FWD: Lou Holtz: Commentary

Subject: Lou Holtz: Commentary
Date: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 10:05:43 -0400
Well worth reading. 

Lou Holtz:  Commentary

The Democrats are right, there are two Americas. The America that works, and the America that doesn’t. The America that contributes, and the America that doesn’t. It’s not the haves and the have not's, it’s the dos and the don'ts.  Some people do their duty as Americans, obey the law, support themselves, contribute to society, and others don't.  That’s the divide in America.


That’s not invective, that’s truth, and it’s about time someone said it.

The politics of envy was on proud display a couple weeks ago when President Obama pledged the rest of his term to fighting “income inequality.”  He noted that some people make more than other people, that some people have higher incomes than others, and he said that’s not just.  That is the rationale of thievery.

The other guy has it, you want it,  Obama will take it for you.  Vote Democrat.  That is the philosophy that produced Detroit.

It is the electoral philosophy that is destroying America.  It conceals a fundamental deviation from American values and common sense because it ends up not benefiting the people who support it, but a betrayal.

The Democrats have not empowered their followers, they have enslaved them in a culture of dependence and entitlement, of victim-hood and anger instead of ability and hope.  The president’ premise –that you reduce income inequality by debasing the successful –seeks to deny the successful the consequences of their choices and spare the unsuccessful the consequences of their choices.  Because, by and large, income variations in society is a result of different choices leading to different consequences.  Those who choose wisely and responsibility have a far greater likelihood of success, while those who choose foolishly and irresponsibly have a far greater likelihood of failure.  Success and failure usually manifest themselves in personal and family income.  You choose to drop out of high school or to skip college – and you are apt to have a different outcome than someone who gets a diploma and pushes on with purposeful education.  You have your children out of wedlock and life is apt to take one course; you have them within a marriage and life is apt to take another course.  Most often in life our destination is determined by the course we take.

My doctor, for example, makes far more than I do.  There is significant income inequality between us.  Our lives have had an inequality of outcome, but, our lives also have had an inequality of effort.  While my doctor went to college and then devoted his young adulthood to medical school and residency, I got a job in a restaurant.  He made a choice, I made a choice, and our choices led us to different outcomes.  His outcome pays a lot better than mine.  Does that mean he cheated and Barack Obama needs to take away his wealth?  No, it means we are both free men in a free society where free choices lead to different outcomes. 

It is not inequality Barack Obama intends to take away, it is freedom.  The freedom to succeed, and the freedom to fail.  There is no true option for success if there is no true option for failure.  The pursuit of happiness means a whole lot less when you face the punitive hand of government if your pursuit brings you more happiness than the other guy.  Even if the other guy sat on his arse and did nothing.  Even if the other guy made a lifetime’s worth of asinine and short sighted decisions.  



Obama would turn that upside down.  Those who achieve are to be punished as enemies of society and those who fail are to be rewarded as wards of society.  Entitlement will replace effort as the key to upward mobility in American society if Barack Obama gets his way.  He seeks a lowest common denominator society in which the government besieges the successful and productive to foster equality through mediocrity.  He and his party speak of two Americas, and their grip on power is based on using the votes of one to sap the productivity of the other.  America is not divided by the differences in our outcomes, it is divided by the differences in our efforts.

It is a false philosophy to say one man’s success comes about unavoidably as the result of another man’s victimization.

What Obama offered was not a solution, but a separatism.  He fomented division and strife, pitted one set of Americans against another for his own political benefit.  That’s what socialists offer.  Marxist class warfare wrapped up with a bow.  Two Americas, coming closer each day to proving the truth to Lincoln’s maxim that a house divided against itself cannot stand. 


Lou Holtz

Leo "Lou" Holtz (born January 6, 1937) is a retired American football coach, and active sportscaster, author, and motivational speaker.


gruaud said...

While the refuting the ideas in this column is like dropping a nuke in a rain barrel, this raised an eyebrow:


Well, Lou, the football head coach position at Notre Dame is one of the highest paying jobs in the entire country. Currently, it is $4,000,000. A year.

A General Practitioner makes about 20 times LESS than that. And most jobs in the service industry (our biggest industry now that the fat cats have dismantled and shipped off our manufacturing sector) pay wages so low it's an insult to American workers.

So, you're being just a little cute here, and you know it.

Anonymous said...

Just FYI, Lou Holtz did not write this crap.

gruaud said...

Quite right, Bob Lonsberry wrote this drivel. Thanks, anon.

Dang it! I committed the cardinal sin of not verifying source.

ferschitz said...

This tedious nonsense, apparently falsely attributed to Leo Holt, basically can be boiled down to:

Never ever tax the mega-wealthy no matter what.

