A good friend sent me a joke called, "A $50 Lesson" that I'd like to share with you:


I recently asked my friends' little girl what she wanted to be when she grows up.  She said she wanted to be President some day.  Both her parents, liberal Democrats, were standing there, so I asked her, "If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?"
She replied, "I'd give food and houses to all the homeless people."
Her parents beamed with pride.
"Wow, what a worthy goal," I told her.  "But you don't have to wait until you are President to do that.  You can come over to my house and mow the lawn, pull weeds, and sweep my yard and I'll pay you $50.  Then I'll take you over to the grocery store where the homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward food and a new house."
She thought about that for a few seconds, then looked me straight in the eye and asked, "Why doesn't the homeless guy come over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?"
I said, "Welcome to the Republican Party."
Her parents still aren't speaking to me.

Well I said I loved it and that I had heard a similar joke about a college student berating her Republican father for his lack of compassion.  He asked her about her grades the previous semester.  She had gotten straight A's.  He said she was probably proud of the hard work she put in to achieve this.  She said she did work hard.  He also pointed out that her friends had partied a lot and did not get good grades.  He asked, "How about if you share some of her A's so that they could all have C's?"  She said, "NO WAY!  I worked hard for those grades!"  He said, "Welcome to the Republican party!"

All laughter aside, what is REALLY sad is what I heard recently on a talk radio station.  The caller was talking to the conservative radio host about redistribution of wealth.  The host asked the caller a number of questions about just how deeply his beliefs went.  The host searched for a situation in which he, the caller, might understand that folks deserve to keep what they've earned in an honest manner, so he asked, "So, if someone gets all A's you are saying that they should share that and bring everyone up to C's?"  The caller replied, (I AM NOT MAKING THIS UP!) "Sure, some people are smarter, they should share their accomplishments."
I almost ran off the road!

My question to the caller is this, "If you child needed brain surgery do you want the Doctor who actually EARNED an A or the Doctor who got the re-distributed grade?"

The only changes I would make to the jokes above would be to substitute "Progressive" for "Liberal Democrat" because they've changed their name again AND there are progressives in BOTH parties.  So I guess substituting "Conservative" for "Republican" would be in order too.

I then signed off as follows:
As we remain in God's hands; the God who taught us to be good stewards of what we are given.  The Lord who did NOT advocate the forced re-distribution of wealth.  The God who taught us to love one another, care for one another, and support one another.

It's important to understand the two world views that are involved in our political discussions.  Jokes like these use humor to point out flaws in the world view that are held by most progressives.  The world view that says if we have just the right government programs, if we just have the right regulations, and if we can just convince all those folks with the opposing world view that "Yes we can" transform this country and the world into a Utopia.  Overlooking the one very important fact, that we are flawed and sinful humans, and that we cannot be "perfected" by government regulation and control is the key to the disastrous results of such world views.  I implore you to read history so that you understand the choices you are making.

Recently the Reverend Al Sharpton responded to a comment:  "Rev. Sharpton, Dr. King's dream has been realized since we have a black president in the White House."  Rev. Sharpton replied:  "We have NOT realized his dream.  His dream was not to have one black family in the White House.  His dream was that EVERYTHING WOULD BE EQUAL IN EVERYBODY'S HOUSE."  I'm thinking that is a bit of a perversion of Dr. King's message.  What about you?  (Note: I am now reading the writings of MLK to be sure.)