I am utterly astounded by the sheer ignorance of my fellow American citizens. I am dumbfounded by the sense of entitlement and indolence that has started to run through our culture. We seem to want everything handed to us on a silver platter. Nowhere is this more prevalent than the debate on healthcare. Some believe that the answer to all our health care problems is to let the government provide compulsory health care for the entire population. I on the other hand believe that socialized healthcare is an artifice ,used to slowly push socialism on the majority of the public. If offered directly to the public, socialism would fall on its face in America. But when it’s wrapped up in the clothes of welfare or healthcare, the irrational emotional tug clouds their vision of the bigger threat of tyrannical government. “Since the general civilization of mankind, I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of freedoms of the people by gradual and silent encroachment of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” James Madison. The push for more expansive government has been ever steady by the left. They do not put socialist policies to an up or down vote. Instead they work in slow steady incremental steps. Those that speak out against the slippery slope of government overstep are labeled as uncompassionate and evil. Well I guess I’m evil. However I can back up my stance with more than just emotional pleas and pandering class envy. I will not blindly support oppressive government.
The first problem with socialized healthcare is quality. America has the best quality healthcare in the world, hands down. Millions flock to American doctors to get treatment that they cannot get anywhere else. Thousands of doctors forgo their state run hospitals and chose to practice in America, and an overwhelming amount of drug innovations are done by American pharmaceutical companies. Why is this? One word: Competition. The value of open markets is nearly un-comprehendible. In America we are free to choose our healthcare providers. This drives all health care companies to provide the best service at the lowest cost. Doctors use their genius to discover better medicine. Insurance companies are always striving to lower costs and provide better service. No one can force you to even pay for insurance. If you find that you don’t want to have health insurance you can spend your hard earned money on anything you like. That’s the beauty of it. When the government is the insurance company, it’s the monopoly, it writes the laws, sets the rules, and makes the payments; you have no other place to go. (Unless your part of the ruling elite)
We often have an emotional reaction to money in healthcare. We have been told at nauseam how evil doctors, insurance, and pharmaceutical companies prey on the American people, just to make money. Tell me then. How should a doctor pay for his 8+ years of medical training? How should pharmaceutical companies pay thousands of scientists to make the most advanced drugs in the world? The best and brightest people in the world become doctors and scientists for the money. The great thing is if a doctor, insurance company, or pharmaceutical company charges too much, you can go somewhere else!!! They spend hundreds of thousands of dollars investing in the best education so they can make great money and provide the best lifestyle that they can for their families. There is no immorality in this. With a socialist system it would not take long for some bureaucrat to put caps on doctor’s pay. If you don’t believe me, just look at what they are doing to the evil CEO’s who took bailout money. Who in their right mind would pay half a million dollars for many years of medical training, if they were not guaranteed a solid payback on that investment? A free market system is the only way we can insure the brightest people become doctors. British doctors see 50% more patients than an American doctor, and as consequence, they have less time to spend with each patient. The reality of socialized medicine is very different than what is portrayed in the media and in liberal biased documentaries. The access to healthcare is abysmal in most cases. I lived in Europe for a large portion of my life and have seen firsthand the inadequacies of a government run system. If you are a Canadian citizen and need medical care you are often times faced with a waiting list. Often time’s people sit on these lists for months in pain waiting for routine surgery. There have been many cases where people have died waiting for care. Unfortunately the media seems to obsess over the “victims” of an evil capitalist system. Let’s not even delve into dental care for the British. Government has failed at far simpler endeavors than medicine. Look at the examples of social security, the bailout, and many other large government endeavors. It is simply a long list of big government failures, and yet there are those that recommend putting our healthcare in the hands of bureaucrats in Washington? Think how hard it is for you to figure out your taxes, you can’t even begin to comprehend the tax code in America. Now translate that to trying to get heart surgery. You can’t even go to the DMV without a headache. Think about trying to get your cancer cured by the same company who takes 2 hours and ten forms of id just to get your license renewed. Why is it believed that if the government can do it better than the private sector, when all the evidence proves otherwise? Superior quality under a socialized system is a myth. “The best minds are not in government. If any were, business would steal them away”. Ronald Reagan. Instead of intrusting our health to medical professionals we would rather give it to politicians who’s only real job requirement is to be likable and a decent speaker. (Unless you’re Barney Frank)
The left often claim the moral high ground on the issue of healthcare. I oppose this view. Government run healthcare gives the government the right to govern every aspect of your life. Take for example the freedom of doctors in a socialized system. At first you would have to decide what patients would see what doctors. They would then have to divide the citizens equally among these doctors. However,as you know doctors are not divided equally around this country. So now doctors now lose the right to choose where to practice. Since when does the government have the right to mandate where people work? In a socialized system the government would have premise to keep you from smoking or doing any “harmful” action as you might tax the healthcare system more. As we all know, overweight people have more medical needs. Should they still get care? It’s a very slippery slope. What government agency gets to decide who gets care or not? What politician gets to mandate these regulations and rules that will most defiantly come with this utopian healthcare system? Furthermore, who gets to decide what’s “harmful”? What stops government from saying drinking coke will rot your teeth, and since