Author James Bartholomew argues that welfare benefits actually increase government handouts by ‘ruining’ ambition. He compares welfare to a humane mousetrap.
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In the controversial book The Welfare State We’re In, James Bartholomew argues that the welfare state in Britain has resulted in a generation of badly educated and dependent citizens, leading to lives of deprivation for thousands and undermining the original intent behind its creation in the 1940s.
Has the welfare state really led to more harm than good? What does this imply for the ever-expanding welfare state in the United States? – Cato Institute
James Bartholomew trained as a banker in the City of London before moving into journalism with the Financial Times and the Far Eastern Economic Review, for whom he worked in Hong Kong and Tokyo. Returning to England on the Trans-Siberian Railway through communist China and the Soviet Union an experience which influenced his political outlook he subsequently became a leader writer on The Daily Telegraph and the Daily Mail.
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President Obama c/o The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Now we have a nursery rhyme about the little red hen. But not the old-fashioned version. Here’s the modernized version the President reads to his kids.
“Who will help me plant my wheat?” asked the little red hen.
“Not I,” said the cow.
“Not I,” said the duck.
“Not I,” said the pig.
“Not I,” said the goose.
“Then I will do it by myself.” She planted her crop and the wheat grew and ripened.
“Who will help me reap my wheat?” asked the little red hen.
“I’m on disability,” said the duck.
“Out of my classification,” said the pig.
“I’d lose my seniority,” said the cow.
“I’d lose my unemployment compensation,” said the goose.
“Then I will do it by myself,” said the little red hen, and so she did.
“Who will help me bake the bread?” asked the little red hen.
“That would be overtime for me,” said the cow.
“I’d lose my welfare benefits,” said the duck.
“I’m a dropout and never learned how,” said the pig.
“If I’m to be the only helper, that’s discrimination,” said the goose.
“Then I will do it by myself,” said the little red hen, and so she did.
The smell of fresh-baked bread attracted all her neighbors. They saw the bread and wanted some. In fact, they demanded a share.
But the little red hen said, “No, I shall eat all the loaves.”
“Excess profits!” cried the cow.
“Capitalist leech!” screamed the duck.
“I demand equal rights!” yelled the goose.
“Share with the 99 percent,” grunted the pig.
And they all painted ‘Unfair!’ picket signs and marched around and around the little red hen, shouting obscenities.
Then the farmer came He said to the little red hen, “You must not be so greedy.”
“But I earned the bread,” said the little red hen.
“Exactly,” said the farmer. “That is what makes our free enterprise system so wonderful. Anyone in the barnyard can earn as much as he wants. But under our modern government regulations, the productive workers must divide the fruits of their labor with those who are idle.”
But only in the President’s fairy tale. In a real-world version, the little red hen never again baked bread and the farmyard suffered Greek-style chaos when the animals riding in the wagon suddenly discovered there was nobody left to pull the wagon.
Thank you so much for your time. I know how valuable it is. I also appreciate the fine family that you have and your commitment as a father and a husband.
Sincerely,
Everette Hatcher III, 13900 Cottontail Lane, Alexander, AR 72002, ph 501-920-5733, lowcostsqueegees@yahoo.com
THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- IntroductionAbortion (as a medical procedure) is never mentioned in the Bible. So that must mean that the Bible has nothing relevant to say on the subject, Right? THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- What Does the Bible Say?Abortion is one of the most critical issues of our generation. Christians need to consider carefully what the Bible has to say on the subject.THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- The Bible Condemns MurderFirst of all, the Bible clearly condemns murder, and by murder I don’t mean all killing. The Bible obviously allows animals to be killed, accidental killing of human beings is not condemned, and human beings may, in fact, be deliberately killed if they’ve committed a capital offense. You see the real issue is murder not killing, and murder is the intentional killing of an innocent human being.THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- Is Abortion Murder?So once again the question, is abortion murder? First of all, abortion certainly kills something: because obviously the fetus is a living organism, biologically distinct from the mother. The fetus also is certainly innocent — no one aborts a fetus because of something the fetus has supposedly done. And, with the exception of abortion to save the mother’s life, abortion is always done with the clear intent of killing the fetus. Therefore, the question of whether abortion is murder turns entirely on whether the fetus is or is not a human being.THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- A Fetus Is a Human BeingNumerous philosophers and scientists have shown conclusively that the fetus is a human being from the moment of conception. In addition, the Bible, which ought to be our first authority, supports the very same conclusion. For example, in Psalm 51 David confesses that he was a sinner by nature from his very conception in the womb (Psa. 51:5).THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- ConclusionThe conclusion is this: abortion is the intentional killing of an innocent human being, and therefore it has to be regarded as murder. The only exception, as I have already indicated, would be in cases where the child must be aborted or the mother will die.THE BIBLE AND ABORTION- Abortion is MurderIn short, while the Bible does not mention abortion specifically, it is clear by implication that abortion is murder. And don’t forget that Psalm 139 tells us that God created our inmost being, He knit us together in our mother’s womb and that all the days ordained for us were written in his book before even one of them came to be.On the Bible and abortion, that’s the CRI Perspective. I’m Hank Hanegraaff.
Sam Phillips, born Samuel Cornelius Phillips (January 5, 1923 – July 30, 2003), was a record producer and the man responsible for the emergence of rock and roll as the major form of popular music in the 1950s. A native of Florence, Alabama, and a graduate of Coffee High School, Phillips is, perhaps, most notably attributed with the discovery of music legend Elvis Presley.
