Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness

On July 4, 1776, our Founding Fathers declared independence from England's tyranny. In that Declaration is a phrase that has been perverted and distorted so much that it has given people a false image of what they deserve:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

I usually try not to get political with my thoughts on my blog, but today's coverage of last night's town hall meeting with President Obama in Ft. Meyers, Florida, has disgusted me. First there is Julio, a college student (good for him) that has been working at McDonald's for quite some time (also good for him). His issue is with health insurance. He can't get it. Or says he can't. Or maybe he can't stomach the fact that his pay check will be dramatically decreased each week when the company takes out his insurance payments. Welcome to the club.
Second is Miss Henrietta, who has allegedly been living in her car, is unemployed, etc. She begs the President to help her out of her situation. No one questioned her on WHY she was unemployed, WHERE her former home went, or WHAT she spent her money on. She was automatically labeled as a victim of circumstance, which may or may not have been the case.

The audacity of these people boggles my mind. When did it become an unalienable RIGHT to own a home? To have health insurance? I thought that my rights were life (thank goodness I didn't get aborted), liberty (better not say too much or I could offend someone), and the PURSUIT of happiness. I take that to mean that I am entitled to pursue my OWN happiness, not pursue OTHERS to give me happiness, wealth, a home, health insurance, etc.

What happened to personal accountability? Or personal pride, for that matter? I grew up in a family that figured things out themselves. They didn't rely on the government or anyone else to pay their bills, be it their mortgage or any other creditor. I'm thankful that that attitude has been passed on to me. Yes, I do have some outstanding bills that my husband and I are working to pay off. But we get up every day, dust ourselves off from working the day before, and go at it again with a vengenance, thanking God that we have another day to work! We aren't going to sit around waiting for a government handout. And neither should anyone else.