government pays, government makes the rules. There is no morality in this. Only control. Surely the bountiful all caring United States government would not overstep these bounds. First, I say that your boundaries may be far different than mine. Second, tell that to the thousands of “disabled” and “mentally ill” people who were prevented from procreating in the 1920’s under a program of eugenics. Or better yet, tell that to the elderly who are now being discriminated against by portions of the stimulus bill. This so called stimulus bill has a provision in it stating that is you are on Medicare and are “too old” to get treatment, that your treatment should be rationed, meaning that if your 70 years old and you need heat surgery you must first have government approval. Daschle says health-care reform “will not be pain free. Seniors should be more accepting of the conditions that come with age instead of treating them.” These are the people that claim a moral high ground and want to make it mandatory that everyone be under this system. This is the very definition of tyranny. “The fundamental article of my political creed is that despotism, or unlimited sovereignty, or absolute power, is the same in a majority of a popular assembly, an aristocratic council, an oligarchical junto, and a single emperor.” –John Adams. We blindly walk down the road of tyranny like little drones, all so we don’t have to pay for health insurance.
The injustice of this “reform” does not end there. A healthcare system like this is not sustainable with the current tax system we have. Healthcare makes up for over 15% of the total United State’s enterprise. In order for the government to take up all payments for this, taxes must increase, hard. There is no free lunch in this world. Socialized healthcare is not free healthcare, by any means. Someone must foot the bill, and the payers will still be you. Instead of you using your hard earned money to purchase health insurance, this system would require you to give your money to some fat politician in Washington to spend it for you. Your still paying for it, but it’s much better now because you don’t have to actually see the money taken out of your paycheck. It’s done automatically!! The pox on this system is that the burden will be on primarily on the “wealthy”. The left will use this as justification to get back at the evil rich. The top 1% of earners in America paid 40% of the tax bill in 2006. Don’t you think they already pay their part? Furthermore, the mindset that this lays on this already spoiled generation is downright scary. No longer would we be responsible for providing for ourselves. Now mommy and daddy government will give us whatever we want off the backs of the evil “rich”. What happens to the mentality of workers in the US? What motivation is there to be wealthy? What motivation is there to be accountable and prioritize your money to pay for your needs instead of flat screen TVs, when you know government will provide for all your needs? “A wise and frugal government … shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” -Thomas Jefferson. There is no integrity in a system the left is proposing. It only leads to a society of drones who would rather be controlled and be taken care of, than to be free and be responsible. “Those who would give up essential Liberty to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” –Benjamin Franklin. (By the way, the Democrats support, and are pushing, giving health care to illegal immigrants. There call, government taking the fruits of one man’s labor and giving it to criminals, morality. I call it theft. If I was to try the same thing I would be thrown in prison)
Those who would oppose me would challenge me on a purely emotional front. They would insist that I would support leaving the impoverished to suffer without healthcare. I am not for that. Nor do I think anyone who fights against socialized healthcare is against helping those who are legitimately needy. ” I am for doing good to the poor, but I differ in opinion of the means. I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it.” –Benjamin Frankin. 260 Million people in America are insured. That leaves 40 million without insurance. There is a large percent of those who can afford insurance but choose not to. They might have to give up that nice new car payment, but I have met very few people without health insurance who could under no circumstance afford it. Americans need to get their priorities straight. We are to comfortable, if there is any ounce of struggle in anything we do, we insist on quitting. We are told because of the small minority of people without health coverage, that we should all be mandated into compulsory health insurance. “I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it.” –Thomas Jefferson. Programs exist such as Medicade to meet the needs of the impoverished and I am not for the ending of responsible welfare in healthcare. I believe that welfare should help people out of poverty, instead of helping them deteriorate in it. Not to mention there are thousands of private charities whose goal is to help the needy. Our lethargic society would rather pay higher taxes, and let the government waste their money, than to take the time to examine and support private charities. (I don’t know about you, but I would rather trust the bureaucrats, lobbyists, and politicians in Washington with my money than give to my local church of community group)
There is no debate that the healthcare system in America is not perfect. There is room for reform. But how? The real answer to our healthcare problems is promoting capitalism and less government red tape. While our health care system is more market oriented than most nations, we don’t really have a free market in health care in the US. Over half of healthcare spending in the US is done by the government and most of the rest is done by bureaucratic institutions. We need to give the power of choice back to the people. We should encourage companies to give insurance to their employees by giving them tax credits for every employee insured. We should reduce the amount of needless regulations imposed over insurance companies and doctors that drive up costs, and we should reform the courts so that good doctors do not fear shady malpractice suits. These provisions will promote competition, drives costs down, and stimulate innovation. This will not be a perfect system, with freedom nothing is. You will always have the drones who would rather buy porn than health insurance. Sure there will be those who fall through the cracks in a free society. With a socialized system, we all fall through the cracks. In America we have a nation with a government, not a government with a nation. We live in the best nation in the world. Even the poorest among us live with luxuries many people in this world envy. Let us not blindly walk into the jaws of tyranny for the “benefit” of “free” healthcare.
(And I did not even get into whether its constitutional or not)

