This might strike you as strange, but I think the fact that individual donations to liberal organizations, including Planned Parenthood, are increasing is great news. Not because I support these organizations and want them to have funds to carry out their objectives; I don’t. However, the increase in donations reflects a fear that government funds (a.k.a as money confiscated from taxpayers) will be less available under a Trump administration. I hope those fears are justified.
On this issue, I lean libertarian. I don’t want to see funds moved from liberal organizations to conservative ones. I want to see funding in general cut back. I resent the National Endowment for the Arts using tax money to promote artwork that ridicules and insults Christianity such as the monstrosity known as Piss Christ, but I have no desire for the government to fund pro-Christian art or art that denigrates atheists. How about leaving funding to private individuals or, if they choose, local governments?
The United States of America is deeply divided morally and culturally. There are organizations that support women through pregnancies and help them with adoptions if desired, and there are organizations that encourage and provide abortion, such as Planned Parenthood. There are groups that encourage fluency in English and those that demand that workplaces and government offices cater to all languages. Some Americans care passionately about carpooling and others about hunting. You can pretty much find a group to support anything from the most picayune to the most profound. By definition, the government picking and choosing what to support means siding with some citizens against others and, too frequently, imposing one group’s values on another group’s pocketbook.
Much of the government’s byzantine structure, with all the inefficiency, corruption and waste that engenders needs to be swept away. Donald Trump’s promise to ‘drain the swamp,’ reflects that, but it is easy to drown in the swamp while trying to do clear it. I worry that Republican and conservative politicians and organizations will make the mistake of building in the muck rather than cleaning it out. Some are already entrenched in the slime.
Have donations to liberal-leaning organizations been increasing? I would be happy to exchange people reaching into the wallets of their fellow citizens for those reaching into their own wallets. We might even find ourselves talking to each other, discussing and debating our ideas, if the government’s role ended. That would benefit us all.
You don’t want big Government
but……….
You want Government to stop abortions???????
You are anti abortion
but…………….
You are pro Death penalty?????????????????
You don’t want to fund public schools
but……………..
You will fund new Prisons????????????
You don’t want sex in movies
but………………..
You like violence in Movies?????????????
(John Wayne, Clint Eastwood)
I don’t understand where you understood any of the above from what I wrote. I also don’t see the connection between all your comparisons. But, wish you a good 2017.
If only things could be put back to 1776.
Taking your article a stage further,the ills of the world are rooted in socialism and in its bleeding heart philosophy firmly ground in envy.Look around the world and see its cancerous effect. Europe,on the verge of
imploding,including France,Italyand Greece all up to their necks in debt.Likewise Cuba and Venezuela.
Eight years of socialist Obama according to reports I read, ditto.Maybe Mr trump can stop the rot, but the voters have spoken and the worm has at least started to turn.
Very good arguments and clear cut objectives. I pray that this type of thinking would reach our elected officials. God have mercy on us.
Much blessings to you all.
I think I agree with you about giving money to Christian organizations. This is a new phenomenal in the Christiandom. Christian institution, well protestant organization wouldn’t take money from government because they knew once government got a foot in the door they would change the organization and this is what has happened to the Catholic organizations. However, when it comes to “draining the swamp” make no mistake about it someone has to jump into the slime to unplug the drain. This is why we need someone outside of the swamp to guide the other and pull him out if he gets caught in an undercurrant. The swamp things aren’t going down without a fight. They will stop up the drain.
That’s an interesting point, but the government has extended itself even when organizations didn’t want to take money. It’s not a religious example, but look up Hillsdale College’s history.
Once again Susan, your clear headed thinking shines the bright light of prudence on an emotionally charged issue! Thanks for sharing.
I’m blushing. Thank you.
Susan, I would like to lean libertarian also. I agree with your sentiment that government funding of art should be left to local governments. As you say, “(you) resent the National Endowment for the Arts using tax money to promote artwork that ridicules and insults Christianity such as the monstrosity known as Piss Christ, but I have no desire for the government to fund pro-Christian art or art that denigrates atheists. How about leaving funding to private individuals or, if they choose, local governments?” My problem with leaving it there is I think it is wrong to equate human souls whom I believe are eternal with art which is bound by time. No doubt you will have heard my argument against abortion before. I hold the view that abortion violates God’s moral law against murder, although I use the term judiciously. I am sensitive when speaking to others about abortion using the term “murder” and explain that I believe it is murder because I believe the embryo is human and created by God. Art which denigrates another human cannot compare with the murder of another human in my opinion. Some do not agree that killing embryonic life is murder. I think the Old Testament (OT) makes plain, Psalms 51:5-6 and 139:12-14, that someone becomes a living soul at conception. Because I now think our nation is committing a national transgression of God’s moral law I fear temporal judgment from the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob on our nation, not because I love this temporal life, but because I pity those who, after this life is over, have no hope in the next. I do not fear for myself eternally but I do for those who disobey the Law, “Do not murder.” Because I believe, as many of our founding fathers did, that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the Living and True God who is sovereignly active in the affairs of men and nations, I now encourage fellow citizens to oppose abortion personally and politically, as we should oppose all murder. Because God is sovereign in raising up nations and taking them down I cannot lean libertarian on the issue of abortion although I might otherwise like to do so. Thanks for the challenge to my thinking with your posting, please accept my respectful regards to you and your husband and thanks for website. Tom Ireton
Tom, thanks for giving me the chance to clarify. I certainly wasn’t comparing artwork to abortion. Since the government is currently funding pro-abortion movements like Planned Parenthood, withdrawing funding would be a helpful step.
You are spot on! Less government would benefit everyone!
My guess is most Americans don’t realize how little the federal government was originally meant to do.