Elections have become public auctions of private goods. Voters have figured out that they could vote themselves more money from the treasury by voting for people who promised to give them more money in exchange for electing them.
The people getting free stuff outnumber the people paying for that free stuff. We are nurturing contempt for private property and destroying self-reliance and -responsibility. Will we vote for those who will redistribute our wealth and limit our freedoms in the name of “social justice”? Will we acquiesce to bureaucrats who are determined to dictate how we live our lives?
If we sanction the subservience of individual interests to collective authority, we disregard the U.S. Constitution at our peril.
History is replete with chronicles of the immorality, dishonesty and exploitation of collectivist societies. In those societies, the individual has a reality only as part of the group, valued only insofar as he serves it. People who join demonstrations and protests demanding somebody’s “fair share” do not recognize private property and reject personal responsibility.
Collectivist ideology contends that the government determines how individuals may live their lives for the benefit of society. Individual rights and choices are limited or eliminated for the “greater good.”
There are some who think it is unimportant who wins or loses in the next presidential election because the changing of “masters” has no effect on freedom. But the results may reveal the depth of our dependency and aversion to individualism.
If choices and decisions required to effectuate self-sufficiency and -determination are an irksome burden, we will vote to join the mob and mass movement to escape individual responsibility and be free from freedom.
Ed Konecnik
Flushing
