Posted on 10/18/2015 10:47:11 AM PDT by george76
progessive ideology is increasingly about asking government to provide more for its citizens — and more for noncitizens, too. From that perspective, it turns on its head the iconic message of Democrat John F. Kennedy to “Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can do for your country.”
On that cold day in January 1961, Kennedy was not, of course, bemoaning government-sponsored “free stuff,” or calling for program cutbacks. Indeed, his administration sponsored fresh endeavors, such as the Peace Corps. He also inspired a generation to view government service as a sacred, higher calling. But the Kennedy model was strongly rooted in the notion of self-reliance, as well as the belief, explicitly stated in his inaugural address, that government is not there to serve us. We are there to serve it.
...
After JFK’s assassination, President Lyndon B. Johnson declared an “unconditional war on poverty.” Its aim, he said, was “not only to relieve the symptoms of poverty but to cure it and above all, to prevent it.” At the 50-year mark, retrospectives suggested LBJ went further than Kennedy would have done. Its mixed results lie at the root of today’s bitter, partisan divide on the best way to improve an individual’s economic status.
...
something inherently depressing about a country that forever needs to pour more taxpayer resources into rescuing people from economic crisis, and a Democratic party that now makes that the chief incentive for voter support.
The era when Americans were not supposed to ask their country what it could do for them, and instead ask what they can do for their country, feels like ancient history. And Democrats are the ones closing the door on it.
(Excerpt) Read more at bostonglobe.com ...
FDR presidency.
Since FDR.
When the party sprouted.
Huey P. (a chicken in every pot) Long [Democrat La]
Sadly it goes back to that progressive republican Theodore Roosevelt, republican William Taft, and democrat Woodrow Wilson (Taft much, much less than the other two). Our form of national government crumbled on their watch, with their strong encouragement.
1033. Do you need a more precise date?
Make that 1933.
Democrats buy voters... when enough illegals are in the country they’ll switch from the bribe to the boot...
Criminal thugs... always the same playbook.
As usual with this quote we see the conflation of “Country” with “Government”. I’m no fan of Kennedy, but he wasn’t saying “Ask what you can do for your Government”. That’s just how modern liberals like to read it.
In the first Democratic debate(?) It appears that each of them wants to become the ‘New’ Santa Claus. Sanders has a bright idea that only costs just $18 trillion, coincidentally just about what we already owe. And the Hildebeast says it can be done, just take it away from all of the multi-millionaires and billionaires, except the Clintons of course.
No it's not.
A tax cut allows people to keep their own money. It's not the same as a gov't check to a welfare recipient.
It's only the same if you assume EVERYTHING belongs to the gov't, including your income.
Joan Vennochi does.
The lesson of Issac selling his birthright for a bowl of potage has not been taken to heart.
For a minute there, I thought you were saying since Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor, became King of Burgundy.
Yes, that's right...the money that businesses/corps earned is not theirs...the gov. owns it, and those greedy corps refuse to pay as much taxes as the libs want them to. Only completely brain dead libs think moronic things like what Vennochi spewed.
Heck, Democrats WIN on free stuff. Why *wouldn’t* they sell it like hot cakes? It works. I mean, look at Cuber. LOL!
Woodrow Wilson signed the Federal Reserve Act in 1913, this was the beginning of the erosion of our currency. That and the 16th amendment enabled the government to start providing “free” stuff.
Of course things expanded greatly under FDR, Johnson, and the rest, but I think it began with Wilson, before he came along, money was real.
“1033. Do you need a more precise date?”
Wow! It’s a little after the time Leif Erikson made it over to the new world from Iceland, and some 33 years before William of Orange conquered England in 1066.
Who gives away more free stuff - the French or Scandanavians? That’s a tough choice in today’s world.
Think I’ll go and re-read that millennial classic, Beowulf!
Since Zoe was Eastern Roman empress.
Her lavishing of benefits on the Constantinople court party, and neglect of the imperial defenses, led to Manzikert.
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