Changing the Tide

Real change can't come soon enough!!! Are you tired of rhetoric and empty promises?

Oil Spill Timeline from RightChange on Vimeo.

Heck! 2012 can't get here soon enough! We need smaller government, not bigger government. Even Katrina proved that! When are we going to understand that real changes come from the bottom up, not the other way around. As long as we wait on the federal government to solve the BP oil spill problem, we are in trouble.


Subsidiarity is an social organizational principle that says matters should be handled by the smallest, lowest or least centralized competent authority. The private sector bears the responsibility for acting to meet local needs. If they are not able to do so, then larger entities, including the government, should step in to do or help do what private institutions have not been able to accomplish. Subsidiarity should include the political realm. That is, political decisions should be made at a local level if possible, rather than by the federal government

The word subsidiarity is derived from the Latin word subsidiarius and has its origins in Catholic social teaching. The principle of subsidiarity was first developed by German theologian, Oswald von Nell-Breuning, who believed that government should only undertake those initiatives which exceed the capability of individuals or private groups acting independently. If a difficult task can be carried out at a local level just as effectively as on the national level, the local level should be the one to carry out the specified function. Subsidiarity is based upon the autonomy and dignity of the human person and requires that larger central authorities create the social conditions needed to fully develop the individual, including the right to work, decent housing, health care, and so on. 

This German theologian's work shaped the social teaching of Pope Leo XIII in his 1891 papal encyclical, Rerum Novarum, a papal effort to articulate a middle course between laissez-faire capitalism and forms of communism that subordinate the individual to the state. Subsidiarity was further developed in Pope Pius XI's 1931 encyclical Quadragesimo Anno, and by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops' Economic Justice for All.

It is a fundamental principle of social philosophy, fixed and unchangeable, that one should not withdraw from individuals and commit to the community what they can accomplish by their own enterprise and industry. (Pope Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno, 79)

Was our president practicing subsidiarity when he refused help from foreign countries with this BP oil disaster at the very beginning? I don't think so. I don't think he has known what to do from the beginning and refusing help from the outside when he was incapable of handling the situation was an acting out of HIS own pride. How did he put it in his speech in France? "America has shown arrogance and been dismissive - even derisive."

Hmmmmm! It sounds like he was talking about himself, not America. We need to stop waiting for bailouts from the federal government. Are you tired of arrogance? Are you fed up with his being dismissive - even derisive? Let's start turning the tide this November. Change must come from within!