Talk politics.

America Becoming a Nation of Freeloaders?

That's the intro to the whole 1 hour special that was on last Friday. I can't find the whole thing online yet, maybe someone else can. Here's a link to the original piece that John Stossel did years ago. And some of the topics covered in the new special are described in Stossel's blog.

In big government America today, it’s rich people who freeload the most. Corporations do it. And rich individuals do it. People like me...Eventually, a storm swept away my first floor. But I didn’t lose a penny. Thanks! I never invited you there, but you paid for my new first floor. A few years later, the whole house went. Again, government flood insurance covered my loss.

To me, this is the ultimate in patriotism, identifying the problems with our government rather than blindly accepting them. Recognizing that trying to help a few has unintended consequences that need to be dealt with. Cutting corporate welfare is smart. That maybe if we stopped giving away money to those who don't need it we might not have to raise taxes on anyone.

Unfortunately, as Stossel's earlier piece shows, I think our society is too far gone down the entitlement track to fix this problem, so I have no hope things will get better.