ObamaCare — How Nice People Crush Freedom
Listening to MSM reports about the Supreme Court judges questioning lawyers on ObamaCare has been kind of comical. As Rand Simberg points out, both the media and the government’s lawyers seemed wholly unprepared for the basic questions from the judges — questions they would have heard a million times by now if they ever actually listened to conservative commentators instead of simply demonizing them. The conservative judges especially are only asking what Tea Partiers at town hall meetings have been asking since the bill was passed: ”If the government can force you to buy insurance for your own good, what CAN’T it force you to do?”
Underlying this question though is a larger issue, put forward by economist Friedrich Hayek in “The Constitution of Liberty”:
Not only is liberty a system under which all government action is guided by principles, but it is an ideal that will not be preserved unless it is itself accepted as an overriding principle governing all particular acts of legislation. Where no such fundamental rule is stubbornly adhered to as an ultimate ideal about which there must be no compromise for the sake of material advantages—as an ideal which, even though it may have to be temporarily infringed during a passing emergency, must form the basis of all permanent arrangements—freedom is almost certain to be destroyed by piecemeal encroachments. For in each particular instance it will be possible to promise concrete and tangible advantages as the result of a curtailment of freedom, while the benefits sacrificed will in their nature always be unknown and uncertain.
In other words, there’s always a good reason to take your freedom away — your health, the poor, your evil opinions, the lousy way you raise your kids — and never a reason to preserve freedom except the love of freedom itself. Thus, so often, the people destroying the American way of life are actually nice people who just want to help.
As C.S. Lewis observed:
Of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end, for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.
When my son was an adolescent he and his friends used to play what you might call an age-appropriate game. Whenever they would read the fortunes in fortune cookies, they would add the words, “In bed.” So if the cookie declared, “You will have good luck,” they would add, “in bed.” And hilarity would ensue.
I would like the government to play a similar game with the words, “And keep us free.” So when they propose an answer to rising health care costs or poverty or traffic jams or whatever, they are forced to show how the solution will not encroach on our liberty. Because if liberty is not the first principle of government, it will soon be no principle at all.
(Thumbnail assembled from multiple Shutterstock.com images.)
Also read:
Nice people?
Where?
Demo-rats in their own minds.
I’ve watched C-Span. These are a class of robber barons who make laws that don’t apply to them and don’t read the bills they pass and give unaccountable bureaucrats unlawful latitude in controlling our lives. Pray for them; their afterlife will not be pleasant.
Unless they repent, which is what we’re hoping for!
But, Mr.K, “they” are not “nice people who just want to help”.No one who intends evil is nice; nor does he wish to help. “He that doeth righteousness is righteous” is an eternal and scriptural verity. And it cannot be righteous to pledge to support and defend our Constitution on the one hand and then attack, evade, ignore it on the other.Nice people do not want to take away our constitutional rights. Nice people do not want to deprive us of our liberties and freedoms. Nice people do not wish to make us into serfs of a global tyranny.
Nice people want to restore our freedoms and cut government down to about 20% of its current size. Nice people want to allow each individual all freedom possible. Nice people want to support and defend our Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. And it may be that the domestic enemy in our country is the majority of the electorate itself, anxious to sell their freedom for government handouts.
Shall we be Americans, proud and free, living in liberty in our constitutional,sovereign Republic;or subhuman, dependent things, scrabbling about for crumbs under our masters table?
>Nice people want to… cut government down to about 20% of its current size.
>Nice people want to… support and defend our Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic.
Nice people get all weird when those two goals conflict, since defending against foreign enemies is the job of a big part of the government.
You might want to wake up and smell the coffee on this one. There is some size of government that is necessary to defend against foreign enemies,but defending against foreign enemies is set to become a small fraction of what our government does. All the plans being proposed at the moment for our future government spending include defined increases of all social spending which will displace defense spending. Our current path is for big government without national defense – you have entirely missed the conflict.
I want to put a “like” to this comment but it has not been provided. Mirrors my feelings, or “ditto” to previous commentor.
It is nice to make sure everyone has health care. While the leadership may be implementing these policies as a power grab, many nice people are supporting them because the policies on the surface are “nice”. Giving people healthcare for free is nice. Of course, making people pay for a chain smoker’s new lungs or to give a new heart to a morbidly obese person that hasn’t worked a day in their life isn’t nice. Perhaps if they had to pay their own bills, Smelly and Fatty would change their behaviors.
The “nice people” part is doubtful, at least in my opinion.
It’s their arrogance that makes them unprepared to defend their position and arrogance is not a trait of “nice people”.
As you point out here, they just know what is best for us and we just need to acquiesce.
