Who's got it right?

We've had a two party system for many, many years now despite the recommendation of none other than George Washington that we avoid it if at all possible.  But its the system we have and we need to make the best of it, for now.  But what are the Democrats and Republicans all about ideologically?  Let's look at the basics.

Democrats are for the "little people", you know, the poor, the elderly, those who "don't have a voice."

Republicans are for businesses, the free market system and to keep government out of our daily lives.

Democrats are more about entitlement programs like Social Security, Medicare, universal health care, etc., and Republicans are more about lower taxes, personal accountability ans self-reliance.

These are broad generalizations of course, but they're fairly accurate.  If I went point by point, you'd be reading for a week.  Now as I've said before, many of the programs that Democrats champion are very altruistic and founded in the best of intentions, but we all what what they say about "good intentions."  Let's look at the king of these programs - Social Security.  It's premise was simple.  Have taxpayers put money into a "trust fund" that they will be able to draw from once they retire.  Sounds good, but the problem inherent in this program reared its ugly head with the very first monthly recipient.  Ida May Fuller of Ludlow, Vermont, paid into Social Security for 3 years, from 1937 - 1939, for a grand total of $24.75.  When she received her first monthly check, it was in the amount of $22.54.  By the time her Social Security stopped, upon her death at 100 years of age, she had received a total of $22,888.92.  Ms. Fuller had received nearly 1000X the amount of money she put in.  It is instances like this that show how flawed government entitlement programs are.

Now two big Republican values are that they favor the death penalty for criminals and the "pro-life" movement.  So while Republicans believe in smaller government and as little government intrusion into the daily lives of citizens as possible, they are OK telling a woman what they can and can't do with their body.  On the other side, Democrats are "pro-choice", but against the death penalty.  So it's OK to kill an unborn child but not a convicted criminal.  I'm not trying to start the abortion and death penalty debates here.  I just used these two examples to point out the hypocrisy of both parties.

If there's one basic truth about the average American, its this:  they like knowing the government programs are there when they need them, and they like lower taxes.  I'd even venture that they would support higher taxes for these programs if they were run efficiently.  Unfortunately, the government and both parties within the government has proven time and again that it is incapable of running these programs efficiently.  The biggest problem is that the parties have almost become interchangeable, especially among "career politicians."  So the question remains - "Who's got it right?"  I guess it depends on your point of view.  In my humble opinion, neither has it right.