In the Spirit of Giving

The Christmas season is a time where families gather, friends party, and good people give to charities.

And it never ceases to amaze me. Liberals incessantly harp about how they are the "givers", the protectors of the poor and downtrodden. They paint conservatives as greedy, rich people who care little about those in need. Nancy Pelosi and her ilk are famous for such rhetoric.
But the facts show precisely the opposite.

John Stossel: "But it turns out that this idea that liberals give more is a myth. Of the twenty-five states where people give an above average percent of their income, twenty-four were red states in the last presidential election. Conservatives are even eighteen percent more likely to donate blood".

According to a study by Arthur Brooks, director of nonprofit studies for Syracuse University's Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and author of Who Really Cares, "When you look at the data, it turns out the conservatives give about thirty percent more per conservative-headed family than per liberal-headed family. And incidentally, conservative-headed families make slightly less money."

Brooks is a former Democrat-turned-Republican-turned-Independent. "You find that people who believe it's the government's job to make incomes more equal are far less likely to give their money away." Liberals are the ideological group that holds to income distribution by the government.

Liberals mistake government re-distribution of income for charitable giving, but there is no relation. First, the taxes used for income redistribution (welfare etc.) is not paid voluntarily. Second, the person contributing the taxes has no say in where it goes or how it is used. Third, there can be no personal gratification as there is in directly supporting a charity. And, finally, most of the neediest and best charities are religion based, and the liberals are the first to remind us that we must maintain a wall of separation between church and state, and would therefore fight any attempt to use taxes to fund such charities.

My first question to any liberal who says the government should redistribute income to better support the needy is this: "If you want the needy to have more of your money, why don't you just donate to the charities that do the job? Why not open your wallet and just GIVE?"

But they are not particularly interested in matching the generosity of conservatives.

Ben Stein, famous for declaring that people should pay a lot more taxes to help support good causes is, himself, very wealthy. But every time a conservative talk-show host asks why he doesn't just voluntarily send more money into the IRS, Stein clams up. Hm-m-m. This seems typical of the liberal methodology of TALKING a good game, without the willingness to PLAY the game.

Which is my point exactly. Liberals TALK a lot about caring for the less fortunate, but personally DO little about it. They would rather have the government do it, from taxes taken from conservatives who are already doing their part.

Once again it appears that if talk is what you want, liberals are the ticket. But if you crave action, and want to actually see something get accomplished, go with conservatives.

I would like to challenge all those "fat-cat" liberals who ache for income redistribution to each open their musty, unused wallets sometime before Christmas Day, and put a substantial amount of their moldy money where their over-active mouths are. You know, the money they SAY they want Uncle Sam to take and re-distribute. Say, 10% of everything earned in 2007, since the Ben Stein liberals claim we should all be taxed another 10%.

The Salvation Army would be a good place to start.

Oops! I forgot. The liberal-backed ACLU is trying to get the Salvation Army Santas outlawed, and thrown out of public places. Maybe the Boy Scouts. Ooops - the ACLU is suing them, too. How about Catholic Charities - nope. That's religious.

Makes one wonder just WHICH of Americas "needy" the liberals would have us all support with increased taxes. One thing is certain - it would only be those that fit a liberal agenda! Like illegal immigrants getting free college. Or foot-wash facilities for Muslims.