Oh I understand the “nice” part. Liberals are nice people in their own minds. They think they are good people and that’s what is most important to them. They surround themselves with the like-minded and don’t even consider that their policies and laws may actually hurt the very people they aim to help. If confronted by that reality, they close down and refuse to accept it since it destroys their self-image. I’ve seen it happen time and again with individual liberals. What they do next reflects their particular character flaws, like arrogance, irrational anger, ad hominem attacks and so on. The actually nice people among them -they are few and far between – will change the subject and move on to something else, still convinced of their niceness and rightness and your wrongness.
I think I understand the liberal rationale. Americans can’t truly and equally exercise their freedom unless they’re healthy. They can’t be healthy if they don’t have access to healthcare. Therefore, by giving them access to healthcare, the Government is maximizing Americans’ freedom.
It sounds reasonable when you put it that way. Howevever, if you unpack the word “giving” it starts to become more complicated. The “individual mandate” is just a warning of things to come. The more dependent you are on the government, the more you’ll be forced to live in a government-approved manner.
I don’t mind getting stuff from the government. But I’d like the government to be there for me only when I ask for its help. The rest of the time, I’d like it to stay out of my life. Like somebody else commented: It’s a safety net, not a hammock.
The argument preys upon our susceptibility to the arguments of the type refuted by Bastiat many years ago in, “That Which is Seen, and That Which is Not Seen” (see http://bastiat.org/en/twisatwins.html) and also manipulates our language to its ends. If someone else receives additional comfort – it is not liberty or freedom received, but comfort and perhaps security – from this law, that result is achieved by taking liberty – and privacy – from me. I have been made poorer. The argument made by the government ignores that the law makes me poorer and focuses only on the beneficiary. It is a political parlor trick.
“Americans can’t truly and equally exercise their freedom unless they’re healthy. They can’t be healthy if they don’t have access to healthcare. Therefore, by giving them access to healthcare, the Government is maximizing Americans’ freedom.”
Possibly without knowing it you plagiarized Hillary Clinton. She said nearly exactly that when she was defending HillaryCare. So obviously you do understand the liberal rationale.
Classic liberal argument that fails to look at the cost – who pays and how does that affect their freedom.
They don’t care who pays, because they view society as a collective entity, which they represent.Therefore, “your” assets, property, and labor are really “our” assets, property and labor. You aren’t reallly paying anything, because it waasn’t really yours to begin with, it was ours – which means they can distribute it as they see fit. It’s the same totalitarian mindset that we’ve seen too many times before, and it’s never worked.
You are correct Sir, on the key being the ‘GIVING’. But what can be GIVEN can be TAKEN AWAY.
And therein lays Tyranny .
They are nice, until you disagree. Then they say — if you don’t have medical insurance and you get sick, at the ER we should tell you tough. I’ve heard this from numerous liberal friends.
They probably don’t mean it, but your friends are right. Why should a hospital not chartered for such purpose be required to serve customers who cannot pay or demonstrate the ability to pay? For a government to require this without adequate compensation is a confiscation of the assets of the hospital. Let those that cannot pay be served at public hospitals established for such purposes, charitable hospitals and public clinics. Every hospital does not have to be converted to a charity by government fiat. The current defective law requiring all ERs to take all comers can be repealed instead of being used as a bulwark for further government takeover of the provision of medical services and goods.
This is preferable to ruining it for us all.
Thank you for clarifying the issue. I agree with you. I’d much prefer charity hospitals and clinics to serve the poor.
We used to actually have these at one time. Probably got “regulated” out of existence. That’s the trouble with “government”. Especially with ours!
We actually have these still. Ask any county hospital if they turn away accident or crime victims for their inability to pay. Yet what happens is that if more people are sampling the same medical pie, the amount each gets diminishes. Most of these hospitals are paid for through public taxes, yet along the border the majority of people using the services of these hospitals are those who are here illegally who do not by and large pay the property or sales taxes to the extent of the services they and their families demand. This is why many public hospitals in border states have closed ER’s. In the most recent year available, Parkland Hospital in Dallas had a birthrate to women who were undocumented of 70% of the total live births. If you figure half of them do not pay, that results in millions of dollars laid back to the taxpayers. And with the Obamacare initiative, there’s no means to address this problem because Obama and his party don’t want to admit there is a problem.
I agree a 100%. We do have immediate care centers, and there has been a proposal to have them inside Wal Mart’s. The biggest objector to this has been the AMA who fears this will reduce the income of doctors. We should understand these “professional organizations” for what they are: Labor Unions! So if the AMA says: “We are opposed..” we should understand that the AMA represents doctors in the same way that the UAW represents auto workers. Unions do not represent “the public interest”. They represent the interest of their members!
To which I’d reply, “Here’s my credit card; if that isn’t enough I have some more.”
I think liberals are nice. Nice and arrogant, and hubristic, and pedantic, and intolerant, and idealistic, and unrealistic, and elitist.
See? You can be all those things at the same time.
