Posted on 12/19/2009 5:27:06 PM PST by Jim Robinson
In the continually harsh public discourse over the President’s proposals for federally-managed healthcare, the Big Government progressives in both the Democratic and the Republican parties have been trying to trick us. These folks, who really want the government to care for us from cradle to grave, have been promoting the idea that health care is a right. In promoting that false premise, they have succeeded in moving the debate from WHETHER the feds should micro-manage health care to HOW the feds should micro-manage health care. This is a false premise, and we should reject it. Health care is not a right; it is a good, like food, like shelter, and like clothing.
What is a right? A right is a gift from God that extends from our humanity. Thinkers from St. Thomas Aquinas, to Thomas Jefferson, to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., to Pope John Paul II have all argued that our rights are a natural part of our humanity. We own our bodies, thus we own the gifts that emanate from our bodies. So, our right to life, our right to develop our personalities, our right to think as we wish, to say what we think, to publish what we say, our right to worship or not worship, our right to travel, to defend ourselves, to use our own property as we see fit, our right to due process—fairness—from the government, and our right to be left alone, are all rights that stem from our humanity. These are natural rights that we are born with. The government doesn’t give them to us and the government doesn’t pay for them and the government can’t take them away, unless a jury finds that we have violated someone else’s rights.
What is a good? A good is something we want or need. In a sense, it is the opposite of a right. We have our rights from birth, but we need our parents when we are children and we need ourselves as adults to purchase the goods we require for existence. So, food is a good, shelter is a good, clothing is a good, education is a good, a car is a good, legal representation is a good, working out at a gym is a good, and access to health care is a good. Does the government give us goods? Well, sometimes it takes money from some of us and gives that money to others. You can call that taxation or you can call it theft; but you cannot call it a right.
A right stems from our humanity. A good is something you buy or someone else buys for you.
Now, when you look at health care for what it is, when you look at the US Constitution, when you look at the history of human freedom, when you accept the American value of the primacy of the individual over the fleeting wishes of the government, it becomes apparent that those who claim that healthcare is a right simply want to extend a form of government welfare.
When I make this argument to my Big Government friends, they come back at me with…well, if people don’t have health insurance, they will just go to hospitals and we will end up paying for them anyway. Why should that be? We don’t let people steal food from a supermarket or an apartment from a landlord or clothing from a local shop. Why do we let them take healthcare from a hospital without paying for itl? Well, my Big Government friends contend, that’s charity.
They are wrong again. It is impossible to be charitable with someone else’s money. Charity comes from your own heart, not from the government spending your money. When we pay our taxes to the government and it gives that money away, that’s not charity, that’s welfare. When the government takes more from us than it needs to secure our freedoms, so it can have money to give away, that’s not charity, that’s theft. And when the government forces hospitals to provide free health care to those who can’t or won’t care for themselves, that’s not charity, that’s slavery. That’s why we now have constitutional chaos, because the government steals and enslaves, and we outlawed that a long time ago.
Sounds like a good idea to me!
Thanks SO MUCH for the ping on this!!!
Thanks for the pingy
Ahem. That's "Comrade," to you, bub. ;)
Thanks very much for the ping. Somehow, I missed this.
Thanks, JR, for posting this. I really like the Judge. Happy New Year to both of you.
Thanks, Judge!
Anyway, I hesitated before shelving the book, wanting to claim it for my own, since helpers receive a free item for assisting with book sales.
"Are you wondering where to put that?," another, much older, volunteer asked. Before I could answer, she exclaimed, "Throw it out! That woman has ruined an entire generation!"
LIMITED GOVERNMENT !!
Bookmarked.
I have also attempted this argument with people I consider to possess more than enough brain power, common sense, yet they don't see it, either. I also use in my argument the objection to the notion that insurance is the only means one has to pay a hospital bill, the insult to anyone who goes to the ER for care that it is automatically assumed he is a deadbeat, won't pay and the cost ends up being borne on the rest of the consumers. Why is that, where did the notion begin that NO ONE pays a bill out of his own pocket? I'm not talking about those in the country illegally, just your average-Joe-citizen.
I have been coming at the Constitutionality argument from the wrong angle, following those who question where in the Constitution is Congress authorized to make the citizen buy a good/product/service. These yahoos are going to try to expand the interstate commerce clause, as they always do, but I think the question asked should be: Where in the Constitution is Congress given the authority to deny the freedom of the citizen, ie. jail time, if he does not purchase a good/product/service?
These dopes are painting themselves into a corner with this *health care is an inalienable right* baloney -- if so, this means that no one may be denied any form of health care for whatever reason, including the fact that some panel has decided they are too old or their quality of life is such that the gubmint can't afford it. Calling it an inalienable right means civil rights lawsuits aplenty from those who don't get what they need.
BTTT
Bump so I can sign up as the Judge’s ‘friend’ on facebook later tonight.
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