In U.S. politics, 'compassion' means giving money and privileges to well organized interest groups at everyone else's expense.
Paul Craig RobertsAccording to the Tax Foundation, the average American worker works 127 days of the year just to pay his taxes. That means that government owns 36 percent of the average American's output-which is more than feudal serfs owed the robber barons. That 36 percent is more than the average American spends on food, clothing and housing. In other words, if it were not for taxes, the average American's living standard would at least double.
Paul Craig RobertsThe US is not a superpower. The US is a financially dependent country that foreign lenders can close down at will. Washington still hasn’t learned this. American hubris can lead the administration and Congress into a bailout solution that the rest of the world, which has to finance it, might not accept.
Paul Craig Roberts