Quote of the Day - Thomas Sowell Edition

We don't need to send the country into bankruptcy, in the name of the poor, by spending trillions of dollars on people who are not poor, and who could take care of themselves. The poor have been used as human shields behind which the expanding welfare state can advance.

The goal is not to keep the poor from starving but to create dependency, because dependency translates into votes for politicians who play Santa Claus.

Thomas Sowell, Dependency and Votes

Word.

Edited to add this:

...though it is now clear that in the popular view of their case, as well as in the political view, the line between the deserving poor and the undeserving poor was not distinctly drawn. Popular feeling ran high at the time, and the prevailing wretchedness was regarded with undiscriminating emotion, as evidence of some general wrong done upon its victims by society at large, rather than as the natural penalty of greed, folly or actual misdoings; which in large part it was. The State, always instinctively "turning every contingency into a resource" for accelerating the conversion of social power into State power, was quick to take advantage of this state of mind. All that was needed to organize these unfortunates into an invaluable political property was to declare the doctrine that the State owes all its citizens a living; and this was accordingly done. It immediately precipitated an enormous mass of subsidized voting-power, an enormous resource for strengthening the State at the expense of society.

-- Our Enemy, The State by Albert J. Nock, 1935

It was explained to us over 75 years ago (and before), but nobody paid attention. Except the ones pushing "progressivism."  They understood all along.

To quote Daniel Webster:

In every generation, there are those who want to rule well--but they mean to rule. They promise to be good masters--but they mean to be masters.

That sumbitch ain't been born.