On January 3, 1950, Sam Phillips opened the doors at 706 Union Avenue in Memphis, Tennessee, to what would become one of the more famous recording studios in the world, the Sun Records label studio. Originally known as “Memphis Recording Service” throughout the 1950s when the building also housed the Sun Records label, the studio was later redubbed “Sun Studio” when the building reopened to the public in 1987. The studio had previously moved to a larger facility on Madison Avenue in 1960, and the Sun Records label had been sold in 1969 to Shelby Singleton’s Sun International group.
According to some, notably, music historian Peter Guralnick, the first rock and roll record was “Rocket 88,” recorded by Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats, a band led by 19-year-old Ike Turner. Turner also wrote the song, which was recorded by Sam Phillips and released on the Chess/Checker record label in Chicago, in 1951. From 1950 to 1954 Phillips recorded the music of black rhythm and blues artists such as James Cotton, Rufus Thomas, Rosco Gordon, Little Milton, Bobby Blue Bland and others. Blues legends like B.B. King and Howlin’ Wolf made their first recordings at his studio.
Throughout this same period, Sam Phillips was looking for a white singer with a special “sound.” Phillips soon changed the face of popular music when he brought together the diverse elements that created rock and roll. When Elvis Presley played his version of “That’s All Right Mama” at his studio, a whole new era in music began.
Presley’s success would be a drawing card for Sun Records as singing hopefuls soon arrived from all over the Southern USA. White singers such as Sonny Burgess (“My Bucket’s Got A Hole In It”), Charlie Rich and Billy Lee Riley recorded for Sun with reasonable success while others such as Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and Carl Perkins would become superstars.
In late 1955, Sam Phillips studio was in need of money and he had little choice but to accept an offer for Presley’s contract. Atlantic Records tendered $25,000, but the powerful RCA Records secured Presley’s services with an offer of $35,000.
On December 4, 1956, Jerry Lee Lewis was playing piano for a Carl Perkins recording session at Sun Records studio. While Johnny Cash stood by watching, Elvis walked in, and the impromptu jam session was soon nicknamed the “Million Dollar Quartet”.
In 1986 Sam Phillips was part of the first group inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. In 1987, he was inducted into the Alabama Music Hall of Fame. He received a Grammy Trustees Award for his lifetime achievements in 1991. In 1998, he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame, and in October 2001 he was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame.
Phillips died of respiratory failure at Francis Hospital in Memphis, Tennessee on July 30, 2003.
Many people think of former President Bill Clinton when they think of Arkansas, and they think of Elvis when they think of Memphis. However, the great Mississippi River separates both Arkansas and Tennessee. It’s history is worth looking into. CNN’s David Mattingly describes how high and wide the Mississippi River is in Memphis, Tennessee. Everybody […]
Memphis has such a rich history of music and the other night I saw the David Letterman Show with Freesol. They are a new group out of Memphis. Below is an article about them from People Magazine. Justin Timberlake’s Signed Band FreeSol: All About the Group By Catherine Kast Tuesday September 06, 2011 06:35 PM […]
Here is the reason why I lay so much stress in my book on the importance of William of Ockham and his justly celebrated razor. Why on earth—if you excuse the impression—do the faithful spend so much time creating a mystery where none exists? And why do they insist on inserting unwarrantable assumptions?
I take the plain meaning of the passage in Luke (in a section that is clotted with stories about the casting out of devils and other embarrassing sorceries) to be the duty to others in distress. Surely it loses much of its force if the lesson is about discrepant ethnicities of which we cannot in any case be certain? Nothing can “invert” the message to emulate the Samaritan and to go “and do thou likewise.”
You dilute the purity of this—which is morally intelligible to any atheist or humanist—by saying that there is a millennium and a half delay between the “revelation” of this simple act of charity and its anecdotal fulfillment. You also appear to find no distinction between the intelligible injunction to “love thy neighbor” and the impossible order to love another “as thyself.” We are not so made as to love others as ourselves: This may admittedly be a fault in our “design,” but in such a case the irony would be at your expense. The Golden Rule is to be found in the Analects of Confucius and in the motto of the Babylonian Rabbi Hillel, who long predate the Christian era and who sanely state that one should not do to others anything that would be repulsive if done to oneself. (Even this strikes me as either contradictory or tautologous, since surely we agree that sociopaths and psychopaths actually deserve to be treated in ways that would be objectionable to a morally normal person.) When you say that men have never known nor yet understood the essential principle, however, you speak absurdly. Ordinary morality is innate in my view. But if, in yours, it is still not known, then centuries of divine admonition have also gone to waste. You are trapped in a net of your own making. Take a look at the list of actual or potential crimes that you mention. Genocide is not condemned by the Old Testament and neither (as you well know and have lsewhere conceded) is slavery. Rather, these two horrors are often positively recommended by holy writ.
Abortion is denounced in the Oath of Hippocrates, which long predates Christianity. As for capital punishment and unjust war, the secular and the religious are alike at odds on the very definitions that underpin any condemnation. (When you include “stem-cell research,” by the way, I assume that you unintentionally omitted the word “embryonic.”)
To your needlessly convoluted subsequent question: Atheists are by no means “coy” on the question of evil or on the possibility of non-supernatural derivation of ethics. We are simply reluctant to say that, if religious faith falls—as we believe it must and to some extent already has—then the undergirding of decency falls also. And we do not fail to notice that a corollary is in play: The manner in which religion makes people behave worse than they might therwise have done. Take a look at today’s paper if you do not believe me: See what the parties of God are doing in Iraq. Or notice the sordid yet pious tradesmanship of Ralph Reed, Jack Abramoff, and the late Jerry Falwell. The latter’s bedside is the one at which you should be asking your question—do you dare to say that a follower of Albert Einstein or Bertrand Russell would be gloating in the same way at their last hour? In either case—an atheist boaster and braggart or a hypocritical religious one—I trust that both of us would know enough to be quite “judgmental.” I would differ from you only in not requiring any supernatural sanction or in claiming to be smug enough to possess such a power.
