Recommended Reading: Stealing America by Dinesh D'Souza
I just finished reading Stealing America by Dinesh D'Souza and I thought it was an excellent book.
Here were two passages I especially enjoyed:
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"Greed means seeking more than one is entitled to. The whole point of capitalism is to allocate wealth to the person who has created it. Capitalism was actually founded as an alternative to greed."
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"They [progressives] purport to be champions of the needy, but whether or not this is true, they should be champions of the needy with their own resources. What kind of generosity is it that forcibly seizes and then disburses other people's money? This is not generosity; it's larceny."
Here were two passages I especially enjoyed:
- - - - -
"Greed means seeking more than one is entitled to. The whole point of capitalism is to allocate wealth to the person who has created it. Capitalism was actually founded as an alternative to greed."
- - - - -
"They [progressives] purport to be champions of the needy, but whether or not this is true, they should be champions of the needy with their own resources. What kind of generosity is it that forcibly seizes and then disburses other people's money? This is not generosity; it's larceny."
But when you step back and think about what he says... He is not really advocating the same things that we are, certainly not that I am.
I liken him to John Stuart Mill's On Liberty. The words sound nice, but when you examine the assertions, you realize that he is only arguing from flawed premises to the status quo he prefers. And he equivocates.
So, too, does d'Souza, as above when he tries to take the greed out of capitalism.
When you consider that he is a Roman Catholic and put that in context, you understand why D'Souza is not calling for a moral revolution, but a return to the moral primitive. Some people like the sound of that, those old Roman virtues of piety, concord, gravity, and civic duty. They sound so republican. But it is a siren song. So, none of the plusses were mine.