Now eat your peas & STFU you lousy peasants!

And the Tea Tardz love it because, ya know, some day they, too, may happen to win the lottery or something, and they, too, do not wish to share their ill-gotten booty! Go figure.

CharlieE said...


That party is the Republican Party, as anyone with half a brain would know.

Still, the writer does a great job of slaying a straw man.

Anonymous said...

Income Inequality is about people who work and people who don't.

The problem is, the people who work are the ones with the least amount of money.

Anonymous said...

In right wing world there are only two types of economic systems: the crony capitalist system we have now and full-on communism. This makes it very easy to choose sides and to identify good and evil.

Unfortunately a lot of young people are not faring well in this crony capitalist system. They aren't finding that a college degree leads to a job that they pays enough for them to live independently. The longer these young people live in such an unrewarding system, the more they will want to find something else that works for them. I think right wingers can imagine very well what economic system that will be!

Hooray4US said...

This falsely attributed screed is written to be read mainly by white men over the age of about 68 or more. That generation - a sandwich between the so-called "Greatest Gen" & the boomers - are probably the last one to retire with a majority doing mostly "ok" or better in retirement. Many of them still have a pension; those that don't probably had enough opportunity at least to have some decent savings.

That generation - Korean War Vets, etc - mostly haven't worked for many years, and consequently, they have NO clue what the working world is like anymore. Insulated by their good fortune to have been born when they were, they benefited when the USA followed FDR's New Deal.

What these nasty old white men don't get is the phenomenal changes that have happened over the past 30 years, when this group - the so-called "Silent Majority" - voted in their "hero" Ronald Reagan. Reagan's admin set about dismantling the New Deal as fast as they could & sold it under the false notion that cutting taxes at the very top would cause "trickle down" to happen - as in no taxes for corporations & the 1% would magically benefit the 99%.

These hateful bigots cling to false concept. Why not? They live in a world of: I got mine; Eff you!

Thanks, RWD, for living your Happy Acres bubble, fuming about how everyone else deserves their fates because they don't work hard enough or whatever other fiction they tell themselves (or read in RWFs). Nice for you, when you enjoy a better life than most Americans ever will again.

Anonymous said...

This wasn't "well worth" my time to read, and it would be worth even less of my time to refute, but can I just thank the author for making me laugh so hard at the assertion that Obama, or even Obama's "philosophy," is responsible for the current state of Detroit? I mean, really, now. If there was ever one problem Detroit didn't have, it was the sort of Robin Hood mentality the author ascribes to him.

profinsad said...

Most of the sarcastic and virulent nonsense written above comes from weak people who cannot afford to digest and deal with the truth about what has happened - and is happening - in this country. Snidely misinterpreting that article will not make it - or the issue - go away. "Progressive" ideology and the long-term and devious misuse of minorities and the poor by vote-hungry Democrats - with cooperation from some also politically greedy Republicans - led us directly here. To try to deny that is self-delusional foolishness. Denial will prevent you from becoming part of the solution.

gruaud said...


If you think Lonsberry's disingenuous crap makes sense, you're the one who's fucking deluded and you're part of the problem.

The regulars here all see very clearly what is happening in this country and it has absolutely nothing to do with progressivism and everything to do with the rise of a corporate welfare state, which is a distinct hallmark of proto-fascism.

ferschitz said...

I fail to see how any of the comments reflect "being in denial" about what is happening in this country. While some sarcasm is expressed, most hit the nail on the head.

Perhaps Profinsad, you are the one in denial, plus rather condescending to minorities & the poor, who, apparently, you believe are the only ones who've been misled, misued & deceived by political parties and/or those in power (not always the same thing, by the way). I'd say, if anything, the ones most misled & deceived by the pernicious propaganda of rich powerful mostly white men are middle to upper middle class whites.

I think the minorities and poor are better aware than you wish to believe about exactly what is happening in this country, and exactly who's getting the shaft, how and why. Apparently, you don't have many friends and acquaintances who are - perish the thought! - minorities or poor people.

I disagree with you, gruaud, that this is proto-fascism. I think we're already into a fully Fascist government/society or what have you. JMHO, of course.

Hooray4US said...

heh... after all, these rightwing forwards are total propaganda and mostly all bogus lies. And to whom are they addressed? Why white people! And indeed, mostly (but not all) middle to upper middle class white people!

But let's focus, instead, on how teh poorz and the dusky-hued are really the ones who fall for propaganda!

Yeah right. Pull the other one, chump. but thanks for demonstrating how that old propaganda most definitely worked on/for you! Great example. Say no more.

Creative Commons License