I think I understand the liberal rationale. Americans can’t truly and equally exercise their freedom unless they’re healthy. They can’t be healthy if they don’t have access to healthcare. Therefore, by giving them access to healthcare, the Government is maximizing Americans’ freedom.
Which is almost word for word the Marxist argument that people cannot be free unless the government makes sure that they have money.
that ol’ Hayek was one pretty insightful fellow.
I am really surpised that conservatives/libertarians have not seen this issue as a golden opportunity to change the socialist narrative of “justice.” This is a Rights issue: my right to use my labor to make my own decicions on a such a basic issue as the health of my body. Health care is a right, just like speech. A right is a fundamental claim of ownership of a essential aspect of my life. The burden remains on the State to prove the necessity of any abridgement.
I always ask people who are in favor of increased State control over healthcare this question: how does surrendering one’s healthcare rights improve healthcare or make for a more just and better world? The reply is always silence.
It’s actually worse than you describe. People find the money to buy the things they value. If you’re uninsured then you’re saying that you value having a new cell phone, cable, beer, cigarettes, or a nice car more than you value your health. Now if you don’t value your health then why should I? And why should part of my labor go to funding something that you don’t value enough to fund yourself? Why should society make slaves of the productive and responsible to satisfy the whims of the unproductive and irresponsible? Oh, right, it’s the votes…
Libertarians understand that government doesn’t “give” you anything without first taking from someone else. US health care was far less costly before the government came into the picture. Every law passed by government increased costs, reduces your freedom to take care of yourself. Government creates monopolies in almost everything it touches. Monopolies generally increase the cost of things. The free market keeps prices low. Government does the opposite.
I happened to be flipping channels and came across that dude Rachel maddow and his top story was whether or not the supreme court justices care what we think of them. Not the merits of obamacare, not the telegraphed decision on its constitutionality, no, it was a pow wow on whether the justices care what we think of them with the emphasis on the more conservative justices because quote “ginsberg and kagan do care and they’re impartial”. It’s amazing to see the stupidity on display in the MSM.
Really? That kind of stupidity from the talking heads still amazes you?
Regarding the comments about liberals being arrogant….I agree, but there is one truth I’ve observed that I haven’t read…. the more arrogant a person becomes is equaled by how foolish he becomes, because, in his arrogancy, he thinks he knows it all and always underestimates the wisdom and skill of those whom he denigrates.
That’s what I’ve observed about these liberals…all of them, including those on the court and in the administration.
And Kagan is so impartial that she didn’t feel the need to recuse herself even after pushing for this legislation as a Solicitor General.
Do leftists try to argue from a standpoint of moral superiority? As in “If you disagree you’re a bigot/racist/whatever-demeaning-insult-I-can-apply-to-feel-better-about-myself”?
It’s all about the posturing. Facts are meaningless, only posture matters.
All they need to know is they are Better Than You. (I have many Obama friends.)
Good post. Too bad leftists will never understand it. Freedom is antithetical to social justice, and social justice is their guiding star.
It’s always the same, see “War on Drugs” the few who “know what’s best” for the rest.
Amen to that, the original Hegelian Solution, sold to women’s groups and evangelical groups.
False preachers marketing the allure of imagined ‘power’.
The greatest tool to destroy the Constitution, ever.
The real criminals quickly took that one away, but it’s second iteration could not be repealed, setting a precedent.
The ‘conservatives’ still glommed on to it.
They too want power more than freedom.
Also the first Federal ‘crime’ laws. Spreading the armed corruption.
Two sides pretending they will elimate human nature, because they are Better Than You.
Sex! Partying! Homosexuality! Race! Inequality! Weather!
This was the original ‘conservative’, evangelical, Republican betrayal.
Volstead and the Republican Drys attacking ‘sinners’ as a soft target.
More interested in a personal racket than attacking the million thugs of Wilson’s American Protective League,
or Teddy and Woodrow’s creation of an illegal draft to force our good men into foreign wars for the new Progressive family ‘corporations’ militant imperialism.
The conservatives stopped defending the Constitution right along with the Progressives a century ago.
Moscow subversives now had a lever to pry us further apart, and a willing ally in FDR.
Still no Constitutional answer by conservatives, just a pretense.
It’s not about “what’s best for you” nannyism … it’s about protecting the rights of you and your neighbors, over the long term. A free society depends upon its citizens maintaining self-control, in order to stay free.
When we choose to enter altered states of consciousness, we inevitably risk giving up that self-control … because of our altered perceptions during the time in that state, and because the effects of those altered “inputs” can shade our reason after we exit that state.
This does not exhibit itself so much as what was depicted in works like “Reefer Madness”, as it does in creating social dysfunction and dependency that the nannies are more than happy to “help” you with … sometimes out of compassion, sometimes out of the desire to “keep order” that tyrants so often use to justify their tyranny.
