A Selective Spreading Of The Wealth

For all of Barack Obama's claims of spreading the wealth around to benefit everyone, he doesn't practice what he preaches.  First, we heard about a half-brother of his that was living in a hut in Kenya, with an income of $1 per month.  Barack Obama spends more in one family trip to McDonald's -- much less a meal with arugula -- than his half-brother earns in two years, but he didn't spread his own multi-millionaire wealth around to his half-brother, did he?

Now, we are hearing about another relative who lives in dire straits:

Barack Obama has lived one version of the American dream that has taken him to the steps of the White House. But a few miles from where the Democratic presidential candidate studied at Harvard, his Kenyan aunt and uncle, immigrants living in modest circumstances in Boston, have a contrasting American story.

Zeituni Onyango, the aunt so affectionately described in Obama's best-selling memoir "Dreams fFrom My Father," lives in a disabled-access flat on a rundown public housing estate in South Boston.

A second relative believed to be the long-lost "Uncle Omar" described in the book was beaten by armed robbers with a "sawed-off rifle" while working in a corner shop in the Dorchester area of the city. He was later evicted from his one-bedroom apartment for failing to pay $2,324.20 in bills, according to the Boston Housing Court.

The press has repeatedly rehearsed Obama's extraordinary odyssey, but the other side of the family's American experience has only been revealed in parts. Just across town from where Obama made history as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, some of his closest blood relatives have confronted the harshness of immigrant life in America.

In his book Obama writes that "Uncle Omar" had gone missing after moving to Boston in the 1960s a quarter-century before Obama first visited his family in Kenya. Aunt Zeituni is now also living in Boston, and recently made a $260 campaign contribution to her nephew's presidential bid from a work address in the city.

Speaking outside her home in Flaherty Way, South Boston, on Tuesday, Onyango, 56, confirmed she was the "Auntie Zeituni" in Obama's memoir. She declined to answer most other questions about her relationship with the presidential contender until after the November 4 election.

So, let's recap.  Obama says he wants to spread the wealth.  In fact, he even told Rick Warren at the Saddleback forum that America's greatest moral failing is that we don't take care of 'the least of these', in reference to the poor.  In his nomination acceptance speech in Denver, he called on Americans to be our brother's keepers and sister's keepers.

And yet, his own charitable giving was less than 1% until he began running for President; even then, it increased only slightly. We know that he has not one but two relatives -- one living just a few miles away -- who are living in abject poverty, but he doesn't nothing to help them!  He spreads none of his wealth to them.  He doesn't follow his own advice, apparently unwilling to correct what he sees as America's biggest moral failure.

He'd rather spread your wealth, through your tax dollars.

This is Barack Obama - the ultimate liberal, living according to one set of rules, while you the peons of America live by another one that he dictates to you.

Hypocrite, or liar?  Maybe both.

People are beginning to figure this out about him, and that's why his campaign has sputtered to a halt, and is beginning to slide backward.

Here's another telling event that sheds light on his views on this subject (emphasis mine):

Speaking in front of a huge audience at downtown Raleigh rally yesterday, Barack Obama threw off a humorous line about John McCain's accusation that the Obama tax plan is redistributionist:

McCain has "called me a socialist for wanting to roll back the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans so we can finally give tax relief to the middle class," Obama said. "I don't know what's next. By the end of the week he'll be accusing me of being a secret communist because I shared my toys in kindergarten."

Ha ha.

Only, in this passage Obama revealed precisely why he is vulnerable to such charges: he can't seem to tell the difference between a gift and a theft. There is nothing remotely socialistic or communistic about sharing. If you have a toy that someone else wants, you have three choices in a free society. You can offer to trade it for something you value that is owned by the other. You can give the toy freely, as a sign of friendship or compassion. Or you can choose to do neither.

Collectivism in all its forms is about taking away your choice. Whether you wish to or not, the government compels you to surrender the toy, which it then redistributes to someone that government officials deem to be a more worthy owner. It won't even be someone you could ever know, in most cases. That's what makes the political philosophy unjust (by stripping you of control over yourself and the fruits of your labor) as well as counterproductive (by failing to give the recipient sufficient incentive to learn and work hard so he can earn his own toys in the future).

Government is not charity. It is not persuasion, or cooperation, or sharing. Government is a fist, a shove, a gun. Obama either doesn't understand this, or doesn't want voters to understand it.

Shall we follow a hypocrite like this, especially considering the enormous financial impact he will have on our livelihoods?

Spread the word, spread the truth.  If you don't, something else will be spread: your money.

There's my two cents.