@ Kapitein Andre

Your parcing of individual sentences prevents you from seeing the forest through the trees.

1) There is massive empirical evidence, based on sociological research, that 'average' Americans are more involved with charity than average Europeans.  The latter tend to console their consciences by realising that they typically face a higher tax burden, in other words they believe (often mistakenly) that government is their mechanism for charity.  It is unclear how you would define "fortunes", but the average American does give more to charity while NOT having a "fortune".  And yes, in general American churches, schools, hospitals and (especially) colleges, receive a higher share of their financing from private sources.  Whether that is a good thing or a bad thing can be debated, but it does confirm Scruton's point about the charity impulse.  Of course, materially richer people can 'afford' to be more charitable than less rich people.  Yet, there are indications that the charity impulse in America is not limited to the 'very rich'.

2)  Indeed, Americans generally do not seem to 'begrudge' other people's material success, and tend to want to emulate it.  That explains why they also seem to be less hesitant to flaunt their individual wealth, while rich Europeans try to hide it more.  These are generalisations, of course.   Respective crime rates have nothing to do with differences in "acceptance of other people's success", but are clearly attributable to other major factors. 

3)   You have a valid point about European"welfare states", up to a point, but not about taxation.   All governments have to raise money through taxation for the purpose of providing "public goods (and services)".  The 'war on terror' is definitely part of the public good of "safety", and is properly financed through taxation.   This should not preclude that various forms of private charity can make valuable contributions in this area too, e.g. for instance many private  Americans provide additional assistance to veterans, soldiers and their families, policemen, firemen, and the like.  In fact, such assistance is one factor in promoting society's patriotism (in a sense also a necessary public good) in ways that distant and impersonal bureaucracy/government never can.

4) Again, you have a limited point about smoking and drinking and insurance-based 'solutions' to such individual problems.  But, this in no way undermines Scruton's broader point, which is about moral values.  The latter are undermined by moral-relativism, which is a direct result of the trend to shift the role of moral arbiter to the state versus the 'traditional judeo-christian ethic' which emphasized the role of individual conscience.  In this context, your comment about "neoconservatives" is nonsensical.  You are simply piling on, i.e. beating up on a contemporary popular target.  This has nothing to do with Scruton's broader moral point, which is very valid.  Secularism is OK as "separation of church and state".  It is not OK if it descends into moral relativism, which is destructive for both the individual and for society.  

5) Socialism fails because human beings are indeed "selfish".  That underscores the need for a morality that stresses individual responsibility and individual virtuousness versus transferring the role of moral arbiter to a collective faceless entity (like the state).     

Scruton: Europeans, who are snobbish about American culture, are also shamed by American altruism. Once they have made their fortune, Americans devote themselves to giving it away. They lavish gifts on their school, their church, their college, or their hospital, taking an obvious pleasure in doing so.

I suppose Mr. Scruton has evidence proving these claims? I suppose this fact explains why the vast majority of Americans do not have fortunes: they gave it all away. Those few that cling on to houses, cars, etc. are European immigrants.

Scruton: They also take pleasure in others' success – an emotion that seems to have vanished entirely from European society.

Indeed. Unlike Europe, the United States has no property crime due to this taking "pleasure in others' success" and wealthy Americans have no need of gated communities, suburbs or security guards.

Scruton: Of course, Europeans are great preachers of altruism. But the more they preach, the less they give. For they do not regard others as their personal concern: It is the state, not the individual, that has assumed the duty of charity, and when things go wrong – as in the recent floods in England – it is the state that must step in to help.

One might counter that European welfare states are in fact charities. In any event, it stuns me that the United States government, which according to one of humanity's most esteemed intellectuals is not "the solution" but "the problem", raises revenue through taxation as opposed to charity. Surely altruism, not taxation, would provide for the 'War on Terror' budget.

Scruton: The core idea of morality, the idea contained in that little word "sake," is rapidly vanishing from the European consciousness. The public square is full of moralizing language about hunting, smoking, drinking, and other forms of enjoyment. But when you ask for whose sake this or that is demanded, the answer is always: yourself. The old training in "sakehood," which our parents regarded as the first step in moral education, simply does not occur. We should not be surprised, therefore, to discover that European cities are full of disoriented teenagers who think of the laws of morality as rules of longterm self-interest, and who seem unable to imagine what it would be, to do something for any other sake than their own.

One could argue that the costs of smoking and drinking could be passed on to the person "enjoying" them by raising his or her taxes accordingly along insurance-based lines, although this would be individual-focussed. In any event those (none in particular) who advocate private or home schooling, which does not make for a united national community, and small government which is more of a "night watchman" for the economy than leader or guide, should not be complaining. Although neo-conservatives pretend as though they are more communitarian than liberals, their policies and programmes effect the same result: individualism and atomization.

If human beings were indeed selfless as opposed to selfish, why did socialism fail? This attempt to link liberal economics, communitarianism and altruism, which presented more as stream of consciousness than essay, is a pathetic one and not what I would expect from such a distinguished thinker as Roger Scruton.

@ Mimi

There is little doubt that private charity is much more pronounced in the USA than in Europe, but I do object  to you advocating its role in the (income) tax code. 

If people want to be charitable they can be charitable.  They should not be 'bribed' by government.  The tax code is already complex enough, and a de facto source of 'inequity' in society.  Some people are much better at 'gaming' the code than others, and billions are being 'wasted', in the sense that the 'tax advise' industry would be superfluous in a society where politicians could not use the tax code to engineer their own re-election (by providing tax code 'provisions' to specific groups).  

The tax code should be transparent and simple.  Perhaps not written down on a piece of paper as some politicians claim, but neither should it be 10000 pages long and complex.   And individuals should not be 'bribed' by politicians to spend their income in various ways.

In the US one can deduct the charitable donation from one's taxes. Is it possible in Europe to the same degree?

There is another thing Americans are very smart about. They stimulate charity by appealing to prospective donors' vanity. It is very common to name buildings and institutions after generous donors. I haven't seen names like "the so-and-so building of humanities" or "the so-and-so chair in the department of engineering" in Europe. maybe it exists, but it's not as common as in the US.

is the role of the media in this. For example, it seems like the European media, more than any entity other than the UN, is willing to assume that there is some sort of utopia just around the corner achievable through endless dialogue between states and regulations within states.

Church groups in America are the loci of most charitable initiatives.  When Hurricane Katrina struck, it was our local churches that rallied the community to donate food, clothing, money, etc... for the victims.  Right now local churches host soup kitchens for the hungry, provide shelter (using their own halls) on a rotating basis for homeless people, and offer immediate financial assistance for those who cannot afford medicine, rent, and other necessities.

The solution comes from the law of nature: anything unnatural will be replaced by a natural reaction. This can be violent or peacefull.

This was the way communism disappeared and marxist-socialism will disappear in the same way. People are "programmed" as nestlings and family. Tribe etc. are naturally programmed human elements, anything against this natural programming will be eliminated.

That's how I predicted the collapse of communism in 1968 and that's how marxism will disappear.

The "atheist humanists" try to ignore the great design of the Creator and therefor made a series of conceptual mistakes since the french revolution, or the fight between good and evil in a different light. 

This is entirely natural for a society drenched in socialism. The state replaces, or has to replace, the family and/or the individual.

Nobody is reponsible anymore, the state is responsible, so nobody takes any personal initiative anymore.