You wrote the piece, how’s about posting more than a excerpt?
So many parents supply so much to their “children” even up to the 30s today that there’s too much time to sit around and think.
I can honestly say that with almost EVERY decision in my life, whether it’s trading stocks and commodities, deciding which job to take or whether or not to stay with a gal or ask one out...
Thinking TOO LONG has almost EVERY TIME had an adverse outcome.
Too much time to think. Too much propaganda out there to make one think the wrong way.
And this is what you get.
Idle hands and such.
Nothing succeeds like success. Sorry, but your premise is faulty.
Even today’s poor live lives undreamed of by royalty less than a century ago …I do not see “today’s poor” living in edifices that even remotely resemble Buckingham Palace (royal residence since 1837) or the prior Buckingham House on the same site (dating back to the 1500s or so).
“Even today’s poor live lives undreamed of by royalty less than a century ago.”
You lost me right there.
Not much lately, this used to be heard around York County, PA. “Shirtsleeves to shirt-sleeves in 3 generations”. A man starts an Enterprise from scratch, in his shirtsleeves and is successful. His son inherits it, wears a coat and tie, but knows how hard Dad worked. The grandson, who did not help build it, takes it for granted, pizzes it away and it goes under....leaving the grandson to find a shirtsleeves job to survive. (This adage predated welfare and other gov’t Dole).
This truth especially for the kids of successful people. Kids want to enjoy the spoils of whatever the parents earned. And it’s true on a large political scale: the parents who went through WWII and the Depression wanted their kids to avoid such hardships. The Hippie revolt against mom and dad and government (Big Daddy) happened at a time when the American economy was booming and there was a hedonistic and moral laxity in the air: do your own thing, sex drugs and Rock & Roll, drop out turn on, etc. Idealism rather than practicality was the virtue of choice. The hard learned success of mom and dad gave rise to kids that wanted to waste their life away “finding themselves” in Tibet. And these Children of God, the ME generation, who went to Woodstock became spoiled children for the rest of their life. (I think part of the reason they like being children is that they don’t have to think about getting old and dying. It’s a self-sustaining solipsistic state of supposed innocence and God like self flattery and delusion. However, getting old is inevitable and second childhood will just be the continuation of a permanent state of childhood.) Anyway, the whole thing is almost Oedipal in that hatred of government (Big Daddy, the Man, the Industrial-Military Complex) comes about through wanting to be spoiled and loved by MOM. Mom is now the generous side of government entitlements and benefits. So success breeds failure.
![](https://3lrofj3556kl9zu0p27yma51-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Good-Times-Bad-Times.jpg")
We are at the "Good Times Create Weak Men" phase, or the "Success Brings Failure" phase.
It isn’t “in the blood.” . . . We are a nation of mutts, so that can’t be it either.
It isn’t that our benevolent governments have driven this. For most of the history of the country all government was relatively small. Throw in the fact these organizations don’t create wealth, but only consume it, and obviously the amazing engine of wealth creation has little to do with the powerful non-profit organizations we call government.
No, the amazing wealth-creating behemoth that is the United States of America is due to the simple fact that individual freedom and limited government is in agreement with reality. They work because they are true, no more, no less.
This really shouldn’t be shocking. Are we shocked when two free hydrogen atoms become water when joined with one oxygen atom? We factually accept this atomic dance because that’s what happens, every time! The same is true with creating wealth.
I like the statement that an America Secretary is better off than Queen Victoria was. Which I interpret as meaning that most blacks today are better off than the slaveowners of 1½ centuries ago were in their day.Alexander Hamilton wrote that
>“The republican principle demands that the deliberate sense of the community should govern the conduct of those to whom they intrust the management of their affairs; but it does not require an unqualified complaisance to every sudden breeze of passion or to every transient impulse which the people may receive from the arts ofIMHO that “men” can usefully be read “socialists” today . . .mensocialists , who flatter their prejudices to betray their interests.” ― Alexander HamiltonExcellent Read! Bookmark and Ping.
I have always appreciated this (and thank you, conservatism_is_compassion..:)
Hard times create strong men.
Strong men create good times.
Good times create weak men.
And, weak men create hard times.”
We are a wealthy country because we value individual freedom.
Actual success breeds success - it’s the false meme that everyone can be deemed “successful” (all get a trophy so they ain’t suffering hurt feelings for losing) that breeds failure. Johnson’s “Great Society” is the perfect example as it devolves into it’s intended format.