Americans' attitude of entitlement very un-American
There is something un-American about entitlements. Our internal minuteman sounds the call to arms against the redcoats and their royal army of entitled kings and princes.
The purpose of our American Revolution was to break the shackle of a despotic king and his court and their birthright privileges.
They thought they owned us.
They were wrong.
Entitlement was also one of the contributors to the Civil War. The Union victory halted the economic entitlement of one human owning another. Slavery had bestowed upon the master the ultimate entitlement to take whatever he wanted, life, families, and/or virtue.
The problem is that a pecuniary aristocracy has arisen in America. There is a growing chasm between the richest citizens and the poorest members of our society — much like the class divide of our mother country.
The magnitude has not been seen since the times of the great robber barons of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. This new American royalty is most evident in corporate bonuses or testimonies of Wall Street CEOs. "Obscene" is the word used to describe the millions a single individual is given by his position and not necessarily by his company's or his own personal performance. It has become an entitlement of position.
Politicians decry the entitlements mandated by law to assist the poor and elderly of society that they themselves authored. The same people ignore their own accumulation of entitlements.
Duchesses and barons were entitled by birth. But we are birthing political dynasties that seem to grow their own sense of entitlement.
Politicians believe they are entitled to the trappings of office and automatic renewal. Re-election is the foregone conclusion. The incumbents have name recognition, free rides in parades and campaign war chests filled with the $10,000 breakfast meetings with lobbyists. There comes with the vote the sense of entitlement of power.
Entitlement certainly is in the eyes of the beholder. An entitlement to one is a rip-off to another. Or an entitlement to one is a life-saver to another. Try getting health care without insurance.
It seems the virtue of entitlement is dependent upon the direction you look. There are those who look up and others who look down. If you are in a position of power or wealth then privileges are yours. You are special and are endowed with perks. Looking down at the recipients of Medicaid or food stamps, one sees waste. However, if the patient on Medicaid looks up to see the ridiculous dollars going to sports figures, actors or Wall Street, they see greed.
