Even though they try so hard to hide them, Leftists eventually reveal their true beliefs. 

They go to great lengths to give the illusion they are working for the common good and that private industry should fall prostrate on the ground and worship the government for all the wonderful things they provide but they really aren’t interested in saving ‘things’ as much as promoting a socio-economic paradigm change that leads us away from Capitalism.

Remember Elizabeth Warren’s speech that tugged at the Leftist heart strings?

“You built a factory out there? Good for you,” she [Warren] says. “But I want to be clear: you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for; you hired workers the rest of us paid to educate; you were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for. You didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything at your factory, and hire someone to protect against this, because of the work the rest of us did.”

“She continues: “Now look, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific, or a great idea? God bless. Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along.”

What a pompous ass!  That was the kind of speech that will make Liberals and lovers of big government stand up and cheer but there is a big problem with Ms. Warren’s little rant as was shown in a Red State post:

“I can certainly unite around the basic sentiment Warren portrays here: The relationship between the private sector and the government needs to be a symbiotic one, and not a parasitic one. That facet is excellent, and it draws people in.”

“Here’s where Warren misses: While the relationship between the government and private sector is parasitic, governmentis the parasite.”

“The core of the issue is this: Government creates nothing on its own. All people who work for the government or are otherwise supported by the government cannot thrive without someone creating wealth for government to tax. All those roads that were built came from taxpayer money. All those policemen are paid with taxpayer money. Most of those schools where the workers were trained came from taxpayer money.”

To see further evidence of this Leftist logic gone wrong, the good people at Destroy The GOP put together a list of things Republicans should do and the top 15 are shown below. 

If you’re a Republican who hates taxes, please do the following.

Do not use Medicare.

Do not use Social Security

Do not become a member of the US military, who are paid with tax dollars.

Do not ask the National Guard to help you after a disaster.

Do not call 911 when you get hurt.

Do not call the police to stop intruders in your home.

Do not summon the fire department to save your burning home.

Do not drive on any paved road, highway, and interstate or drive on any bridge.

Do not use public restrooms.

Do not send your kids to public schools.

Do not put your trash out for city garbage collectors.

Do not live in areas with clean air.

Do not drink clean water.

Do not visit National Parks.

Do not visit public museums, zoos, and monuments.

This is a classic straw man argument that Leftists are fond of brining up in an effort to paint conservatives as people who are against roads, bridges, national parks, zoos, police departments, fire departments, etc.  Conservatives have never said we should have zero government and most of the items on the list in the previous link are things conservatives gladly support giving their tax dollars to.  But as I’ve shown before, we don’t have a tax revenue problem; we have a spending problem and there is no better state to demonstrate this problem than California.

We see in an NPR article that the state of California will be forced to shut down several state parks because they don’t have the money to maintain them. 

“On July 1, 15 California state parks are slated to be closed permanently to the public — the first such closures in the state’s history. They’re the victim of budget cuts in a state with a $16 billion shortfall.”

“Over the past year, park enthusiasts have scrambled to save dozens of parks from closure, including Henry W. Coe State Park, California’s second-biggest state park, located about 30 miles south of San Jose.”

“With 135 square miles of spectacular wilderness in the Diablo mountain range, Coe Park is considered one of the Bay Area’s greatest secrets. Its namesake, Henry Coe, was a cattle rancher whose land became a state park in 1958.”

This is truly sad because parks are one of our national treasures that should be preserved for the enjoyment of its citizens but with a $16 billion deficit, something has to be cut.  But fear not, this story has a happy ending because a private citizen, Dan McCranie, has stepped up and raised the money to keep at least one of the parks open.  From the NPR article:

“McCranie made his money in the semiconductor industry. For 30 years now, when he has needed to escape the grind of Silicon Valley, McCranie has sought refuge in Coe Park, where an inscription on a monument to Henry Coe reads, “May these quiet hills bring peace to the souls of those who are seeking.”

“I’m crazy about this place,” McCranie says. “I think everybody who comes here is crazy about it.”

“When McCranie heard that Coe Park was on the list slated for closure, he stepped up with three-quarters of $1 million to help keep it open for the next three years. While McCranie is Coe Park’s main donor, others have also contributed smaller amounts. In total, about $900,000 of private donations will be given to the state of California to fund rangers and maintenance staff for three years.”

“McCranie, who is turning 69 soon, says he couldn’t think of a better thing to do with his excess wealth than to preserve Coe Park. Still, he admits he did not tell his wife before making the donation. “I figured forgiveness would be better than permission,” he says with a laugh.”

“McCranie figures that now that private donors have stepped up, state money will never come back to Coe Park. So it will be up to them to create an endowment fund big enough to keep this park open in perpetuity. But this model is precarious if enthusiasm flags or fortunes shift.”

Well that is just awesome!  A successful capitalist who played by the rules, paid his taxes and amassed a large amount of wealth has voluntarily chipped in (and encouraged other to chip in as well) to save the park and keep it operational for the foreseeable future. 

What is not to love?  The park will stay open for the enjoyment of the public and this plan will not require any state tax dollars.  Mr. McCranie and his associates are on their way to cutting 1/16^th of the California state budget deficit using money from the private sector.

Surely Liberals are happy with this, right?

Not according to Rob Reich.  From the NPR article (emphasis mine):

“Getting the state off the hook for funding parks may also set into motion a slippery slope, says Rob Reich, who is a co-director of Stanford University’s Center on Philanthropy and Civil Society.”

“On one level, Reich says, McCranie’s donation makes a sweeping philanthropic statement. But Reich is also troubled by the questions it raises: What about parks in areas that don’t have a lot of money? Who saves them? And what about donors who attach all kinds of strings to their gifts? And does private philanthropy replace the common good?” “You get lots of people like [McCranie] or others who do this who have great intentions and are civically minded and spirited,” Reich explains. “But acting one by one by one, they set into motion this dynamic … where suddenly we’re not acting collaboratively or collectively as a public. We’re acting individually as philanthropists to benefit the thing we’re most passionate about. And suddenly we don’t have a civic sphere anymore. We don’t have political participation. We don’t have an ‘us.’ We have a bunch of ‘I’s.’ “

Did you catch that?  Mr. Reich is concerned that governments are losing the control over the money and private investors are acting independently to spend their money where they desire.  Does that sound like Socialism to you? 

Mr. Reich’s view of government is antithetical to my view of how our founding fathers envisioned the role of government.   Mr. McCranie and his associates just demonstrated how Capitalism is a far superior economic system to Socialism because we have evidence where private citizens used the profits of their labors to give back to the community.  How often do you think this happens in a Socialistic country? 

When it gets right down to it, Leftists aren’t concerned about parks, schools, bridges, roads or other projects that benefit the country’s citizens.  They are more concerned about huge coffers of government money where the collective ‘we’ (i.e. politicians) decide where to spend the money instead of the “bunch of I’s” that have the freedom to spend their money based on their own desires and what the Free Market produces.

This is the heart of what Leftists really desire and this NPR article demonstrated it beautifully.