Ron Paul: ‘Entitlements are not rights’

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Republican presidential candidate Ron Paul claimed on Sunday that Americans don’t have a right to entitlements like Social Security and Medicare.

During a debate hosted by NBC, WHDH’s Andy Hiller asked Paul: “In your opinion, what services are Americans entitled to expect to get from government?”

“Entitlements are not rights,” Paul flatly stated. “Rights mean you have a right to your life, you have a right to your liberty, you should have a right to keep the fruits of your labor.”

“Earlier on here, there was a little discussion about gay rights. I, in a way, don’t like to use those terms: gay rights, women’s rights, minority rights, religious rights. There’s only one type of right: It’s a right to your liberty.”

He added: “No, they’re not entitled. One group isn’t entitled to take something from somebody else. And the basic problem here is, there’s a lot of good intention to help poor people, but guess who gets the entitlements in Washington? The big guys, the rich people, they get the entitlements, the military-industrial complex, the banking system. Those are the entitlements we should be dealing with.”

According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, the definition of entitlement is “a right to benefits specified especially by law or contract.”

Watch this video from MSNBC, uploaded Jan. 8, 2012.