The End of the Middle Class?

The End of the Middle Class?

One of the great things about the USA is the middle class.  Nearly everyone likes to think of themselves as a part of the middle class.  Some might say that they grew up as a part of the lower middle class.  Others who become quite affluent will still say they are part of the upper middle class.  No one wants to be labeled as poor or rich.  Americans who are poor aspire to rise to the level of middle class, and most do in a period of a generation or less.  It’s a comfortable thing to be a part of the middle class.

The middle class, by general consensus, is where the heart of America lies.  It’s often viewed as the rock solid, hard working, positive, energetic, industrious core of America where American values and American fairness are displayed most prominently.  The broad nature of the American middle class shocked Soviet dictator Nikita Khrushchev when he visited the United States.  It scared him.

He wanted to go to Disneyland in the Los Angeles area and President Eisenhower obliged.  But it was when he flew into LA and saw the freeways full of automobiles and the endless sprawl of homes that he began to realize the strength of America.  He didn’t want to believe it, but the evidence was undeniable.  America had achieved what no other nation in the history of the world had achieved – a broad and quite wealthy middle class.  

The American middle class is the envy of the world.  You can go anywhere in the world and see palaces and dachas and big, expensive homes, but only in the USA can you find such a broad and expansive middle class that drive new cars, live in nice homes, eat well, and aspire to even greater financial heights.  Sure, Europe has a level of prosperity, but the homes are small, the cars are small, and frankly the range of aspirations is often limited by government regulations.  In Japan, Taiwan, or South Korea the situation is worse.  The cars are small, the homes tiny, and the government is even more intrusive.

But America’s middle class is under attack.  Liberal elitists detest the American middle class and their middle class values.  The middle class stands in the way of everything they want to achieve.  The middle class doesn’t like high taxes, big government, liberal judges, wild spending, or a decline in traditional moral values.  The middle class is by and large the part of America that believes in God, volunteers to help others, donates generously, and believes that the words in the US Constitution mean exactly what they say.

The American middle class is the home to common sense, i.e. wisdom.  They live responsibly, act responsibly, obey the laws and expect others to do so also.  They love America and may even tear up when the national anthem is played.  When America goes to war, the sons and daughters of the middle class volunteer to serve.  

It is from the middle class that America often finds its great doctors, inventors, engineers, scientists, and even lawyers.  And if the American middle class elects someone to public office, they consider that man or woman to be a public servant and act like one, not like a master.

But today the American middle class is under attack.  The Obama Administration doesn’t really like or respect the middle class.  In fact, they see middle class values and standards as an obstacle to their plans to create a “just” America.  

Obama is no fan of free enterprise.  He loves government control and socialist schemes like Obamacare.  Rather than have people decide how to live their lives, he thinks that a liberal elite can do a better job of telling people where to live, what kind of car to drive, what news to listen to, where they should work, etc.

Obama and his liberal friends see America and the American middle class as a sign that America is an unjust and unfair nation.  As silly as it sounds, they believe it’s just luck that some people get ahead and others do not succeed.  They discount hard work, risk taking, intelligence, perseverance, and determination as any part of success.  According to them, some are just luckier than others.  Now, of course, some folks do achieve more financially than others and some are born with advantages of intelligence or skill or location more than others are, but God decides when and to whom and where we will be born.  And He blesses who He chooses when it comes to skills and intelligence.  After all, He is God, and He is the one who created this universe in the first place.

The liberals’ goal is equality of outcome.  They tried that in Russia, but, not surprisingly, it did not work.  Of course, liberals say that Stalin and Lenin were not enlightened as they are.  They simply did not do socialism right.  They are more attracted to the European form of socialism, the cradle to grave variety.  But of course, Europe has never had the broad middle class that we enjoy here in the US and as nations they continue to underperform economically.  Just ask an average Frenchman or Englishman or German what nation in the world offers the most opportunity and 99 times out of 100 they will say the United States.  Everyone in the world knows this except for American liberals.

Obamacare and the global warming hoax are key elements in the liberals’ plan to cut America down to size.  Left to run free as it is under the Obama administration, the EPA regulations alone will ensure that America will never again return to the prosperity that previous generations enjoyed.  

And those seeking to rise into the American middle class will have the ladder of opportunity kicked out from under them.  They will be stuck where they are with no opportunity to rise as far as their talents, ambition, and God’s blessings take them.  The America that you and I have come to know and love will be gone forever.

But it doesn’t have to happen.  There is still time.  But in order to reverse this frightening tide of government growth and intrusion into our lives, you and I must engage in the political process.  We must become informed and then act.  Otherwise our children and grandchildren will not have the opportunity to enjoy and appreciate the America we grew up in.

So don’t sit around and fret and let the liberal steamroller re-elect Barack Obama in 2012.  Start working and giving today to elect citizen-statesmen, the kind our Founders envisioned to represent us in Congress and in the White House.  Do it today before the sands of time run out for the Republic that our forefathers created.