I am sorry to see that you sarcastically refer to Thomas Jefferson as “my” beloved. Do you not respect him also? And why can you not summon enough charity to believe that a non-believer can give blood, say, for no return, out of the sheer satisfaction of doing a service that involves only a benefit and no loss? According to you, my doing this is pointless unless I accept the incredible idea that, after hundreds of thousands of years of human life and suffering, God chose a moment a few thousand years ago to finally mount an intervention. You will have to accept sooner or later that a good person can be born who cannot force his mind to believe such a fantastic thing. At that point, you will see that your strenuous conditions are surplus to requirements.
In closing, I reply to your clumsy observation about my motor vehicle by citing Heine, who said: In dark ages people are best guided by religion, as in a pitch-black night a blind man is the best guide; he knows the roads and paths better than a man who can see. When daylight comes, however, it is foolish to use blind old men as guides.
The argument that you have been making was over long before either of us was born. There is no need for revelation to enforce morality, and the idea that good conduct needs a heavenly reward, or that bad conduct merits a hellish punishment, is a degradation of our right and duty to choose for ourselves.
Christopher Hitchens – Against Abortion Uploaded by BritishNeoCon on Dec 2, 2010 An issue Christopher doesn’t seem to have addressed much in his life. He doesn’t explicitly say that he is against abortion in this segment, but that he does believe that the ‘unborn child’ is a real concept. ___________________________ I was suprised when I […]
Max Brantley in the Arkansas Times Blog reports that Ron Paul is leading in Iowa. Maybe it is time to take a closer look at his views. In the above clip you will see Chistopher Hitchens discuss Ron Paul’s views. In the clip below you will find Ron Paul’s latest commercial. Below is a short […]
DEBATE William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens Does God Exist 07 Below are some reactions of evangelical leaders to the news of Christopher Hitchens’ death: Christian leaders react to Hitchens’ death Posted on Dec 16, 2011 | by Michael Foust DEBATE William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens Does God Exist 08 Author and […]
DEBATE William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens Does God Exist 04 Below are some reactions of evangelical leaders to the news of Christopher Hitchens’ death: Christian leaders react to Hitchens’ death Posted on Dec 16, 2011 | by Michael Foust DEBATE William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens Does God Exist 05 Author and speaker Christopher […]
DEBATE William Lane Craig vs Christopher Hitchens Does God Exist 01 Below are some reactions of evangelical leaders to the news of Christopher Hitchens’ death: Christian leaders react to Hitchens’ death Posted on Dec 16, 2011 | by Michael Foust Author and speaker Christopher Hitchens, a leader of an aggressive form of atheism that eventually […]
“O Timothy, keep that which is committed to thy trust, avoiding profane and vain babblings, and oppositions of science falsely so called: which some professing have erred concerning the faith. Grace be with thee. Amen” (1 Tim. 6:20-21).
One of the most important questions to face our generation is this: “Are human beings simply the product of millions of years of mindless, evolutionary mutations and adaptations, or are we the creation of an infinitely wise, powerful, and loving God?”
The answer to that question is critical. Why? Because it determines your attitude toward God in heaven and mankind on earth. The debate over human origin is one of the most critical issues of our times.
THE DAMAGE OF EVOLTION
It’s hard to measure the enormous damage inflicted by Darwinian evolution, the teaching that life arose from a spontaneous spark in a pond of primordial ooze. The amazing thing is that influential scientists themselves are now denying Darwin’s theory as impossible. Yet its destructive effects remain.
For instance, if man is an accident of nature, then there is no fixed standard of right and wrong. So what the Bible calls sexual perversion is now a “lifestyle.” And a human life can be readily destroyed, whether in the womb or partially delivered.
Worst of all, evolution has helped destroy belief in God for millions. Denying biblical creation, evolutionists have “changed the truth of God into a lie” (Romans 1:25).
Should we be surprised that euthanasia is gaining widespread acceptance in our society or that the tide of abortion cannot be turned? Is it any wonder that sexual perversion is received as a valid alternative lifestyle? We have taught our children that they are just another species of animal – and they are finally beginning to act like animals! And our children and grandchildren are still being fed this lie today.
THE DECEIT OF EVOLUTION
What is behind this whole idea of evolution? Why is it such an emotional issue? Why can’t the world simply agree that there is no creation without a Creator, and out of nothing, nothing comes?
Humanist Aldous Huxley expressed the answer to those questions in his book, Ends and Means. Huxley said he and his contemporaries did not want government or morality. So they chose evolution in order to shut the mouths of those who believe in special creation.
For more than 100 years, the evolutionists have succeeded in convincing people that evolution is the only logical, scientific, and intelligent theory of human origin.
But this campaign has been carried out amid deceit and slight of hand on the part of many evolutionists. We’ve all seen the creative drawings of supposed ancestors of mankind, built on a few teeth or a piece of a skull. And the fossil hoaxes perpetrated over the last century are well known.
No wonder in his book Darwinism: The Refutation of a Myth, the Swedish embryologist, Soren Lovtrup, suggests that he believes that some day Darwinism “will be ranked the greatest deceit in the history of science.”
THE DEFEAT OF EVOLUTION
Despite its lack of credible evidence, evolution holds sway in our schools, the courts, and the public mind. What can we do?
We can preach, teach and defend the truth! We can set our children free from the devil’s lies by giving them the Truth of God’s Word (John 8:32) And we can point lost, confused and dying souls to Him who is the Way, the Truth and the Life!
With the steadfast support of friends like you, Love Worth Finding will continue to hold high the banner of Jesus Christ.
