow the deficit if plied with enough tax cuts." By 2009, they "reduced federal revenues to 15% of gross domestic product," lowest since the 1940s. Still today they're irrationally demanding an extension of those "unaffordable Bush tax cuts [that] would amount to a bankruptcy filing."

Recently Bush made matters far worse by "rarely vetoing a budget bill and engaging in two unfinanced foreign military adventures." Bush also gave in "on domestic spending cuts, signing into law $420 billion in nondefense appropriations, a 65% percent gain from the $260 billion he had inherited eight years earlier. Republicans thus joined the Democrats in a shameless embrace of a free-lunch fiscal policy." Takes two to tango.

Stage 3. Wall Street's deadly 'vast, unproductive expansion'

Stockman continues pounding away: "The third ominous change in the American economy has been the vast, unproductive expansion of our financial sector." He warns that "Republicans have been oblivious to the grave danger of flooding financial markets with freely printed money and, at the same time, removing traditional restrictions on leverage and speculation." Wrong, not oblivious. Self-interested Republican loyalists like Paulson, Bernanke and Geithner knew exactly what they were doing.

They wanted the economy, markets and the government to be under the absolute control of Wall Street's too-greedy-to-fail banks. They conned Congress and the Fed into bailing out an estimated $23.7 trillion debt. Worse, they have since destroyed meaningful financial reforms. So Wall Street is now back to business as usual blowing another bigger bubble/bust cycle that will culminate in the coming "American Apocalypse."

Stockman refers to Wall Street's surviving banks as "wards of the state." Wrong, the opposite is true. Wall Street now controls Washington, and its "unproductive" trading is "extracting billions from the economy with a lot of pointless speculation in stocks, bonds, commodities and derivatives." Wall Street banks like Goldman were virtually bankrupt, would have never survived without government-guaranteed deposits and "virtually free money from the Fed's discount window to cover their bad bets."

Stage 4. New American Revolution class-warfare coming soon

Finally, thanks to Republican policies that let us "live beyond our means for decades by borrowing heavily from abroad, we have steadily sent jobs and production offshore," while at home "high-value jobs in goods production ... trade, transportation, information technology and the professions shrunk by 12% to 68 million from 77 million." As the apocalypse draws near, Stockman sees a class-rebellion, a new revolution, a war against greed and the wealthy. Soon. The trigger will be the growing gap between economic classes: No wonder "that during the last bubble (from 2002 to 2006) the top 1% of Americans -- paid mainly from the Wall Street casino -- received two-thirds of the gain in national income, while the bottom 90% -- mainly dependent on Main Street's shrinking economy -- got only 12%. This growing wealth gap is not the market's fault. It's the decaying fruit of bad economic policy."

Get it? The decaying fruit of the GOP's bad economic policies is destroying our economy.

Warning: this black swan won't be pretty, will shock, soon

His bottom line: "The day of national reckoning has arrived. We will not have a conventional business recovery now, but rather a long hangover of debt liquidation and downsizing ... it's a pity that the modern Republican party offers the American people an irrelevant platform of recycled Keynesianism when the old approach -- balanced budgets, sound money and financial discipline -- is needed more than ever."

Wrong: There are far bigger things to "pity."

First, that most Americans, 300 million, are helpless, will do nothing, sit in the bleachers passively watching this deadly partisan game like it's just another TV reality show.

Second, that, unfortunately, politicians are so deep-in-the-pockets of the Wall Street conspiracy that controls Washington they are helpless and blind.

And third, there's a depressing sense that Stockman will be dismissed as a traitor, his message lost in the 24/7 news cycle ... until the final apocalyptic event, an unpredictable black swan triggers another, bigger global meltdown, followed by a long Great Depression II and a historic class war.

So be prepared, it will hit soon, when you least expect.

I have to agree with pretty much all of this.  This is the main reason why I no longer consider myself to be a Republican.  To quote a politician of the opposing party, "I didn't leave my party, my party left me."  The GOP has lost sight of what it stands for and has become "Democratic Lite".  This is not a party that I can support.  I have become far more libertarian than anything else.  The less government intervention, as far as I'm concerned, the better. 

An Email...On Political Parties

A good friend of mine emailed me this:  

In my humble opinion... before I am accused of being party biased, the only difference between the two parties is how they waste your hard earned dollars and what part of the constitution they don't mind treading on. They both stink.

Sadly, I had to agree.  For the most part, the GOP, at least for the past 10 years has been "DemLite"...and for 20 years before that, utterly blinded by social issues...instead of keeping their eye on what is important.  In my humble opinion, that would be keeping a lid on the size of government and government spending.

Recently, we hit rock bottom.  But, in the course of it all...not once have we taken a penny of government money.  Non one red cent.  Every avenue of assistance that we have used, has come from private sources.  It took a little work, and putting aside any shred of pride we had left...but we were able to NOT suck off of Uncle Sam's hind tit.  Now if I can't do this...why can't others?

Government isn't the source of all assistance.  For the first 300 years that there have been "Americans", per se, we didn't look to the government for hand outs.  We did what we had to do, and depended upon ourselves and our neighbors if we needed help.  What happened to America that we lost that standard of self reliance...?  What happened to America that we've come to see the government as being the source of help?  When did we lose sight of that vision?

Government does nothing efficiently.  Nothing at all...except waste money by the bucket full.  How in the hell did we become dependent upon a government that takes from those who do...and gives to those who won't?  Once upon a time, it was said that our "republican experiment" would last only as long as "We The People" didn't vote ourselves priviledges...has that day come to pass?