What about the children?

I was watching Bill Maher on HBO, and I think I just figured out the perfect (well, semi-perfect) logic to counter the socialist argument that the government needs to provide care for poor people. This one has always been a tough one for me because of the track record of the Republican party.

Let’s start with a couple of assumptions:

1) Liberals with a normal social conscience are concerned about poor people;

2) Conservatives with a normal social conscience, especially Christian conservatives, are concerned about poor people.

Now that we have established that both liberals and conservatives care about poor people, we may state the problem:

What is the best way to help poor people?

Liberals may likely be inclined to believe that the federal government should tax it’s citizenry and dole that money out to the poor. Conservatives would likely believe that private charity would better serve the needs of the poor.

I believe the conservative approach is the best way, and I think most liberals could be persuaded to believe this to be true if there were more honest communication between the two sides.

The problem lies with the lack of strict adherence to conservative principles (i.e., strict constitutional constructionism). Liberals don’t seem to trust most conservatives, and why should they? The (neo)conservative movement has apparently co-opted and traded true conservative principles for a turn at the government trough for entitlements that are anathema to the liberal's way of thinking.

Until now.

Dr. Ron Paul’s message of strict constitutional constructionism solves all of these problems.

I don’t have the budget figures to prove it, but I would imagine that if the size of federal government was drastically reduced, and all liberals only gave half of the money that they would have paid in income taxes to the charitable organization of their choice, then there would be no lapse in care for the poor. In fact, I imagine that some of those same charitable organizations would receive money from conservatives, as well.

The money is there, it's just not being spent wisely under the current system. Furthermore, no one, conservative or liberal, can seriously argue that the government is as efficient as a private organization.

Therefore, it is true to say (assuming the budget figures support it) that the poor would be better served if the federal government adhered to the Constitution and let private individuals (or even individual states) handle welfare.

Ultimately, neither conservatives nor liberals want to see children go without care, least of all Dr. Paul (who I might add, has delivered babies for free at times).