THREE TELLING ARGUMENTS AGAINST EVOLUTION
1. The fossil record. Not only is the so-called missing link still missing, all of the transitional life forms so crucial to evolutionary theory are missing from the fossil record. There are thousands of missing links, not one!
2. The second law of thermodynamics. This law states that energy is winding down and that matter left to itself tends toward chaos and randomness, not greater organization and complexity. Evolution demands exactly the opposite process, which is observed nowhere in nature.
3. The origin of life. Evolution offers no answers to the origin of life. It simply pushes the question farther back in time, back to some primordial event in space or an act of spontaneous generation in which life simply sprang from nothing.
Milton Friedman in his series “Free to Choose” used a pencil as a simple example to should have the “invisible hand” of the freemarket works (phrase originally used by Adam Smith).
“How grateful I have been over the years for the cogency of Friedman’s ideas which have influenced me. Cherishers of freedom will be indebted to him for generations to come.” —Alan Greenspan, former Chairman, Federal Reserve System
“Right at this moment there are people all over the land, I could put dots on the map, who are trying to prove Milton wrong. At some point, somebody else is trying to prove he’s right That’s what I call influence.” —Paul Samuelson, Nobel Laureate in Economic Science
In 1980 when I first sat down and read the book “Free to Choose” I was involved in Ronald Reagan’s campaign for president and excited about the race. Milton Friedman’s books and film series really helped form my conservative views. Take a look at one of my favorite films of his and if you take time to watch these episodes on inflation then you see how Ronald Reagan was able to bring inflation under control in the 1980’s with the help of Paul Volker of the Federal Reserve:
Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose (1980), episode 3 – Anatomy of a Crisis. part 1
FREE TO CHOOSE: Anatomy of Crisis
Friedman Delancy Street in New York’s lower east side, hardly one of the city’s best known sites, yet what happened in this street nearly 50 years ago continues to effect all of us today. Wall Street. Most of us know what happened here 50 years ago. Inside the Stock Exchange on October 29, 1929, the market collapsed. It came to be known as Black Thursday. The Wall Street crash was followed by the worst depression in American history. That depression has been blamed on the failure of capitalism. It was no such thing but the myth lives on. What really happened was very different.
Although things looked healthy on the surface, business had begun to turn down in mid 1929. The crash intensified the recession. So did continuing bank failures in the south and Midwest. But the recession only became a crisis when these failures spread to New York and in particular to this building, then the headquarters of the Bank of United States. The failure of this bank had far reaching effects and need never have happened.
It was something of a historical accident that this particular bank played the role it did. Why did it fail? It was a perfectly good bank. Banks that were in far worse financial shape had come under difficulties before it did and had, through the cooperation of other banks, been saved. The reason why it wasn’t saved has to do with its rather special character. First its name, Bank of United States, a name that made immigrants believe it was an official governmental bank although in fact it was an ordinary commercial bank. Second its ownership, Jewish, both its name and the character of its ownership which had so much to do with attracting the large number of depositors from the many Jewish businessmen in the city of New York. Both of them also had the effect of alienating other bankers who did not like the special advantage of the name and did not like the character of the ownership. As a result, other banks were all too ready to spread rumors, to help promote an atmosphere in which runs got started on the bank and which it came into difficulty. And they were less then usually willing to cooperate in the efforts that were made to save it.
Only a few blocks away is the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. It was here that the Bank of United States could have been saved. Indeed, the Federal Reserve System had been set up 17 years earlier precisely to prevent the worst consequences of bank failures.
The Federal Reserve Bank of New York, whose directors today meet in this room, devised a plan in cooperation with the superintendent of banking of the State of New York to save the Bank of United States. Their plan called for merging the Bank of United States with several other banks and also providing a guarantee fund to be subscribed to by still other bankers to assure the depositors that the assets of the Bank of United States were safe and sound. The Reserve Bank called meeting after meeting to try to put the plan into effect. It was on again, off again. But finally, after an all night meeting on December 10, 1930, the other bankers, including in particular John Pierpont Morgan, refused to subscribe to the guarantee fund and the plan was off. The next day the Bank of United States closed its doors, never again to open for business. For its depositors who saw their savings tied up and their businesses destroyed, the closing was tragic. Yet when the bank was finally liquidated, in the worst years of the depression, it paid back 92.5 cents on the dollar. Had the other banks cooperated to save it, no one would have lost a penny.
For the other New York banks, they thought closing the Bank of United States would have purely local effects. They were wrong. Partly because it had so many depositors, partly because so many of the depositors were small businessmen, partly because it was the largest bank that had ever been permitted to fail in the United States up to this time, the effects were far reaching. Depositors all over the country were frightened about the safety of their funds and rushed to withdraw them. There were runs. There were failures of banks by the droves. And all the time the Federal Reserve System stood idly by when it had the power and the duty and the responsibility to provide the cash that would have enabled the banks to meet the insistent demands of their depositors without closing their doors.
The way runs on banks can spread and can be stopped is a consequence of the way our bank system works. You may think that when you take some cash to a bank and deposit it, the bank takes that money and sticks it in a vault somewhere to wait until you need it again to turn it back over to you.
Bank teller: Okay, how would you like this? Two tens, one five and five ones. Okay.
Friedman: The bank does no such thing with it. It immediately takes a large part of what you put in and lends it out to somebody else. How do you suppose it earns interest, to pay its expenses, or pay you something for the use of your money? The result is that if all depositors in all the banks tried all at once to convert their deposits into cash, there wouldn’t be anything like enough cash in the banks of the country to meet their demands. In order to prevent such an outcome, in order to cut short a run, it is necessary to have some way either to stop people from asking for it, or to have some additional source from which cash can be obtained. That was intended to be the purpose of the Federal Reserve System. It was to provide the additional cash to meet the demands of the depositors when a run arose.