Alcohol is different than the “targets” of the Drug War, because it has other uses besides altering one’s perceptions, and because the user can take action to avoid the perception-altering effects before they impair their self-control. (BTW, I don’t drink myself, hate the taste). The “targets”, OTOH, have only one use outside of a doctor’s care: to go right into those altered states, with far less effort and time than it takes to do so using alcohol.
And let’s face it, all the promotion of hemp products and medical marijuana is driven by the desire to legalize it for recreational use, specifically to enter an altered state of consciousness … and as a wedge to open the door to legalizing other recreational drug use.
Are you willing to trade your liberty for a high?
Some people are, and that’s their choice.
Their choice is threatening our liberty … and that is where the choice stops, the way I see it.
We talk about how people who choose to “get by” on a government check (as opposed to those who CAN’T be self-sufficient due to problems beyond their control) are an affront to our liberty and ability to pursue happiness … how many of those are “getting by” because they are more interested in the high than in a paycheck? And as long as they choose to “get by”, the nattering nannies will use them as justification for more government intervention, and call us heartless for opposing it.
It is time for EVERYONE to grow up in this nation, and act like citizens instead of infants in need of a nanny.
Are you willing to trade yours to stop someone else from getting high?
Oh wait, that’s right. You thought you were only trading away Jose Guerena’s.
Oops.
Apples and oranges … overzealous/imprudent use of SWAT is a problem, no matter the reason. It doesn’t change the validity of my argument one bit.
For every innocent life lost like that, I see hundreds that were lost because some people value a high more than other peoples’ rights.
Prove it. The overwhelming proportion of those who die because of illegal drugs die because of violence, violence made inevitable by the high profit margins prohibition insures.
How many lives have been made better by giving someone a prison record or confiscating their property (other than corrupt DA’s)?
I thought we were discussing overzealous use of SWAT … are you now moving the goalposts?
If you think that legalization will get rid of illegal activity, think again. JustAL, the drugs still aren’t going to be given away for free, and do you really think that government won’t attach strings to them that will encourage black-market acquisition if they legalize?
And we already have enough people who choose to be dependent, simply because they can … are you willing to risk expansion of that dependency through expansion of recreational drug use and the resultant loss of self-control I describe?
You are giving the nannies some handy justifications for jamming their morality down all our throats, including those of us who do maintain self-control, by condoning such inherently-irresponsible behavior.
Sorry this is misplaced, no “reply” link to your comment below. I’m a little slow today, but as far as I can see you are the only one talking about SWAT. I’m talking about Liberty and how it’s crushed by well meaning do gooders, on both sides of the aisle.
There is only “one” political party that believes in freedom for all. That is the Libertarian Party. check out their website at http://www.lp.org.
I have a problem with the Libertarian party’s open boarder plank, but, pragmatically, both wings of the Republicrat party boast pro amnesty stalwarts.
The rest of the platform is solid although I think more teeth should be put into the national defense plank. We seriously need to re-assert the deterrent effect of our strategic arsenal by openly letting the world know we’ll use it.
While I’ve mostly voted Republican for the last 37 years, at heart I’m a Porcupine Libertarian.
There is nothing “nice” about these people or their intentions.
Wait, are you saying I was supposed to outgrow the bit about adding “in bed” to fortune cookies? Ooops.
Yes, because as we get older we realize there are deeper and more satisfying ways to entertain our friends…
In bed.
Nice people? Not in my experience. It’s just that they spend so much time telling the world how nice they are.
Liberals: Such nice people that they strongly disapprove of organ transplants for their political opponents.
OTOH, I think we conservatives would be glad to contribute to the transplant of one organ into most liberal/Progressive recipients …
… a brain …
… because we would end up money ahead in the long run.
The evidence suggests that many of them would also need a soul transplant.
Nice? To paraphrase a famous politician, I guess it depends on the meaning of the word, nice.
“Nice people”? Is there some reason why you don’t use the exact term for such people, Andrew?
Liberty is nowhere near as appealing as a free lunch. Even wild animals will come close enough for capture if you apply a little labor free goodies in the trap. Tyrants and trappers both know this all too well, and dangle the goodies in front of those they wish to entrap.
Few in these United States seem to realize how enslaved they are already, still spouting this is the land of the free and home of the brave, not realizing that our tax burden exceeds that of the citizens of communist China. We warn of the dangers of slipping into communism as we labor away under its ugly twin socialist sister called economic fascism, or corporatism if you prefer that term over Mussolini’s moniker.
The constitution is dead. Been dead for a long time. We have just pinched our collective nose dulling the stench of its dead corpse. Pretending it still means anything to more than about 15% of the citizenry (right or left) when their pet violation is threatened is ignoring reality.
