Soap Box

When a person hears the word "free" they are apt to get excited because they think it means they're going to get something of value without having to give anything in return.

This is rarely the case.

How many times have you been lured into some great sounding deal that begins with an official looking letter or a phone call that starts out something like, "Congratulations, you have been chosen to participate in our test market program and will receive a free trip!" Or some other attractive sounding come on designed to grab your interest and keep it until you can be talked into taking the bait; hook, line and sinker.

The trouble is the trip itself may be free, the accommodations and a couple complimentary breakfasts, but - of course - there's the airfare and a "few" other expenses you must cover, and if you fall for it, you'll find yourself sitting in the lobby of some run down motel with a couple dozen other irritated folks waiting for your room, which is the size of a broom closet, to be vacated.

Your complimentary breakfast consists of a crowded buffet line with greasy bacon, cold eggs, hard biscuits and congealed gravy complete with an empty coffee machine, or stale doughnuts.

By the time you get home and figure what you've spent on airfare, car rental and going out for decent food, you realize the only thing that was free is the crimp in your back from sleeping on a lumpy mattress and jumping out of bed all night to try to get the air conditioner working.

Free is a misnomer, everything given to one person or group is paid for by somebody and therein lies the fallacy of socialism, which in reality should be called income redistribution.

Left-wing college professors and opportunistic politicians, among others, have persuaded many of our young people that whatever money or benefits doled out by the federal government, come from an endless supply of funds that just somehow magically replenish themselves and should be used to provide cradle to grave, trouble free existence, complete with education, health care, jobs and a generous retirement package, never realizing that every dollar spent on a social program came out of the pocket of someone who earned it.

They have been convinced that bigger government, higher taxes, more regulation and income redistribution is the answer to all our fiscal problems and they flock around the political candidate who makes the biggest promises to provide the kind of life they've come to believe they're entitled to.

Before the cherry pickers accuse me of being cruel and hating the poor, let me assure you that I believe in charity. Charity is a Biblical principle, and it should be voluntary, and given with a joyful heart.

They have a bitter lesson to learn, the truth that nothing worth having except the love of Almighty God is free.

Free college: Are the professors going to teach for free, are the buildings going to heat and cool themselves, are the books going to arrive with a paid in full sticker on them, are the maintenance crews going to keep showing up without a paycheck?

Free health care: Are the doctors and nurses going to take care of patients free of charge, are the hospitals going to provide beds gratis and the drug companies provide state of the art medicines they've spent billions perfecting without getting paid for them?

Income redistribution: The combined wealth of every millionaire, billionaire and multi-billionaire in America would be hard pushed to just pay off the eighteen-trillion dollar debt our government has run up, so if all the super wealth in America were confiscated it might just barely get us even.

So, what do you do then, just say the government did confiscate the wealth of the super rich, where do they go from there to get the kind of money it would take to continue this "everything�s free" Utopian society?

Why, the next ones down the financial rung of course, the majority of the population we call the middle class. And since so much is needed, the tax hikes would be substantial and just keep on coming until it reached the sticking point, and then where do you go?

Of course, there's value added and consumer taxes but after a while there's no place to go for the money needed to sustain the monster, so the only thing left to do is to cut benefits, and then the real trouble begins.

When the entitlement society finds out that their monthly checks will not arrive, that they can't check into a hospital or have to leave college in mid-semester or that the food stamps have dried up, what will they do!

There will be chaos of course, riots in the streets, destruction of property, physical violence, but this time to no avail because there'll be no money to reinstate benefits and the whole system will tumble like the house of cards it is.

Government was never meant to be a welfare agency or the arbiter of how much of your paycheck you should be able to keep and no matter how hard those who present compassionate diatribes about the unfairness of capitalism and the haves over the have-nots convince voters that they can live a pampered life if they just elect the right candidates, the naked truth remains.

Socialism destroys initiative, stifles creativity, abolishes personal freedom, reduces the quality of life and becomes a bloated, redundant, bureaucracy heavy, floundering monolith, doomed for the garbage bin of history.

Welfare is meant for those who need it, not those who want it.

Nobody is too good to work for a living, if they are capable.

�For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule: "The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat." � 2 Thessalonians 3:10

Nothing is free; somebody has to pay for everything.

What do you think?

Pray for our troops and the peace of Jerusalem.

God Bless America

� Charlie Daniels

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