A classic example of how this system could and did work properly can be found over 2,000 miles from New York near the great Salt Lake in Utah.
In the early 30’s some banks in Salt Lake City and surrounding towns began to get into difficulties. The owners of one them were smart enough to see what had to be done to keep their banks open and courageous enough to do it. When fearful depositors began to clamor to withdraw all their money, one of George Eccles jobs was to brief his cashiers on how to handle the run.
TEMIN: We don’t think the big capital arose before the government did? VON HOFFMAN: Listen, what are we doing here? I mean __ defending big government is like defending death and taxes. When was the last time you met anybody that was in favor of big government? FRIEDMAN: Today, today I met Bob Lekachman, I […]
worked pretty well for a whole generation. Now anything that works well for a whole generation isn’t entirely bad. From the fact __ from that fact, and the undeniable fact that things are working poorly now, are we to conclude that the Keynesian sort of mixed regulation was wrong __ FRIEDMAN: Yes. LEKACHMAN: __ or […]
MCKENZIE: Ah, well, that’s not on our agenda actually. (Laughter) VOICE OFF SCREEN: Why not? MCKENZIE: I boldly repeat the question, though, the expectation having been __ having been raised in the public mind, can you reverse this process where government is expected to produce the happy result? LEKACHMAN: Oh, no way. And it would […]
The massive growth of central government that started after the depression has continued ever since. If anything, it has even speeded up in recent years. Each year there are more buildings in Washington occupied by more bureaucrats administering more laws. The Great Depression persuaded the public that private enterprise was a fundamentally unstable system. That […]
Worse still, America’s depression was to become worldwide because of what lies behind these doors. This is the vault of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Inside is the largest horde of gold in the world. Because the world was on a gold standard in 1929, these vaults, where the U.S. gold was stored, […]
George Eccles: Well, then we called all our employees together. And we told them to be at the bank at their place at 8:00 a.m. and just act as if nothing was happening, just have a smile on their face, if they could, and me too. And we have four savings windows and we […]
Milton Friedman’s Free to Choose (1980), episode 3 – Anatomy of a Crisis. part 1 FREE TO CHOOSE: Anatomy of Crisis Friedman Delancy Street in New York’s lower east side, hardly one of the city’s best known sites, yet what happened in this street nearly 50 years ago continues to effect all of us today. […]
This video is from Adrian Roger’s Memorial Service held at Bellevue Baptist Church in Memphis, TN in 2005. He was one of the greatest preachers of the past century and I praise God for the impact he has had on my life and ministry. To learn more about Adrian Rogers and his continuing ministry, visit: www.lwf.org
CORDOVA, Tenn. (BP)–Two longtime friends of Adrian Rogers were among those who stepped up to the pulpit at his funeral, in their case, to voice the admiration of fellow pastors for his influence in their lives.
“Let us pray that a double portion of Adrian Rogers’ spirit shall be upon us all,” said Jerry Vines, pastor of First Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Fla., and a former Southern Baptist Convention president -– as was Rogers, who died Nov. 15 at the age of 74 after a battle with cancer and pneumonia.
“He taught us preachers, ‘Holiness is not the way to Jesus, but Jesus is the way to holiness,’” Ken Whitten, pastor of Idlewild Baptist Church in Tampa, Fla., told the crowd at Rogers’ Nov. 18 funeral at Bellevue Baptist Church in suburban Memphis.
A transcript of their remarks follows:
JERRY VINES
“I’ve been asked to speak on behalf of Dr. Rogers’ friends and his brothers in the ministry. Joyce reminded me Tuesday night that very often he and I would sermonize in our telephone calls. I must say to you, on more than one occasion I was able to creatively disguise one of his outlines -– as have we all. You haven’t preached until you’ve preached an Adrian Rogers sermon.
“So permit me just briefly to sermonize. When Elisha saw the prophet Elijah carried into heaven, he cried, ‘My father, my father! The chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof. It was a cry of sadness, a cry of witness, a cry of gladness.
“It is a cry of sadness. ‘My father, my father!’ Elisha speaking out of the deeply personal grief he is experiencing. There is something deeply personal about that word. We grieve this evening, not to the level or to the degree of the Rogers family, but we bring our grief alongside your grief. Who could not but grieve? Who could have a dry eye over the loss of this good and faithful man? The Bible says we’re to sorrow not as those who have no hope, but it does not say we are to sorrow not. Our Christian faith does not dehumanize us.
“It is a cry of witness. There is something definitely testimonial. Notice the language carefully. ‘The chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof.’ Normally it was spoken of the chariots -– plural -– of Israel. And yet when God gets ready for Elijah to go to heaven, he sends a chariot and Elisha recognizes that this chariot represents this prophet of God, Elijah. One man, who challenged and conquered the prophets of Baal, who through the power of his prayers could call down fire or rain, whichever was needed on the occasion…. Adrian Rogers was our acknowledged leader…. He led us in the Southern Baptist Convention conservative resurgence. He led by the godliness of his character, the Christ-likeness of his behavior and the power of his spirit-filled life. It is a cry of witness. There is something testimonial.
“It is a cry of gladness. There is something delightfully supernal about it. I have chosen that word, Joyce, carefully — supernal. I think Adrian would like that word. It’s an old word. You pick it up in some of the hymns, Steve, of old. Supernal. Celestial. Coming from on high. ‘My father, my father! The chariot of Israel and the horsemen thereof. As he was propelled by a whirlwind, escorted by a chariot of fire into the presence…. When he went into the hospital, most of you read these things, he said, ‘I’m in a win-win situation.’ It sounds just like him…. He said many times, ‘When my time comes, don’t be sorry for me. I will be kicking up gold dust on the streets of glory.’
