The American Dream

Part of the reason we are in this financial mess is that too many politicians wanted "everyone" to be able to live the American Dream and own a home. Well, that didn't work out so well. Now, tens of thousands of people who were put into homes they never had any hope of paying for have lost the home and the dream. On top of that our financial institutions have been shaken to their foundations, the government has basically nationalized the banking industry and every day a new industry gets into the corporate welfare line looking for a handout.

What is most wrong with this picture is this: Home ownership is not the American Dream. The beauty of this country is that each person defines for him or her self what their dream is. The American Dream is to be free to live life as you wish. When governments decide what we want they define us. When they give us what they think we want, they co-opt us. When we begin to depend on the government to take care of us, we lose, bit by bit, our freedom.

People have come to America (and Canada) from all over the world for the freedom to live as they wish. Our Constitution gives no rights to citizens beyond "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness." What it mainly outlines is what the government is not allowed to do to us. The document has stood up pretty well for over 225 years. The idea of conferring onto citizens the "right" to home ownership or any other right is to go against the constitution and the core ideal of the nation.