“Political tags — such as royalist, communist, democrat, populist, fascist, liberal, conservative, and so forth — are never basic criteria. The human race divides politically into those who want people to be controlled and those who have no such desire. The former are idealists acting from highest motives for the greatest good of the greatest number. The latter are surly curmudgeons, suspicious and lacking in altruism. But they are more comfortable neighbors than the other sort.”
–Robert Heinlein, Annapolis 1929
He forgot the third class – those who want to control the others.
Now you see the result of decades of Americans brainwashed in public school.
Millions of easily stampeded morons whom H.L. Mencken would call the booboisie.
Democracy can not long withstand an army of marching morons.
Writes Hayek (excerpted from Andrew’s quote above):
“Where no such fundamental rule is stubbornly adhered to as an ultimate ideal about which there must be no compromise for the sake of material advantages—as an ideal which, even though it may have to be temporarily infringed during a passing emergency, must form the basis of all permanent arrangements—freedom is almost certain to be destroyed by piecemeal encroachments.”
Admirable sentiments… but unfortunately, destroyed by the following “piecemeal encroachment”:
““In the Western world some provision for those threatened by the extremes of indigence or starvation due to circumstances beyond their control has long been accepted as a duty of the community.¹ The local arrangements which first supplied this need became inadequate when the growth of large cities and the increased mobility of men dissolved the old neighborhood ties, and (if the responsibility of the local authorities was not to produce obstacles to movement) these services had to be organized nationally and special agencies created to provide them.”
–Friedrich Hayek, “The Constitution of Liberty” ch. 19 (sourced here.
Hayek had many tremendous insights, but his concession of the “nice people”‘s moral premise render shaky the moral ground under anyone relying on him to challenge the Left, or their competitors (not “enemies”) among the religious right.
Not only Hayek, but Milton Friedman, and even the most famous libertarian political philosopher of all, Robert Nozick, all made allowance for taking care of the truly indigent. When libertarians put “freedom” above life itself, their argument loses much power. It becomes “freedom for the fortunate”. There is no freedom without life, and no life without base sustenance. Arguing for personal responsibility and accountability is compelling. Arguing that we have no responsibility for those who genuinely cannot provide for themselves is far less so, and in fact it devolves into a “might makes right” argument that is thoroughly undemocratic, and ultimately antithetical to freedom. It is not a mere coincidence that, with the single exception of Ayn Rand, the greatest proponents of free markets and libertarianism in the last hundred years unanimously agreed that we do in fact have a moral obligation to the indigent. It is the one thing that Southern Baptists and secular humanists overwhelmingly agree on (leaving aside the specific mechanism by which care for the indigent is best provided).
And keep us free….in bed
LOL.
Like many above, i think this is a great post but the headline descriptor of “nice” is misused.
Way back in 1941, Dorothy Thompson wrote a remarkable essay in Harper’s Magazine, titled “Who Goes Nazi”. Here’s the link:
http://harpers.org/archive/1941/08/0020122
I read this years’ ago and have never forgotten it. Kudos to Harper’s for keeping it alive and available.
THAT was a marvelous article. It put into words I always instinctively understood about people. I have always been able to sense these things about people, but just never categorized them like this. Well, maybe here and there, but not in such a delineated grouping.
Thanks for linking that.
Andrew,
The article, I believe, points out what I believe to be true, that the liberals at their core are not “nice”. They just enjoy control and feigning nice gets them power.
Walter
As for the “nice people” part, I would suspect that most of the people that are duped into voting for leftist politicians are nice pelple, just misguided, except for those who vote for leftists because they want leftist handouts.
As for the leftist politicians themselves, I think most of them value power far more than niceness or altruism. Their claims to promote niceness and altruism is just their route to power.
Conservative politicians are not free of the power taint either. For example, I think conservatives whose main value is social rather than fiscal conservatism, are just as much motivated by power as leftists.
I think fiscal conservative and libertarian orientated politicians are the only ones that can make a legit claim to not be mainly motivated by power, since they are the only ones whose stated political goals actually reduce their power when they succeed, rather than increasing it. Of course even in their case, there are those who try to gain power by TALKING about fiscal conservative or libertarian values, only to betray those values once in power. But at least there, an actual betrayal is required to increase their power, while for lefitsts and socons, they can increase their power AND acheive their stated goals.
Agree with a lot of what you say … except about the socons.
The most strident of the socons … the hardcore pro-lifers … are at least interested in protecting someone’s right to live. I look on their efforts as preventing life from being cheapened at all stages … and since I am getting older, the idea that certain stages of life are cheap to some is rather threatening, particularly when someone like Ezekiel Emmanuel has the ear of the President on this subject.
And a lot of the socons are evangelicals who adhere to the doctrine of “the priesthood of the believer” and local church autonomy, which leaves them rather resistant to any significant effort to institute a theocracy. They have torn apart churches for a lot less.
