Posted on 01/21/2013 4:48:32 PM PST by SkyPilot
President Obama defended the idea of entitlements like Medicare and Social Security in his second inaugural address Monday, arguing that these programs strengthen the nation and free Americans to "take the risks that make this country great."
"We reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future," Obama said. "For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty, and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn."
He continued: "We do not believe that in this country, freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few. We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us, at any time, may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm. The commitments we make to each other – through Medicare, and Medicaid, and Social Security – these things do not sap our initiative; they strengthen us. They do not make us a nation of takers; they free us to take the risks that make this country great."
(Excerpt) Read more at livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com ...
I’d like to ask Obama what behavior would make us a nation of takers?
Dwayne Johnson? Is that you?
You tell me and we’ll both know.
His “risks” are what are destroying this country.
I'm in the same situation.
I think it's high time we made a very large distinction between Social Security where you pay into it for your working life and get it back when you retire vs programs like Food Stamps, Obamaphones, AFDC, WIC, etc. where the true takers are directly supported by the taxpayers without making any contribution themselves.
Social Security is an earned entitlement. The rest of the entitlements are unearned entitlements.
Medicare and Social Security which is TAKEN out of my check, which was TAKEN out of my Parents and Grandparents checks IS NOT AN ENTITLEMENT!
I swear to the Living, Loving GOD I cannot take one more person spouting this BUL&SH&T!
Well, aren't you "entitled" to it?
Addiction is hard to kick, huh?
So says the lying scumbag, the African communist, the President of the Democrats of the United States.
That piece of sh** can drop dead.
Horse manure.
Anybody who dumps money down the government toilet their whole working life deserves to take back whatever they can. You better believe my SS checks will be well spent on boat payments and casino trips.
Yes, I am “entitled” to it, but not in the sense you and alot of others are chosing to mean.
Are illegals who have paid not one cent into the system “entitled” to it...Shouldn’t be, but they are.
How about Welfare and Food Stamps, are any of us “entitled” to it? In a way. everybody needs help sometimes, especially in these times. Should MOST of the people on Welfare and Food Stamps, and in Public Housing be on these programs, no they should NOT.
When times hit my family hard, and we swallowed our pride and applied (many years ago) for Food Stamps, we were denied.
Do you know that OUR Government in running “Public Service Announcements” in Mexico, TELLING them how to come to our Country and get ALL the help they need?
And what exactly do you mean by that?
Don't presume to tell me what I am "chosing to mean"
Are illegals who have paid not one cent into the system “entitled” to it.
No.
How about Welfare and Food Stamps, are any of us “entitled” to it?
No.
Do you know that OUR Government in running “Public Service Announcements” in Mexico, TELLING them how to come to our Country and get ALL the help they need?
Yes.
Hard to wean oneself off the government teat, ain’t it?
I read what Shadowstrike said and your accusation- in a snide way- that they are on the government teat. Some assumption about someone you don’t know-especially when they are COMPLAINING about those who are. You have a strange mind. And having what looks to be American Indians on your page is even more ironic-seeing as how so many of them ARE government dependent.
Your screen name is apt since you have, out of a clear blue sky, jumped on a day old thread that didn’t concern you, but I am sure that SS appreciates you riding in to save the day. Sorry, but there are many “anti-Big Handout Conservatives” who bitch and moan about freeloading welfare takers while at the same time they are collecting a government check themselves. As someone young enough to have no expectation that Soc Sec will exist by the time I retire, yeah, I think of current Soc Sec recipients as being of the same ilk as welfare recipients, and they certainly act like they are entitled to the hand out, justifying themselves by talking about how many worthless devalued 1960s and 1970s dollars they paid into the system. All of the old-timers will jump on me for saying so, but Soc Sec is ruining us every bit as much as food stamps and welfare checks.
“I don’t consider myself a taker. I’m receiving Social Security, a program I’ve paid into for 50 years and am still paying into.”
Not to pick an intergenerational fist fight, but it doesn’t matter what you “consider yourself”.
What you “paid into” for 50 years was taken from you.
That doesn’t mean that folks today who pay for your benefits are not also “taken from”.
So you are getting an entitlement. You have to accept the truth, regardless of what you wish it to be.
There are a lot of people getting entitlements that are paid for by people who have their money taken from them today (or money taken from their children, most of whom haven’t even been born yet - and may never be born because of it).
take your check. spend it as you will. But accept the truth of where the money is coming from.
You see those dollars as "worthless and devalued", because they are today - which is all you've ever known. They weren't when those people were having them taken from their pay.
Your attitude and conclusions are based on your experience, which is considerably more limited than theirs. The idea that they should discard attitudes and conclusions based on their own depth of experience and adopt those based on your own perspective based on a much shallower pool of experience is, IMHO, just another form of "it's all about ME".
“One of the most disgusting things about this President is that he wants the public to think his opponents see people like you and people like the guy with a Gucci hat and an iPhone buying steak at the checkout line with an EBT card (stole that last part from Iowahawk) as the same sort of person. “
The unfortunate thing is that the taxpayer who pays for it all can’t tell the difference.
“Those are the TAKER Programs”
Again, the taxpayer can’t tell the difference. They have to pay and pay - government gets more than they do.
Government Spending is Government Spending. It is all immoral when it is taken from somebody who earned it in such proportions as to guarantee their future impoverishment.
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