What happened to self responsibility?

Having read Dick Durbin's article in the Daily Herald regarding more federal money being pursued by Elgin and Hanover Park for their police departments, I see what I think should be obvious to all but is more obviously not seen, and that is the attitude that has permeated our society: "I have a problem and someone else should solve it or at least pay for its solution."

Why should individual problems become a federal issue? Where has the concept of "self responsibility" gone? Why don't the feds concentrate on federal issues like border control, national defense, and interstate matters and let the states have all that tax money going to Washington and use it to solve their own problems? The closer to home they are dealt with the better and more lasting the results, be these personal, neighborhood, state or federal.

Why does everything have to be a federal issue? Let's get back to self responsibility. The lack thereof is all too often the cause of almost all of our problems, whether it's behavioral, family, neighborhood, city, state or federal.

This idea that the government should take my money and give it to those whom they choose is insulting, suggesting that I'm not able to manage my problems and that I'm not charitable to those in need.

Walter Diem

Elgin