I got an e-mail the other day from my oldest daughter, who is pushing forty.  She and her husband bought a house in the Florida Keys a few years ago.  Soon after buying it, they moved to the British Virgin Islands (BVI) for two years.  They have since returned.  She says that now, regarding the house, "We are having to grow up and we HATE it!!"

She continued:

... while we were in the BVI we had decided to be scum just like everybody else in this country and stop paying our mortgage and drag out a short sale for 2 years (while renting the house to someone and pocketing the $).  But at the end of the day, we just couldn't do it.  It is wrong and as Andy [her husband] said one day, "It's not that we CAN'T pay the note, it's that it is difficult to pay it."  We don't want to be scum and if we lose it, we will never get another one down here.

I wrote back to her that "growing old is inevitable, but growing up is optional."  Never confuse the two concepts, I told her.  There are plenty of "old" people who are scum, who shirk responsibilities that they signed on for, then walked away.

You cannot avoid getting old!  It happens to the best of us.  But you can certainly avoid growing up!  The key concept, I told her, was to never avoid or shirk responsibility, but at the same time to never "grow up" -- to be a child (with all the wonder that entails) for your entire life.  Enjoy life to the fullest, and always be able to laugh -- especially at yourself.  I quoted American Clergyman Roy L. Smith: "The ability to accept responsibility is the measure of the man" (or in this case, a woman).

I then started thinking (yes, it hurt) about our president, Barack Hussein "kill list" Obama, and what he has done -- or not done -- to shirk responsibility.  His favorite way to do this is to always blame someone, or something, else for problems that he and/or his policies have caused.

In his article entitled "Obama's Endless Energy," William L. Gensert said:

A leader takes responsibility and gives credit.  Barack Obama takes credit and shirks responsibility.  He has to lie.  How else could he claim to be the father of all success, while maintaining his failures have many daddies -- George Bush, the tsunami, those bastards the Canadians who want to send us "sharia-free" oil -- in other words, anyone but Barack?

Here is another example, this time from Congressman Diane Black (R-TN):

President Obama has had nearly a year to put forward a plan to cut $1.2 trillion from federal spending, and he has done absolutely nothing.  While the President appears to think he can just shirk his responsibility, the House spoke loud and clear today -- 'not so fast, Mr. President, the American taxpayers and our troops deserve answers and solutions, not more excuses'.

In February of this year, Peter Ferrara published a paper about how Social Security is unsustainable, how it needs personal savings accounts as a potential alternative for reform.  But, as Ferrara points out, Obama's recent budget proposal again ignores this looming problem.  Obama's budget proposes approximately $11.7 billion to the Social Security Administration to administer the program and to fund programs that are already in place. 

Obama has shown that Social Security's $18 trillion in unfunded liabilities are someone else's problem to deal with down the road.  His one "change" asks taxpayers to increase funding for "Continuing Disability Reviews," which are aimed at determining the eligibility of current Social Security beneficiaries.

Here is another example of Obama shirking his responsibilities, this one cited by Dr. Thomas Sowell.   While Obama wants politicians and bureaucrats to make decisions about the economy, he does not want government ownership of the means of production, which is the definition of "socialism."  What he wants is government control of private enterprise.  Sowell comments:

That way, politicians get to call the shots but, when their bright ideas lead to disaster, they can always blame those who own businesses in the private sector."  "Government ownership of the means of production means that politicians also own the consequences of their policies, and have to face responsibility when those consequences are disastrous -- something that Barack Obama avoids like the plague.

Here is an analysis of Obama's 2012 State of the Union speech by Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL).  Sessions, in a USA Today article, said that the consequences of Obama's continued irresponsible budgeting could be dire for the majority of Americans.  After the speech, Sessions said, "It was stunning how thoroughly and deliberately the president ignored the ominous threat hanging over this country -- our surging $15 trillion debt."

Who can forget this favorite: Obama says that he personally killed Osama bin Laden, that the Navy SEALs were merely instruments of his policy, and that he would not "spike the football."  Obama, while explaining his decision not to release photos of the bin Laden death, declared that "we don't need to spike the football."

But guess who is doing that very thing now, via a campaign ad entitled "One Chance" with Bill Clinton talking about Obama's decision!  That's correct -- Obama.  Keeping one's word is also a sign of responsibility.  It seems that Obama has a problem in that department as well.

And we are discovering that the "One Chance" ad name is a lie as well.  Obama, at the behest of Valerie Jarrett, canceled the operation to kill Osama bin Laden on three separate occasions.  Richard Miniter, a two-time New York Times bestselling author, wrote "that Obama canceled the mission in January 2011, again in February, and a third time in March."  The avoidance of lying, something Obama (or Bill Clinton) has yet to master, is yet another sign of responsibility.

I am, needless to say (but I'll say it anyway), very proud of my daughter and her husband.  It's too bad that I can't say the same for "scum" like Obama.  While he is certainly growing older -- next Saturday will be his 52^nd birthday -- he has yet to accept responsibility for his actions or inaction.

Dr. Beatty earned a Ph.D. in quantitative management and statistics from Florida State University.  He was a (very conservative) professor of quantitative management specializing in using statistics to assist/support decision-making.  He has been a consultant to many small businesses and is now retired.  Dr. Beatty is a veteran who served in the U.S. Army for 22 years.  He blogs at rwno.limewebs.com.