Thought for Today

"No nation ever yet found any inconvenience from too close an inspection into the conduct of its officers, but many have been brought to ruin and reduced to slavery by suffering gradual impositions and abuses."

~~~~~ Edward Livingston

Thought for Today

"When work is a pleasure, life is a joy! When work is a duty, life is slavery."

~~~~~ Maxim Gorky

Thought for Today

"When a man has emerged from slavery, there must be some stage in the progress of his elevation when he takes the rank of mere citizen and ceases to be the special favorite of the laws."

~~~~~ Joseph P. Bradley

Thought for Today

"The distinguishing sign of slavery is to have a price, and to be bought for it."

~~~~~ John Ruskin

Thought for Today

"The distinguishing sign of slavery is to have a price, and to be bought for it."

~~~~~ John Ruskin

Thought for Today

"The time is near at hand which must determine whether Americans are to be free men or slaves."

~~~~ George Washington

Thought for Today

"Thought takes man out of servitude, into freedom."

~~~~~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

Rights vs. Entitlements

Bill Whittle has a short, but incisive, NRO essay addressing the question of "What Is a Right and How Do We Know?" Here's how it starts:

During the presidential debate Tuesday night, Barack Obama was asked if he thought health care was a “right.”

He said he thought it was a right. Well, if you accept that premise, I think you can ask some logical follow-up questions: Food is more important than health care. You die pretty quickly without food. Do we have a “right” to food in America? What about shelter? Do we have a “right” to housing? And if we do have a right to housing, what standard of housing do we have a right to? And if it is a right, due to all Americans, wouldn’t that mean that no one should have to accept any housing, or health care, which is inferior to anyone else’s… since it’s a right?

Do we have a right to be safe? Do we have a right to be comfortable? Do we have a right to wide-screen televisions? Where does this end?

You'll want to read it all.

Along with Bill, I was also angered by Obama's statement that he believes health care to be a right. After all, if we accept that one human being has a "right" to health care, food, shelter, clothing, or any other fruit of someone else's labor, that would necessarily mean that another human being has an obligation to provide it – whether or not he wishes to do so.

After all, even the Obamessiah with all his powers cannot conjure up health care, food, housing, or clothes out of thin air. Those things can exist only as the result of someone's labor.

In other words, taking Obama's assertion to its logical conclusion, we're talking, at some point, about involuntary servitude.

What's a synonym for involuntary servitude, that condition in which one human must labor for the benefit of another against his will? That's right, class: slavery.

Logically, then, there is no escaping the fact that Obama, as well as all of the others who honestly believe that along with their rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, citizens have rights to health care, food, shelter, clothing, education, cars, cell phones, flat screen TVs, or any other products of others' labor, must also believe in slavery.

Perhaps that doesn't bother you. Maybe you think, privately, that such an arrangement wouldn't be so bad. After all, others with more talent, skill, and initiative would be tasked with the job of providing you with the health care to which you will have a "right" under the Obama regime, while all you'll need to do is show up and receive it. Bill Whittle comments:

“Free” health-care costs us something precious, and no less precious for being invisible. Because there’s a word for someone who has their food, housing and care provided for them… for people who owe their existence to someone else.

And that word is “slaves.”