~Aaron West

“The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools.”
– Herbert Spencer

Contact your Senator – I did
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

Dear Senator,

The tax payers of the great Commonwealth of Virginia, and America, were taken to the cleaners tonight with the irresponsible actions of the US Senate. The Constitution provides no enumerated powers to the Senate to take action like this. You have no authority or right to redistribute wealth from one to another. You have no authority or right to set the cap of any American worker. You have no authority or right to steal our money and give it to illegal aliens. We did not send you to Congress to spend our money on Frisbee golf courses. I can go on and on.

I, and hundreds like me, have had enough of irresponsible actions by our Government. Today, you participated in support of the single largest transfer of capital power from the private sector to the government in recorded history. You have participated in supporting an irresponsible action that has no chance to create meaningful jobs in America. You hide behind the disguise of tax relief when really your tax relief is nothing more than another spending program. The American people are smarter than that. Sir, with all due respect, taking money from a tax paying Americans and giving it to someone who contributes nothing is not a tax cut. That is a socialist spending program. We aren’t buying it. We aren’t supporting it either.

The Senate refused to take the advice of their own Congressional Budget office who’s analysis of this plan is that it will not stimulate the economy. Irresponsible and shameful. The Senate also refused to consider the 63%, and growing, dissatisfaction rating by the American people, who you work for, rushing instead towards socialist spending and appropriations pork with reckless abandon. The more we learn about what is in the plan, the more we are against it. We have had enough and insist that the Senate begin to act responsibly.

The Senate has pulled numbers out of the air for this plan and have failed to make any attempt at communicating a cogent explanation of this plan to their bosses, the American people. The Democratic Senator from Louisiana said as much tonight on television when asked point blank about how the numbers were crafted. Her clueless response was an embarrassment to the position. No Senator has been able to stand before a camera and speak competently to the American people about any facet of this plan and how it will work. Every talking head only hopes this might work and is only confident about one thing, that the end price tag for this nonsense will be exponentially higher than it is being talked about today. That does not instill confidence in the American people.

You have mortgaged the future of my son and his children with irresponsible thievery of our prosperity. That is absolutely unsatisfactory. I have never witnessed anything more irresponsible in my life. Something so important, so urgent, to be rammed down our throat with so little study and discussion is Un-patriotic and is not what our framers had in mind.

There is still time to do the right thing. You need to have the courage to call a Congressional time-out and allow this plan to be studied, analyzed by non-partisan experts. Then you need to bring the plan to you boss, the American people, in a clear and convincing way that gives us the confidence we deserve in the deliberations of their elected officials. We deserve it and you owe it to us. Do not rush to failure. Show us some leadership or we will find someone else to speak for us. Right now, you own this plan and we will hold you personally responsible for the inevitable economic demise this spending plan will have on our economic future.

Respectfully, yet fervently submitted.

A sworn defender of the Constitution of the United States, against all enemies, foreign, and domestic.

