Healthcare and the Resourceful Poor

The American Thinker ^ | August 15, 2009 | Christopher Chantrill

[Scanian]

Evil political wizard Karl Rove seems to be tasting blood. His analyzes the president's stuff for Obamacare in the Wall Street Journal and concludes that the pitcher is in a jam.

There are no polling data or focus groups on earth that can help Mr. Obama out of this jam. He has set in motion events he appears unable to control and commitments he cannot keep.

It can't be that bad. With his stratospheric intelligence (especially compared to the notoriously deficient President Bush) the president's supporters can still be confident that he'll pull a rabbit out of a hat.

The good thing about the Obama administration is that its intelligent blundering will create a new opportunity for practical conservative reform. And since the essence of liberal politics is patronage-of the kind that advanced people considered corrupt a century ago in the heyday of the urban political machine-the essence of conservative politics must be to discredit the crude vote-buying that characterizes liberal politics and that supports liberal power.

But the minute that you propose to touch a penny of the trillions of our money that liberals spend on their patronage state, the cry from the modern Tapers and Tadpoles goes up: You are balancing the budget on the backs of the poor!

Everyone knows that the poor are helpless, and that without government programs the poor would go to the wall, or worse.

But are they helpless? We have seen James Tooley in The Beautiful Tree describe how the Third World poor pay for the education of their children when the government schools are no good. Then there is Dr. Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh and his Off the Books: The Underground Economy and the Urban Poor. He describes the urban poor African-Americans of Maquis Park on Chicago's South Side.

[Uncle Ike]

” Taxes, regulations, licenses, credentials: these are the building blocks of liberal power. It’s a pity that each block knocks a rung off the ladder of opportunity for the poor.

Yet our liberal friends are even now straining every sinew to increase taxes, regulations so they can give us health care. It’s a pity that the increased bite will make it even more difficult for the poor to go legit. “

A great article that we all need to pay attention to — as the “We WON” Liberals advance their agenda of wrecking the ‘real’ economy, and replacing it with massive, omniscient, omnipresent, government, we will have no choice but to engage in the ‘shadow economy’ to some greater or lesser extent....

[wiggen]

some of the article may have been good but what about this?
“It can’t be that bad. With his stratospheric intelligence (especially compared to the notoriously deficient President Bush) the president’s supporters can still be confident that he’ll pull a rabbit out of a hat.”
Insulting Bush as well as ceding ‘stratospheric intelligence’ to s guy with one skill,running a campaign?

[Graybeard58]

I believe the author was being sarcastic.

[SaintDismas]

I get a real big kick out of the “underground economy”. But I have to really wonder about that with health care. Who ya gonna buy that from? Also a fan a alternative medicine, nobody really talking about that in reference to this “reform”. But you can almost bet your bottom dollar that these thugs really don’t want you taking care of yourself “alternatively”, since neither does the current medical establishment.

[wiggen]

i’d hope so,but truly,how does one tell?

[tbw2]

Or trying to throw in the statement so liberals would read the article, too. ObamaCare Jokes Obama Jokes

[tbw2]

Black market medicine has a bad reputation for a reason. We can't expect the underground economy to cover this problem. If good medicines get rationed, expect Mexican gangs to smuggle in fake antibiotics, pain pills, and cholesterol drugs and even more people to die in an expanded "drug war". ObamaCare Jokes Obama Jokes

[SaintDismas]

I don’t agree with you about what you term as “black market medicine”. Some is bad for certain, but there are alternatives to what the conventional wisdom is with our current medical regime that is far superior to what they are doing.

I rarely go to the doctor myself, and disagree with my doctor with some of the things he wants me to do and he knows it. (Cholesterol drugs—statin, won’t take it, EVER) He can “fire” me if he wants to, but it will be far more likely that I will fire him.

I take natural remedies, ie red rice yeast, oatmeal, etc. and manage my cholesterol just fine without spending $100 a month for Lipitor. They can all go jump off a cliff.