There ya go, S-Hub, now you're communicating.

I will bet you that no-one on this forum believes that government should take total responsibility for the poor.

Every individual alive is responsible for their own condition; it's not just a good policy, it is a fact of nature.

Given that, what is the right balance of compassion to take for those who are sick, old, beaten-down or otherwise somehow crushed. Viet vets still hallucinating from the horrors of war and agent Orange? Those who lose all their assets in tornados? How about those whose lives are ruined by unexpected illness? Elders ripped off in legal ways by their own grandchildren? Disabled postal employees? The variations of possible catastrophes that can interfere with the exercise of resposnibnilityu is endless.

The organization of help is not a crime, and the government is a natural candidate, since it by necessity can draw on the whole citizenry.

Help does not refute responsibility, it simply declares the value of human compassion.

The problem with leaving it entirely up to enterprise is that since it is not profitable, it won't attract much organizing talent. Leaving it up to individuals makes for haphazard cracks int he system, just at a time when such omissions might prove lethal.

I would recommend that you go down to a soup kitchen in your nearest large city sometime this month while the weather is still cold, and talk to some of the people who go there to get enough food to keep their bones and soul joined.

Sure you'll find some who have given up and are just taking the ride, but you will find plenty who fought every inch of the way down hill as best they knew, and weren't smart enough, lucky enough, well-informed enough or protected enough to stop the slide.

A