When was the last time a socon even proposed a law that threatens liberty, or jams their morality down our throats …
… as opposed to, say, protecting a societal institution that has transcended religion and culture for centuries as a stabilizing influence, from being re-defined on a whim just to make some people feel warm-and-fuzzy about their lifestyle choice — and in the process, attempt to muzzle their critics?
Can we get single minded? Yes … and that is a legit criticism. But don’t paint us with the same broad brush as the Progressive fundamentalists do, and lose sight of the greater problem. Their fundamentalist zeal makes socons look like libertines at Mardi Gras.
I think you misapprehend us SoCons. We are FisCons, too. The emphasis on SoCon issues is from a sincere belief that it is immorality which lurks beneath the fiscal misbehavior and indeed, is the cause of all the ills of our government.
“You cannot con an honest man.” Confidence schemes work by appealing to the greed of the mark. The desire for something free, even if it comes perhaps a bit illicitly, is the great trap for the mark. An honest man is not tempted by free stuff, preferring to “earn his bread by the sweat of his brow”. The temptation touches him not at all. He notices it not.
People with the hearts of thieves vote for thieves to represent them. Most do not even know they are thieves, having never even thought about it, but you know them by the people for whom they vote.
Thieves all have one truly dark trait in common: They are only limited by the restraints society puts upon them. Whatever they can get away with is what they will do. Moral men restrain themselves and thieves do not.
Some men are torn between the two ends. They have not yet cast off all self-restraint, but the longer they engage in such thievery, or associate with other thieves, the less self-restraint they have. At some point, they just give over completely. They acknowledge they are thieves. They cease to care, and they cast off all restraint entirely.
They then engage in all kinds of dishonest behavior unashamedly, for shame is just another way of saying self-restraint. You then know the complete thieves for their complete lack of shame. Doesn’t that describe the most vile of individuals in the Progressive movement?
You know an honest man by his ability to feel shame, and a dishonest man by his lack of shame.
So I want to know what will be said after the Supreme Court decides that ObamaCare is Unconstitutional, like many of us said it was while they spent a year and even voted over the holidays to pass this law also in an improper manner and in the meantime they also passed Stimulus bill which did not stimulate anything for the economy as a whole and probably actually made things worse for the nation, what the hell has Obama got to run on?
As far as I can see not anything worthwhile, what a putz!
AMEN
Government, like any other organism, refuses to acquiesce in its own extinction. This refusal, of course, involves the resistance to any effort to diminish its powers and prerogatives. There has been no organized effort to keep government down since Jefferson’s day. Ever since then the American people have been bolstering up its powers and giving it more and more jurisdiction over their affairs. They pay for that folly in increased taxes and diminished liberties. No government as such is ever in favor of the freedom of the individual. It invariably seeks to limit that freedom, if not by overt denial, then by seeking constantly to widen its own functions.
Mencken
kevino, what has driven us into the arms of government is, in the last century, the replacement of a healthy respect for wisdom and demonstrated expertise, with the blind worship of the mere appearances of either/both … to the point that we consider those who hold to the appearances as practically omniscient.
What do we look for in a President? Many look to see what schools he went to, what degrees he has earned, what positions he has held, how does he look, how does he speak, etc … but few of us look at what they have actually accomplished in their endeavors, how they have come to the decisions they have made, how they view the government’s role — and the role of the citizen — in our society.
Then, based upon that appearance, many of us make the judgment that the well-appearing candidate is so much SMARTER than the rest of us, we should let him/her solve our problems FOR us.
We tell ourselves that we just CAN’T solve the problems we face, better than they can, because they are so smart … despite the fact that many of those problems are highly specific to the individual, that our “closeness” to the problem gives us insight into it that the experts have no way of getting, that the same mechanisms of government that protect our liberty get in the way of the experts’ efforts to solve problems with a basis in behavioral/ethical issues.
And the experts are more than happy to go along with our judgment … for it justifies their positions, power, and meal tickets. For them, it is a lot easier to get and stay in power when we give them a list of problems to solve, than it is to get elected on a platform of having us solve more of our problems, ourselves.
When this expert-worship is combined with the notion that experts are even more trustworthy when they work in “non-profit” endeavors and therefore their judgment is supposedly untainted by greed or self-service, the expert-worship is amplified to the point it drowns out those who would express disagreement with their judgments.
The end result, is the 21st-century version of “cooperation” … an elite few whose connections to the individual are tenuous at best giving the orders, and the rest of us willingly obeying them, even when the orders don’t lead to better outcomes. This is high-tech serfdom … where the serfs lack the confidence to find better solutions for the problem we face, but instead look to government to guarantee their “right” to get high/get laid/get a free penicillin shot/get a check and just “get by”, at the expense of their right to get ahead.
It is times like this when I like to bring out a quote from Justice Brandeis.
“Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.”
