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With New Orleans little more than a fetid soup bowl and southern Mississippi reduced to a flat, slab-speckled landscape, as many as 1,000,000 Americans must rely on the kindness of strangers for food, water and other basic needs. They may depend on that kindness for months.
In times like these Americans are reminded of the importance of private charity. It is a lesson we will not soon forget.
Federal and local government programs, of course, are making huge efforts and progress as well. The military and police, needless to say, are always invaluable in search and rescue efforts. I don't mean to diminish the good work those public servants have done and will continue to do saving and rebuilding lives. What I do say is that private charity allows the generosity and ingenuity of Americans to meet the unpredictability of life head-on in a way a staid government program never could.
Charity can work quickly. It can be tailored to the needs of specific victims. It can move in unorthodox ways to fix unprecedented problems. And the results can be astounding.
My liberal friends often accuse me of being uninterested in helping the less fortunate simply because I'm conservative. Since I'm not interested in forcing public funding of the government's social programs, they insist, I must want poor people to suffer.
'Tis not true.
There are many reasons conservatives trumpet private charity as the best way to fix societal problems. During this national tragedy, I believe events on the ground will show that it's not an unreasonable belief.
First, I don't believe an individual's commitment to helping the less fortunate can be measured by the amount of money one thinks the government should take from others. Having money taken from you does not make you charitable. Conversely, believing the government should leave people's hard-earned money alone does not make one uncharitable.
Rather, the charity is in the giving. If my liberal friends really believed that arguing for big government programs covered their responsibility to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, they'd put on an "I Donated to FEMA April 15th" t-shirt and call it a day. Of course, they won't do that. If I know them, they'll give.
My liberal friends are incredulous when I say that private charity could match the problem-solving power of the federal government. They say their fellow citizens would never give enough of their own volition. I disagree. When the long recovery from Katrina is someday over, I'm confident my fellow Americans will have proved my faith is not misplaced. They may even gain a few new believers along the way.
Are liberals really interested in "helping the poor", or are they interested in forcing the "evil rich Republicans" to help the poor while the liberals sit on their couch drinking beer?
The liberals say they beleive in choice, but only if its their choice I suppose. Otherwise its coercion.
With New Orleans little more than a fetid soup bowl and southern Mississippi reduced to a flat, slab-speckled landscape, as many as 1,000,000 Americans must rely on the kindness of strangers for food, water and other basic needs. They may depend on that kindness for months.
In times like these Americans are reminded of the importance of private charity. It is a lesson we will not soon forget.
Federal and local government programs, of course, are making huge efforts and progress as well. The military and police, needless to say, are always invaluable in search and rescue efforts. I don't mean to diminish the good work those public servants have done and will continue to do saving and rebuilding lives. What I do say is that private charity allows the generosity and ingenuity of Americans to meet the unpredictability of life head-on in a way a staid government program never could.
Charity can work quickly. It can be tailored to the needs of specific victims. It can move in unorthodox ways to fix unprecedented problems. And the results can be astounding.
My liberal friends often accuse me of being uninterested in helping the less fortunate simply because I'm conservative. Since I'm not interested in forcing public funding of the government's social programs, they insist, I must want poor people to suffer.
'Tis not true.
There are many reasons conservatives trumpet private charity as the best way to fix societal problems. During this national tragedy, I believe events on the ground will show that it's not an unreasonable belief.
First, I don't believe an individual's commitment to helping the less fortunate can be measured by the amount of money one thinks the government should take from others. Having money taken from you does not make you charitable. Conversely, believing the government should leave people's hard-earned money alone does not make one uncharitable.
Rather, the charity is in the giving. If my liberal friends really believed that arguing for big government programs covered their responsibility to the victims of Hurricane Katrina, they'd put on an "I Donated to FEMA April 15th" t-shirt and call it a day. Of course, they won't do that. If I know them, they'll give.
My liberal friends are incredulous when I say that private charity could match the problem-solving power of the federal government. They say their fellow citizens would never give enough of their own volition. I disagree. When the long recovery from Katrina is someday over, I'm confident my fellow Americans will have proved my faith is not misplaced. They may even gain a few new believers along the way.
Are liberals really interested in "helping the poor", or are they interested in forcing the "evil rich Republicans" to help the poor while the liberals sit on their couch drinking beer?
The liberals say they beleive in choice, but only if its their choice I suppose. Otherwise its coercion.