“So what’s left for us? Let us pray that a double portion of Adrian Rogers’ spirit shall be upon us all.”
America’s public education system is failing. We’re spending more money on education but not getting better results for our children.
That’s because the machine that runs the K-12 education system isn’t designed to produce better schools. It’s designed to produce more money for unions and more donations for politicians.
For decades, teachers’ unions have been among our nation’s largest political donors. As Reason Foundation’s Lisa Snell has noted, the National Education Association (NEA) alone spent $40 million on the 2010 election cycle (source: http://reason.org/news/printer/big-education-and-big-labor-electio). As the country’s largest teachers union, the NEA is only one cog in the infernal machine that robs parents of their tax dollars and students of their futures.
Students, teachers, parents, and hardworking Americans are all victims of this political machine–a system that takes money out of taxpayers’ wallets and gives it to union bosses, who put it in the pockets of politicians.
If you want to change this nation in a big way then you will at the fact that in the last 40 years we have increased our educational spending every year and our test scores have dropped. The problem is not money but education competition. We don’t need to spend over $29,000 per kid in the Washington D.C. district when we could give vouchers out (under $9000 per kid) and have better results. Take a look at this article from Milton Friedman.
Michelle: you are the grandfather of school vouchers do you feel victorious?
Mr. Friedman: Far from victorious, but very optimistic and hopeful. We are at the beginning of the task because as of the moment vouchers are available to only a very small amount of children. Our goal is to have a system in which every family in the U.S. will be able to choose for itself the school to which its children go we are far from that ultimate result. If we had that a system of free choice we would also have a system of competition, innovation which would change the character of education. You know our educational system is one of the most backwards things in our society in the may we teach people they did 200 years ago there is a person in the front of the room there are children sitting down at the bottom and they are being talked to can you name any other industry in the U.S. which is as technologically backward I can name one and only one..the legislature for the same reason. Both are monopolies the elementary and secondary school system is the single most Socialist industry in the U.S. leaving aside the military, but aside from the military its a major socialist industry, it is centralized and the control comes from the center and the difficulty of having a monopoly in which people cannot choose has been exacerbated by the fact that it has been largely taken over by teachers unions, the national education association and the american federation of teachers and the unions. Understandably I do not blame them but they are interested in the welfare of their members not the welfare of the children and the result is they have introduced a degree of rigidity which makes it impossible to reform the public school system from within. Reform has to come through competition from the outside and the only way you can get competition is by making it possible for parents to have the ability to choose.
Michelle: Give to me a model, an example of how it would work
Mr. Friedman: Very simple, take the extreme the government says we are willing to finance schooling for every child. The government compels children. If you look at the role of government in education there are 3 different levels there is a level of compulsory the government says every child must go to school until such and such and age. That is the equivalent of saying if you are going to drive a car you must have a license. The second stage is funding not only do we require you to have an education but the government is willing to pay for that schooling. That would be equivalent to saying the government is willing to pay for your car that you drive. The third level is running the educational industry that would be the equivalent of the government manufacturing the automobile or to put it in a different image consider food stamps today. Food stamps are funds provided by the government but if that were to be runned like the schools they would say everybody has to use these food stamps at a government grocery and each person with food stamps is assigned to a particular government grocers so the only way you can get your food stamps is by going to that grocer do you think those groceries would be very good? We know what the situation is in schooling people say why now and not 50-75 years ago? Well, when I went to high school t hat was a long time ago in the 1920s there were a 150,000 school districts in the U.S and the population was half what it is now. Today, there are fewer than 15,000 school districts. So it used to be that you really did have competition cause you had small school districts and parents had a good deal of control over those school districts, but increasingly we have shifted to very large school districts, to centralized control, to a system in which the governmental officials in which the educational professionals control it and like every socialist industry it produces a product that is very expensive and of very low quality. Of course it is not uniform there are some very good schools do not misunderstand me, but there are also some very bad ones.
Michelle: I interviewed some folks who are against school vouchers and they say that if you really want to help out a school what you should do is provide high quality early childhood education, small classes, small schools, summer school available to children who want it. Put money to those items which they claim would work.
Mr. Friedman: They don’t, we have been doing that. The amount of money spent per child adjusted for inflation has something like doubled or tripled over the last 20 years. Twenty years ago we had this report A Nation at Risk that pointed out all of the difficulties I just referred to and which pointed out this was a first generation that was going to be less schooled then its parents. We are now in the next generation and will be even less well schooled. We have had every possible effort you could have from reform from within. It is not just in schools it is in any area reform has to come from outside it has to come from competition. Let me illustrate that from within the school system. the united states from all accounts ranks #1 in higher education people from all over the world regard the United States colleges and universities the best and most varied. On the other hand in every other international comparison we rank near the bottom in elementary and secondary education why the difference?…one word..choice. The elementary and secondary education the school picks the child it picks its customer. In higher education the customer picks its school, you have choice that makes all the difference in the world. It means competition forces product. Look over the rest of the economy is there any area in the u.s. in which progress has not required progress from the outside. Look at the telephone industry when it was broken down into the little bells and opened up the competition it started a period of rapid innovation and development the key word is competition and the question is how can you get competition. only by having the customer choosing.
Michelle: There is concern that money is going to religious schools. That the majority of the students in voucher programs that exist use them to attend schools with religious affiliation?
