Dear President Obama: We're better off on our own!

This is one of those posts where I want musical accompaniment.  So please, click the embedded video below, then proceed to read:

                        (1)

This past week President Obama gave a speech wherein you warned that if he were not reelected, government would tell people "you're on your own." You know what? Sounds awesome!

You see, Mr. President, I wasn't raised to count on government to take care of me. I'm not standing in the street waiting for you to give me money our of your "stash." I've got a job where I earn my own living...I have a college degree which I paid for myself through my own hard work...I've got everything I have by the grace of God and the sweat of my brow...and I'm darn proud of it.

That's the problem I have with Obama's leftist policies. It's not the government's job to take care of me. It's my own job to do that. It's not up to the government to provide me with healthcare. It's up to me to figure that out on my own. 

Now I'm no anarchist. I'm glad that I, as one member of We the People, have joined into the contract of government of the people, by the people, and for the people. I'm happy to pay taxes so that we can have centralized protections from police internally and military externally. I'm happy to pay taxes so there are roads and bridges and so forth. What I do object to is the mentality that we NEED government to do far more than that.

See what Obama doesn’t understand…refuses to understand really, is that I’m better off on my own. I can take care of myself far better than the nanny-state government can do. I can decide for myself whether or not I want to eat food with trans-fats. I can decide for myself how much salt I should eat. I can decide for myself whether or not to buy health insurance and I can deal with the consequences of that decision on my own.
As an individual with the assistance of other individuals we can take care of the needy just fine without the government doing it. We’re called the Church of Jesus Christ. There are other groups like us except they’re called synagogues, or Salvation Army, or the Rescue Mission, or Volunteers of America. We give benevolently from our ability to churches and synagogues and charities so we can provide for food pantries, shelters, and other organizations with which can care for the needy far better than the government can giving handouts. If you don’t believe me, then ask me why it was that there wasn’t widespread starvation in the Great Depression…after all there wasn’t massive government safety nets to care for people…yet there wasn’t widespread starvation. You know why? It’s because churches and charities took care of those needy individuals and provided food and often shelter. Who do you think ran those bread lines and soup kitchens you see in old newsreels? It sure wasn’t the government!

The truth is, Mr. President, I can take care of myself just fine. I’ve got a blood family and a church family who will help me if I need it. Now I don’t mind having that minimal safety net for those in need like unemployment insurance and emergency medical care at hospitals, regardless of ability to pay. A safety net isn’t the problem. The problem is that liberals like you, Mr. President, have decided that the government should not be providing a safety net but instead be a source of provision for people full time. And once you’ve made people comfortable in poverty rather than simply providing their needs, you now make it so people don’t want to pull themselves out of poverty! That’s the difference between giving a hungry person a bag of nutritious groceries and an EBT Card where they can purchase candy and soda with instead of food.

While we’re at it, your accusation that the Republicans’ way means “dirty air, dirty water” is flat out baloney. You see, we had more than enough regulations to actually keep the water and air clean before you came along and added to them. Despite what liberals seem to believe, it is not possible to pass a law so perfect that nobody will break it. Yet they seem to think if the law is broken we need a new law. Actually, if we’d just enforce those laws and punish those who break them, we’d be just fine, thank you very much. We don’t need new laws. We don’t need to pass a moratorium on deep water drilling because there was an accident in the Gulf of Mexico. Do you recall what gas prices were before that moratorium? I do…below $2 per gallon. Then the President bans drilling and gas prices double. Meanwhile, Exxon has cleaned up the spill in the Gulf and, shock of shocks, our magnificently created planet has healed itself completely thanks to such wonderful natural organisms like bacteria that eat oil. (It’s almost like Earth was designed that way, isn’t it?) It wasn’t government that fixed that problem, now was it? It was the magnificence of God’s creation coupled with Exxon cleaning up after itself.

We don’t need to pass a law to force people to buy health insurance…it turns out the safety net we already had worked just fine. As a matter of fact, your law has cost people their insurance. Companies like McDonalds that offered optional accident and sickness coverage have had to drop that coverage because it’s too expensive, thanks to Obamacare. Even though your law was supposed to give more people health insurance, it’s cost people their insurance. It’s making it harder to for employers to provide insurance now than it was before by making it more expensive. See, the Republican’s “do nothing solution” isn’t really doing nothing period, it’s getting government out of the way and letting the private sector “do something.”

Mr. President, we’re doing just fine on our own. We’d be better off without your “help.” So when you tell us that if you lose “we’re on our own” my response is HALLELUJAH! I’m on my own! I can take care of myself just fine, thank you kindly. So do me a favor, will you, Mr. President? Let me be on my own. I’ll keep my freedom and my personal responsibility. You can keep the change.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

(1) Lynyrd Skynyrd - That aint my America