Gary West, Colonel, USAF, (R)

The FIX
Governments since the dawn of time have been promoting themselves as the fix to their people’s problems. They promise shelter from the raging storms, but time only deliver in unintended consequences. The fix to our economy is not to let the government spend away our future. First we must lower taxes on the people who generate economic growth. America suffers from a 35% tax rate on businesses (one of the highest in the world). This tax cut will enable the producers in our society to generate more jobs. “Tax cuts give incentives to work, save, and invest, thus creating jobs and increasing economic growth.” The way out of this mess is to allow the people of this great nation to do what they do best, generate wealth. The true failed policies of the past are the tired policies tried with FDR, Carter, and in socialist nations around the world. Obama is right about one thing, if we allow government to try to spend its way out of this crisis, the times before us will be more difficult.”The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history, whether man shall be allowed to govern himself or be ruled by a small elite.”– Thomas Jefferson. Our country was build around the principle that people should have the right to their own property and how it should be exercised, not on big government spending taking from the pocket of the producers and wasting it on massive deficit spending

–Aaron West

The success of Obama campaign is astounding. To think that a one term junior senator could arise to the most powerful office in the world, defeating a Clinton along the way, is astonishing. Watching Obama change from the extreme liberal to the idealistic centrist in time for the first presidential debate, is just as unbelievable. The Obama campaign had to out left the Clintons in order to squeak out the Democratic nomination, and then shift these positions quickly for the presidential campaign. Obama has to pose as a tax cutter, in order to appeal to the middle class voters. I say this position is nothing more than a ruse to hide Obama’s socialistic, wealth redistribution policies. To the discerning eye, this “tax plan” is nothing more than a big government, authoritarian policy, utilizing class envy to achieve political ends. However, to the public at large, Obama’s tax plans seem to be rational and centrist, giving credence to the notion that America is still right of center nation.

Another very interesting circumstance of the Obama campaign has been the overwhelming support of young voters. You could make the case of mis-education, for this typically under informed demographic, citing Liberal run schools and universities, dominated by liberal teachers unions. I believe that the draw of the Obama campaign for these young voters is based on celebrity instead of careful policy consideration. The fashionable position for this group is largely anti Bush. So a candidate whose campaign is centered around “change” and Bush bashing, becomes very attractive to these idealistic voters. When asked, these voters show no real comprehension of Obama’s policies. Instead, they talk about his oratory skills and messianic demeanor. To these voters, this election is not an affirmation of Obama’s policies, but a protest of the Bush presidency. This is another indicator that America has not been transposed to a liberal nation.

The fact is, America has not fundamentally changed. Voters have been misled into thinking our economic crisis was caused by capitalism and policies of the Bush administration, and are led to the conclusion that safety can be found in the government. The Obama campaign had to outspend McCain 2-1 and prey on the fears and ideals of a blind electorate. America is still a right of center nation. There is no doubt that Obama knows this, and for the first 2 years will not risk a political over reach; learning from the Clinton policy mistakes that led to the Republican Congress takeover of the 90s.

Some in the Republican party will use this election as cause for the Republicans to rework their ideals. They would a spouse watering down the conservative message in order to win over independent voters. This is just a recipe for continued Republican defeat. As conservatives we have a clear recipe for victory that we continually ignore. Ronald Reagan showed us how conservatives win elections. He promoted standing on the principles of Individual freedom and the ideals of our founding. He thought that The idea that a man (or woman) should have the right to keep the fruits of his labor, has been the singular virtue of this great nation, and was the driving force of our rise as the greatest nation in the world. Americans have not turned their back on this principle. It is the Republican Party who has betrayed these principles. I can only hope this election will act as a lesson for these Pseudo-Republicans. Reagan did not change his message based on the sway of the polls, instead he took on these issues and changed minds. He moved the polls. While it is easy to present a populist message, and talk like the compassionate conserve, we must convince the population that self government is the best way to ensure equality. Now is not the time to compromise and merge to the left. If there is any hope for the ideals of freedom and liberty to survive we have to get back to our principles. As Reagan said, “What we need is a party of , not pale pastels.” This election will not kill the conservative party, as this party is based on the God given spirit of individual freedom. This election will serve as a refining fire. “Eternal Vigilance is the Price of Liberty” We will continue to fight.

Thanks for reading

~Aaron West

“That no free government, or the blessing of liberty, can be preserved to any people but by a firm adherence to justice, moderation, temperance, frugality, and virtue, and by frequent recurrence to fundamental principles.”
– George Mason