Mr. Friedman: Why? Because the vouchers are so small in some cases. It is true that of the private schools in the u.s the great bulk of them are religious. that is for one simple reason here is someone selling something for nothing somebody down the street is giving away chocolate and you want to get into the business of selling chocolate that is kind of tough isn’t it here at schools children can attend them they are not free they are paying for it in the form of taxes but there is no specific charge for going to that school somebody else is going to offer it. The churches, the religious organizations have had a real advantage in that they were the only ones around who were in a position to subsidize the education and keep the fees down low. If you open it wide the most recent case was Ohio, cleveland case. The voucher that they had had a max value of $2,500 now it is not easy to provide a decent education at $2,500 and make money at it make it pay at the same time the state of Ohio was spending something like over $7,000 per child on schooling if that voucher had been $7,000 instead of $2,500 I have no doubt that there would have been a whole raft of new private, non-profit both profit and non-profit schools. That is what has happened in Milwaukee. Milwaukee has a voucher system and today the fraction of the voucher users in Milwaukee going to religious schools is less than the fraction going to religious schools was before this system started because there have been new schools developed and some of them have been religious but many of them are not. In any event, the Supreme Court has settled that issue they have said that if it is the choice of the parent if there are alternatives available there are government schools, charter schools, private non-denominational schools, private denominational schools so long as the choice is in the hands of the parent that is not a violation of the 1st amendment.
Michelle: You have a friend and an ally in the White House when it comes to vouchers
Mr. Friedman: I should say. Mr. Bush has always been in favor. He is in favor of free choice. Remember vouchers are a means not an end the purpose of vouchers is to enable parents to have free choice and the purpose of having free choice is to provide competition and allow the educational industry to get out of the 17th century and get into the 21st century and have more innovation and more evolvement. There is no reason why you cannot have the same kind of change in the provision of education as you have had in industries like the computer industry, the television industry and other things.
Michelle: Is it refreshing to have a President that, Bill Clinton was firmly against vouchers.
Mr. Friedman: No, it is a case of circumstances when he was Governor of Arkansas he was not against vouchers. He was in favor, but when he became President he came out against vouchers. I should say he did not oppose vouchers as Governor and he did as President and that was for political reasons. People don’t recognize how powerful politically the teachers unions are. Something like a quarter of all the delegates at the democratic national convention are from the teachers union. They are probably the most powerful pressure group in the U.S… very large funds, very large number of people and very active politically.
Michelle: We talk in the office about how President Bush has some very Friedmanesq ideas.
Mr. Friedman: They are not freidmanesq they are just good ideas. I hope that is true anyway. I think very highly of President Bush and I think in these areas don’t misunderstand me that is not a blanket statement there are some things he has done that I disagree with, but taken as a whole he has been moving in the right direction of trying to move toward a smaller more limited government trying to provide more freedom and more initiative in all areas. His philosophy on Medicare is the same as his philosophy in schools.
Michelle: Is that refreshing?
Mr. Friedman: It is an interesting thing, if you look at the facts the one area the area in which the low income people of this country, the blacks and the minority are most disadvantaged is with respect with the kinds of schools they can send their children to. The people who live in Harlem or the slums or the corresponding areas in LA or San Francisco they can go to the same stores, shop in the same stores everybody else can, they can buy the same automobiles, they can go to supermarket but they have very limited choice of schools everybody agrees that the schools in those areas are the worst they are poor. Yet, here you have a Democrat who allege their interest is to help the poor and the low income people here you have to take a different point every poll has shown that the strongest supporters of vouchers are the low income blacks and yet hardly a single black leader has been willing to come out for vouchers there were some exceptions Paul Williams in Milwaukee who was responsible for that…and a few others
Michelle: Why do you think that is?
Mr. Friedman: For obvious reasons, political. It has been to the self interest to the leaders the school system as long as its governmental its a source of power and jobs to hand around and funds to dispose of. If it is privatized that disappears and the other aspect of it is the power of the teachers unions. Right now those of us that are in the upper income classes have freedom of choice for our children in various ways we can decide where to live and we can choose places to live that have good schools or we can afford to pay twice for schooling once by taxes and once by paying tuition at a private school. It seems to me utterly unfair that those opportunities should not be open to everybody at all levels of income. If you had a system the kind I would like to see the government would say we require every child to get a certain number of years of schooling and in order to make that possible we are going to provide for every parent a voucher equal to a certain number of dollars which they can use only for schooling can’t use it for anything else. They can add to it, but they cannot subtract from it. Those will be those can be used in government schools let the government run the school but force them to be in competition so that all government schools charge tuition, but can be paid for by that voucher but that same voucher can also be used in private schools of all kinds and then you would have an open the teachers union complained and they insist they are doing a good job. if they are doing a good job then why are they so afraid of some competition?
No one did more to advance the cause of school vouchers than Milton and Rose Friedman. Friedman made it clear in his film series “Free to Choose” how sad he was that young people who live in the inner cities did not have good education opportunities available to them. Remembering Milton Friedman’s School Choice Legacy […]
Everywhere school vouchers have been tried they have been met with great success. Why do you think President Obama got rid of them in Washington D.C.? It was a political disaster for him because the school unions had always opposed them and their success made Obama’s allies look bad. In 1980 when I first sat […]
I ran across this very interesting article about Milton Friedman from 2002: Friedman: Market offers poor better learningBy Tamara Henry, USA TODAY By Doug Mills, AP President Bush honors influential economist Milton Friedman for his 90th birthday earlier this month. About an economist Name:Milton FriedmanAge: 90Background: Winner of the 1976 Nobel Prize for economic science; […]
Milton Friedman and Chile – The Power of Choice Uploaded by FreeToChooseNetwork on May 13, 2011 In this excerpt from Free To Choose Network’s “The Power of Choice (2006)”, we set the record straight on Milton Friedman’s dealings with Chile — including training the Chicago Boys and his meeting with Augusto Pinochet. Was the tremendous […]
The True Cost of Public Education Uploaded by catoinstitutevideo on Mar 5, 2010 What is the true cost of public education? According to a new study by the Cato Institute, some of the nation’s largest public school districts are underreporting the true cost of government-run education programs. http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11432 Cato Education Analyst Adam B. Schaeffer explains […]
Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times Blog reports today that Mitt Romney is for school vouchers. I am glad to hear that. Over and over we hear that the reason private schools are better is because they don’t have to keep the troubling making kids. It reminds me of this short film that I saw many […]
John Brummett (10-26-11, Arkansas Democrat-Gazette online edition) does not want charter schools to put public schools out of business but he wants them to show public schools how to do it. (Paywall) I seek in these matters a kind of Clintonian third-way finesse: I support charter schools only to the extent that they should be […]
