Posted on 03/06/2010 4:19:16 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
So there was President Obama, giving his bazillionth speech on health care, droning yet again that "now is the hour when we must seize the moment," the same moment he's been seizing every day of the week for the past year, only this time his genius photo-op guys thought it would look good to have him surrounded by men in white coats.
Why is he doing this? Why let "health" "care" "reform" stagger on like the rotting husk in a low-grade creature feature who refuses to stay dead no matter how many stakes you pound through his chest?
Because it's worth it. Big time. I've been saying in this space for two years that the governmentalization of health care is the fastest way to a permanent left-of-center political culture. It redefines the relationship between the citizen and the state in fundamental ways that make limited government all but impossible. In most of the rest of the Western world, there are still nominally "conservative" parties, and they even win elections occasionally, but not to any great effect (Let's not forget that Jacques Chirac was, in French terms, a "conservative").
The result is a kind of two-party one-party state: Right-of-center parties will once in a while be in office, but never in power, merely presiding over vast left-wing bureaucracies that cruise on regardless.
Republicans seem to have difficulty grasping this basic dynamic. Less than three months ago, they were stunned at the way the Democrats managed to get 60 senators to vote for the health bill. Then Scott Brown took them back down to 59, and Republicans were again stunned to find the Dems talking about ramming this thing into law through the parliamentary device of "reconciliation."(continued)
(Excerpt) Read more at ocregister.com ...
It seems Mark Steyn is much more sanguine about ObamaCare than I am.
It seems to me that we already have this leftist political culture even without the government health system.
Yeah, it’s never been about reforming healthcare but about Progressives seizing control of this Republic.
True indeed!
LOL
Yeah, its never been about reforming healthcare but about Progressives seizing control of this Republic.
:::::
Exactly.
This is the single most important article ever posted in Free Republic... or anywhere else.
Unfortunately, I fear that it will remain so... that what it predicts will come to pass.
"And those are NOT my fingerprints all over the congressional bill.
I merely facilitated discussion between opposing parties."
Yesterday I went off on Mark and called him an idiot. Well I was the ‘idiot’ because, what Mark describes in this article is Australia.
There is no such thing as a “Conservative” party in a socialist country.
Mark, you nailed it and I apologize. I just hope that ALL of America realizes what they have to lose.
I just pray that the Republicans can hold them off until January of next year when there'll be nothing to worry about.
This happened in Hawaii. Even though we have a Republican Governor, she can hardly get anything done or passed as the whole rest of Hawaii’s legislature is pure left wing zombie’s. I mean from the two Senators to the House members down to the state house and senate. All democrats. I laugh when someone on Freepers says ,be sure to call your representative and let them know how you feel. I might just as well go out and talk to my concrete fence. They rule and don’t give a crap what we the people want or feel.
There will always be something to worry about until the Complicit Media Problem is addressed.
By any means necessary.
-- George Will
I agree. The two-party one-party state is the evil here. The line about the Dems betting on the Reps to not have a backbone rings a little too true.
Steyn’s always good - this is inspired.
One way that Progressive Democrats have managed to keep alive their dead, defeated,
bankrupting theories on issues like so-called health care is by perverting the
definition of very basic terms.
The word right is one of the most glaring examples of a definition thats been
distorted by the intellectual house-of-horrors mirror that is leftist theory.
Every American has the right to health care they argue.
Theyre right. Every American does have a right to health care. In fact, they have
that right right now. They have the right to buy insurance. They have the right
to not buy insurance. They have the right to pay out of pocket. They have the
right get a second opinion. They have the right to rub a little dirt on it and suck
it up. They have a right to help out a friend in need. These are individual rights.
America is set upon individual rights.
What they dont have is the right to health care in the perverted leftist sense
of the word.
A right, in the traditional American lexicon laid out by the likes of Thomas
Jefferson, is something that exists by virtue of our humanity. It is inalienable
and we are endowed with these rights by our creator. No government or
institution has the power to take away these rights. You exist, therefore these
rights exist.
In the leftist sense of the word, though, a right is something very different. In
fact, its not a right at all: its a handout provided to you by government, often
at exorbitant costs to society.
I have the right to health care! the leftists demand angrily. Therefore, the
government must provide it for me! This is where they veer off course. You
do not have a ‘right to healthcare provided by government’. Or a house, or a
college degree or education, or car loan or food etc, etc, etc.
B-b-b-b-b-but!, scream the leftists. Insurance companies can already deny you
health care.
No, they cant. Insurance companies are certainly part of the problem. Weve
grown to depend on them too much and on ourselves too little. The system does
need to be fixed.
But insurance companies cannot deny you the inalienable right to health care.
They do not have that power. They can only choose not to pay for certain
procedures. You can still find another insurance company, seek help in a
different state, find a charitable doctor to pay for it, benefit from a fundraiser
or, worst-case scenario, benefit from the generosity of a well-funded, for-profit
private health care institution.
After all, you still have the right to find that care. Even in a worst-case
scenario in the current system, you only need the means.
But when government monopolizes the system, when government first decides
what kind of care youll get, and when government next decides if theyll even
pay for it, your right to health care no longer exists
I believe that Obamacare is first and foremost about ObamaEgo. He wants to go down in history as the person who did what no one else could: create a “universal” [read socialist] health care system. May even be a grudgefest with the Clintons.
Whatever, anything else is secondary to his ego. JMO.
All Republicans are in trouble and will be targets for removal if the party doesn’t mobilize and confront the uncomfortable reality that business as usual is history.
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