Although I would question whether or not Obamacare was “well-meaning.” I think it was merely a power grab/crony payoff disguised as “well-meaning.” The point still remains, in the last hundred years we have traded liberty for small securities doled out by the government. We haven’t guarded sufficiently against this and now the government thinks it can force us to do/buy what it wants.
The matter hearkens directly back to basics: What is a right; what sort of entity can possess rights; how are rights distinguished from claims that are not rights; what is the proper relation between rights and freedom; to what extent may a majority cede the rights of all to a delegated agent (the State)? Until these become the topics of conversation, and serious conversation without escape hatches at that, we will remain mired in the sort of legislative misery that began with the Sherman Act, got a big boost from the Sixteenth Amendment, and accelerated to Mach 1 with the New Deal. For there will always be a plenty of those who say:
“Yes, yes, freedom is all very well, but we have to draw the line somewhere.”
The really scary thing is that the United States, along with almost every first and even second world country already has a 100% user pays medical system in the form of Veterinary care.
It cost me $6000USD for my dog to have intestinal surgury to remove a blockage and repair a suspected perforation and that included everything except the fuel to drive him to and from the vet. He made a full recovery.
If the patient was human, multiply by 20, 25…
There is a gigantic amount of money waiting for the organisation who brings the cost of human care down to that we give our pets, the only issue is that 100% USER pays WILL be part of the solution.
Random,
I wonder if, like kramer, i can go to the vet?
W
The thing is, pets are still considered PROPERTY, so they get efficient and responsible care by interested owners who want to take care of them.
In other words, the best way to bring at least women’s health care up to the quality and efficiency that pets receive is to declare them property too.
(Note: A component of this quality/efficiency axis is the fact that pets don’t vote; you’d probably end up with a litany of subsidized doggy treats, vet visits by psychologically damaged pets trying to jones for the vets as owners, protests from cats not receiving the same treatment as dogs because “we are all equally valuable pets,” etc.)
Pets also aren’t subject to the scam of managed care … where the insurers pressure the doctors for deep discounts to access their patient pools … then the doctors raise the “cash” price so that, after the discount, they still make enough to keep the practice going … while sticking the cash patient with the full amount, which comes nowhere near to reflecting the actual cost of service (which includes enough profit for the practice to be viable and worthwhile).
This charade is one reason why costs are so high for anyone outside of group coverage. It reminds me of the old Soviet saying … “they pretend to pay, we pretend to work” …
Not any more.
First, companies started offering health insurance policies for pets.
Now, companies are offering HMOs for pets. For example:
http://thepetinsuranceplace.com/united-pet-care/
[Disclaimer: This is NOT spam, I am NOT affiliated with that company in any way]
If they do succeed at destroying our healthcare system, I wouldn’t be surprised to see veterinarians moonlighting as back-alley physicians to provide care to people who can’t get access legally and can’t go across the boarder.
Gee, “Nice people” crush freedom, just like “troubled urban youths” ruin cities; when did even Andrew Klavan becoms too politically correct to use the proper English term for the beneficiaries of the 19th Amendment?
If we can’t use more precise and descriptive terms than our knuckle-dragging 20th century ancestors then why even bother speaking at all? Take the phrase:
I WAS KNOCKED OUT BY URBAN YOUTH AND THEN THE NICE PEOPLE SAID IT WAS REALLY MY FAULT FOR BEING NEITHER NICE NOR YOUTHY.
Basically it’s only communication value is for people who know what the euphemisms mean, and those who do are generally fellow victims of the Niceocracy. You want actual help, use words that call up actual pictures in the mind. Otherwise you’re just a nice-y.
Too bad all the fake conservatives and fake Tea Party people don’t apply this type of thinking to more than just health care. How come “conservatives” don’t trust government to oversee their health care, but they do trust government to wiretap, indefinitely detain, and even murder U.S. citizens without transparency or due process?
There’s a whole lot of people in government crushing your freedoms, but for some reason half of them get a free pass just because they have an R in front of their name.
Dear Wes,
I am shocked that this sort of abuse that you describe is happening, and as a conservative I will take efforts to end it completely.
Could you provide a list of these illegally detained, bugged, and/or murdered Americans?
Please exclude who experienced this in the context of war against the United States, as war occurs *between* rival legal-political structures, and the protections of the constitution address issues *within* our legal-political structure.
But I am sure your remaining list must be impressive. We’ll get on it right away. No, really. Conservatives hate that kind of stuff.
I note you inserted the term “illegally” in your reply to Wes, which, of course, negates your reply. Each and ever scenario Wes put forward is now “legal”, which is, of course, the point of his post. Nice try, no cigar.
Do you deny that the federal government has gathered unto itself the exact same powers that Wes described? Or do you insist on responding to what you wish he’d posted instead of what he actually posted?