1. It Would Require the Federal Government to Balance Its Budget Every Year.
The federal budget deficit is a record high $1.6 trillion—more than 10 percent of the nation’s entire ouput, or Gross Domestic Product (GDP). We face such an enormous deficit because we spend too much, not because we tax too little. The Lee-Walsh Balanced Budget Amendment (BBA) would force Washington to live within its means.
2. It Would Prevent Tax Hikes.
The Lee-Walsh BBA would require a two-thirds majority vote in both chambers to raise taxes, which would help prevent the prosperity-killing tax hikes that years of trillion dollar deficits, as proposed by President Obama’s budget, would surely bring. The Lee-Walsh BBA would achieve a balanced budget by cutting spending instead of raising taxes.
3. It Would Make it More Difficult to Raise the Debt Ceiling.
The Lee-Walsh BBA would require a three-fifths majority vote in both chambers to raise the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling has been raised ten times in just the past decade. It’s clear that we need to make it more difficult to raise the debt ceiling. The Lee-Walsh BBA does this to ensure that Congress cannot raise the debt ceiling so carelessly.
4. It Would Limit Spending to 18 Percent of GDP.
Congressional spending currently consumes approximately 25 percent of GDP. Federal revenue from taxes over the past 40 years has averaged about 18 percent of GDP, making 18 percent a reasonable limit for spending if Congress is in fact interested in balancing the budget for the long haul.
5. It Would Reduce the Size and Scope of Government.
If we want economic growth to return and be a permanent part of American life, it is imperative that we dramatically reduce the size and scope of government. The Lee-Walsh BBA would put real restraints on the amount of money Washington can spend.
6. It Has a Good Chance of Passing.
The Lee-Walsh BBA has a very good chance of passing the Republican-controlled House. In the Senate, the BBA has unanimous support from all 47 Republicans. It’s likely to gain bipartisan support in both chambers.
7. The Lee-Walsh BBA Has Teeth.
Some proposed BBAs have numerous loopholes that make it easy for Congress to override the amendment. The Lee-Walsh BBA has real teeth that would require Washington to balance its budget each year.
8. Americans Overwhelmingly Support Balanced Budget Amendments.
Balanced Budget Amendments have always been popular with the American people. By 72-20 percent, most voters favor a balanced budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution, according to a Fox News poll.
9. It Would Prohibit Congress from Perpetual Deficit Spending.
Deficit spending is simply a hidden tax on future earnings. It is irresponsible for Washington to continue to borrow now and tax us more down the road. The Lee-Walsh BBA would help end our deficit spending and our debt culture.
10. It is a Good Start to Restoring Fiscal Sanity to Washington.
A Balanced Budget Amendment may not be a cure all. But it’s a step in the right direction to rein in excessive spending. Enactment of this amendment will go a long way in ensuring Washington never gets so carried away with reckless spending again.
I just got finished writing my Congressman Tim Griffin of Little Rock, but since I have a lot of close friends in your district I thought I would write you too. The time you were elected you joined 87 Freshman lawmakers in Washington and I have been watching closely to see how conservative all of you voted. I must say that I was extremely proud that many in this Freshman class of 2010 voted against the debt ceiling increase deal of August 2011. I just got finished writing Jeff Landry of Louisiana, Idaho First District Congressman Raúl R. Labrador, Kansas Congressman Tim Huelskamp, Rep. Justin Amash (R-MI), and telling that I wrote several letters to Speaker John Boehner quoting their exact words why they voted against the debt ceiling increase in 2011!!!! I AM HOPING THAT YOU WILL JOIN THEM NOW IN OPPOSING A DEBT CEILING INCREASE UNLESS WE GETA BALANCED BUDGET AMENDMENT PASSED FIRST.
I have written a lot on the blog in the last year about the debt ceiling argument. It has been one of the top issues I have dedicated my time to and as result of coming up with interesting issues like that I have experienced over 300,000 hits in the last 12 months on my blog.
Basically on my blog I have spent most of my time on budget issues and the pro-life issues but I also deal with popular culture and sports.
I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you have one thing you can hold over his head and that is the debt ceiling.
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. DON’T LET THEM RAISE THAT […]
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. DO NOT TAKE THE […]
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Open letter to Speaker of the House John Boehner (Part 2 on raising taxes) John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but […]
John Boehner, Speaker of the House H-232, The Capital, Washington, DC 20515 Dear Mr. Speaker, I know that you will have to meet with newly re-elected President Obama soon and he will probably be anxious for you to raise taxes and federal spending, but he will want you to leave runaway entitlement programs alone. When that happens then you […]
Max Brantley of the Arkansas Times noted: House Speaker John Boehner was spotted in Little Rock yesterday — lunch at Whole Hog Cafe and at Cajun’s Wharf during the evening hours. My spin on John Boehner is very simple. He needs to be brave enough to join those conservatives in the House that really do […]
The Arkansas Times Blog reported today: Debt ceiling non-compromise updates BOEHNER: Screaming “Hell no you can’t!” Ah, the good old days. Slate has a running update of the debt ceiling debate in Washington. So far it looks like Speaker of the House John Boehner will have the votes in the House to pass his plan. […]
