"I think we've been through a period where too many people have been given to understand that if they have a problem, it's the government's job to cope with it. 'I have a problem, I'll get a grant.' 'I'm homeless, the government must house me.' They're casting their problem on society. And, you know, there is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families. And no government can do anything except through people, and people must look to themselves first. It's our duty to look after ourselves and then, also to look after our neighbour. People have got the entitlements too much in mind, without the obligations. There's no such thing as entitlement, unless someone has first met an obligation."
To what are the wealthy entitled? What is the extent and measure of their obligation to those outside their immediate family? Their immediate, often gated, community? Do we have a political, civic, or moral obligation to our fellow citizens? Answer from The Right, No. From Jesus, Yes. How then is a Christian Right possible? What cause in nature makes these hearts so hard? And will they when broken, shamed and discarded, bear their own misery in diffident silence? Some, Evangelicals, certainly set a higher and more Christian standard. May their voices be heeded. The market is no substitute for civic virtue.
My friends in the Right Wing Think Tanks! To say there is no society as you, and those you lackey, live on the fat of the land, at the tip of every pyramid, is a sin against the Holy Ghost. Were there no Society you would torn apart by ravening mobs. (See Hobbes.)
