“I am for doing good to the poor; but I differ in opinion about the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor is, not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. In my youth I travelled much, and I observed in different countries that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and, of course, became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.” – Benjamin Franklin, On the Price of Corn, and Management of the Poor
Thanks to Politics and Reason for bringing this up.
I’m guessing that Benji did NOT intend for us to give 99 WEEKS of Unemployment Assistance as a way to make the poor “not easy in their poverty”, among other things.
And when we showed him all of the other items that the “poor” can now obtain for themselves, well, …
…I’ll bet his reaction would be less than favorable.
Just an FYI, DD:
my post from yesterday was written with you EXPLICITLY in mind.
(Think: “Star Wars”!!)
Excellent post! It’s funny how everyone seems to know how governments take control because it gets put into movies and sci fi books all the time. But most people today do not seem to want to stop it and are actually embracing it all. Very strange.
Strange indeed, DD.
All I can assume is that they grit their teeth as they make those movies, knowing that their audience will identify with such a story-line, even though it goes against their personal beliefs.
Either that, or they are blissfully UNAWARE of the disparity between their movies’ values and their own.