The only citizens whom the Government has power to put in detention camps are those who have taken up arms against this country in a time of war.
If you join al-Qaeda to attack Americans, I don’t care if you’re a U.S. citizen. You’re a military target.
And there is a legal precedent: Read about the Supreme Court case Ex parte Quirin.
I too disagree with the “nice people” assumption. Most of these people are not driven out of any concern to be nice. Most so called do gooders are simply ego-maniacs with insane desire to run things!
Worst case scenario:
1. Supreme court knocks down Obamacare
2. Democrats retake congress
3. Congress and WH “Deem” Obamacare to have been approved by the Supreme Court, or engages in some other wordplay to put Obamacare “beyond the purview of the court”, and begin enforcement of it regardless of Supreme Court ruling.
What scares me is, if something like this were to happen, every liberal in the country would support it, arguing that it is perfectly reasonable for one or two branches of government to overrule or ignore another, “when they are obviously wrong.”
I’ll see your “worst case scenario” and give you a worse one.
1. Court knocks down Obamacare.
2. Congress stays closely divided
3. Romney wins and “fixes” Obamacare
Result: the same intrusive, ineffective, expensive big government solution with just enough KY to slide past the court. . . and a big fat “R” on it. And because it has an “R” on it a number of ersatz conservatives will think it’s “victory”.
Fine, and then states start arresting abortionists for murder-for hire.
Obamacare was doomed from the beginning since so many americans don’t like our Orthodox medical system and alternative medicine is now a Billion dollar industry.
them liberals gonna make me eat brocoli and i don’t want to eat no brocoli i don’t wants to eat anything they tells me to eat, i likes being fat and unhealthy they all going to hell, hahaha.
Judging by your choice of handle, I’m going to make the educated guess that you’re from the UK. Add in your unfunny and pathetically obvious attempt to sound like a ‘redneck’, and I conclude that you’re a self-important, supercilious twit (thanks for that one, A.K.) who approves of the 3/4 socialist country in perpetual decline that the UK is fast heading towards or has already reached.
We in the USA prefer to not have some distant government dictate our everyday actions. I thought you’d realize that, as from what I understand the wounds are still sore even 200 years after our countries last ‘discussed’ this issue.
Here is an Obamacare message to Nancy Pelosi from the Bridge to Nowhere Tea Party. You might like it.
http://punditpete.blogspot.com/2012/03/tea-party-group-posts-obamacare-message.html
Nice People don’t:
Lie to get elected
Take away 30% or more of your income
Hand money to people who refuse to work for their own sustenance
Activly fund fornication and promiscuity
Fund abortion clinics
Look into mom’s home packed lunch and delare it unfit
Fund Christ in urine
Fund ACORN and its voter fraud “Project Vote”
Don’t create media buzzes and campaigns all based on lies (ala Sarah Palin or Rush derrangement)
Expect others to pay for your birth control pills or abortions
Promote union thuggery
Promote imtimidation against Wall Street, Main Street, or Banks
Shut down business over bait fish and other such inventions
Promote scare campaigns (global warming, plastic, oil, gas etc.)
Hand money to foreign governments and entities while shutting down our own oil, gas, & coal businesses
Pass 2700 pages of unreadable bills into law
Swear to abide by the constitution, then do as they darn well please
Pass out boodles of money to their millionaire and billionaire friends while they are railing against millionaires and billionaires
Hide all their records
Say they are for transparency, then meet at the coffee shop across the street so the visitors don’t have to sign the visitors log
Turn off the indentifiers for donations under the reporting limit
Stab our allies in the back and hand over secret data to our enemies
Support the MuBros, Hamas, Hezballah, Jihad, and other violent organizations
Take our people to war, then don’t fight to win
I agree with all your points, but please, everyone…’nice people’ in this case is obviously a sarcastic choice of words. Have you ever seen any of Mr. Klavan’s PJTV videos on Youtube? HIGHLY recommended! (Honestly, as Google’s an Obumbler bundler I’m surprised they’re still up) In them, the sarcasm drips heavily. More heavily, even, than the soul-crushing burden Obamacare attempted to be.
I cant wait for the supreme court to overrule this law. Then I can sue that the govt (state or federal) cant force me to buy auto insurance whose rates are killing me more than the drivers.
I know a lot of people who don’t own cars. They are not forced to buy auto insurance.
Here we go again. Platitudes instead of specific situations. Every speed limit sign is an affront to somebody’s freedom. “Freedom to’ drive safely and “freedom from” those who don’t. There must be a balance between “freedom to” and “freedom from.” When we have a train wreck instead of a health care system, we need “freedom to” get health care and “freedom from” a health care system that isn’t accessible or effective. Details. Details. Details. You can utter generalities about freedom and liberty all you want, but the truth is in the details.
What concerns me is that this may mean that there are no limits upon the government.