Health Care For All Is A Prescription For Death

I've read a lot lately about the Obama administration's push to introduce "affordable health care" for all people in this country. On the surface, it sounds like a laudable endeavor. Who would speak against it and deny the sick, the lame, and the indigent the help they need obtaining health care? What kind of terrible person would fight against letting the government become a provider of health insurance for those who cannot afford to pay for their own?

Well, it's not that simple; it never is when it comes to the government. The promoters of this plan assure the public that those who already have health insurance would be allowed to keep it. We are told the new plan would in no way impact our health care. If we are satisfied with the current arrangements we have with our insurance company and our medical team, nothing would change. That is a flat out lie, and worst of all, they know it!

The government has been sweet-talking the medical profession in an effort to get them on board with the new plan. Many doctors and other providers are afraid that if they don't agree to the plans, they will be left out and run over by the bus of regulations and smaller reimbursements. Incredibly, many are buying in to this fear tactic.

And now we have a media-sponsored propaganda event on ABC this Wednesday, July 1, in which the Obama administration will supposedly answer the hard questions and refute the "lies" being spread about their wonderful plan. Republicans asked that one representative from their group be allowed to participate in the question and answer session. They were soundly rebuffed. The only opposing voice on ABC that I've ever heard is John Stossel. He won't be participating in the spectacle either.

Once the "sheeple" are molified and convinced that the government isn't really trying to control our medical treatments, the eager Congressional Democrats will believe themselves to have the necessary support from the public. That's all they will need to overwhelmingly vote in this abomination of health care reform.

They have promised we can always continue with our own insurance companies. But what people aren't thinking through is that the private insurance companies will cease to exist. Once the sheeple see the government subsidizing the health insurance of people who say they can't afford insurance, what incentive will there be to continue to pay your own health insurance? As more and more people jump on the "free" bandwagon, private insurance will have fewer participants. They will either raise the rates on those left in the program, or throw in the towel and do something else. It's simply the law of supply and demand. Once the demand for private insurance drops to a certain level, it's no longer viable for them to stay in business.

I've never understood why some people think insurance companies (among others) shouldn't make a profit. Nobody goes into a business to lose money or to not make enough profit to pay their investors a worthwhile return. Only the government seems to think it's a smart idea to spend money they don't have and run up mountains of debt they don't intend to pay back. Ordinary people in business can't get away with that. Even large corporations (as evidenced by the recent trouble at General Motors, Chrysler, and dozens of financial corporations) can't stay in business when they don't make a profit.

In the end, when the people have deserted the private insurance industry to suck at the government "teat", the health insurance business will go under the same way many other enterprises have. That's when our benefactors will begin to limit our access to medical services and dictate what we can and cannot receive in the way of treatment. Doctors and hospitals won't fare any better. Somebody will decide that just because a man or woman has spent hundreds of thousands of dollars going to medical school, it doesn't mean they have a right to "earn too much money." So the government will decide how much money doctors and nurses are allowed to make.

People will start clamoring to go back to the old system, where everybody purchased the insurance coverage of their choice and went to whichever doctor or hospital they preferred. But it will be too late. With no private health insurance providers in business any longer, who will step up to the plate and take a chance on starting a new one? Nobody. Not when they run the risk of government bureaucrats taking over again and running them into the ground.

So people, wake up! The line has been drawn in the sand. It's the final battle to preserve our freedom of choice about our own health care. Where will you stand? Will you insist your congressional representatives listen to your wishes? Or will you give up and decide it's easier to let Big Brother take care of all your needs.

George Orwell was off by thirty years. It looks like 2010 will become his version of 1984.

Obama's Bailout for the Despots

I'm feeling "lax" for not posting new stuff, and have been prodded by some of my friends to "do something!" So, I thought I would share with you the work of some great opinion writers until I get my act back together. Enjoy and please let me know what you think!

Obama's Bailout for the Despots
Jonah Goldberg
Wednesday, April 08, 2009

It's President Obama's worst bailout so far. He's going to rescue the U.N. Human Rights Council.

Now admittedly, the council wasn't on the verge of going out of business. Heck, if there were a nuclear war, the pinstriped thugs of the United Nations' "human rights" bureaucracy would probably be all that's left to keep the cockroaches company.

But although the effete goons of the UNHRC aren't going bankrupt, Obama has bailed them out in another way. He's given the repugnant cabal that dominates the council a fresh injection of political capital.

President Bush refused to cooperate with the agency. Obama, on the other hand, feels it is vital to work with the organization from the inside.

The old U.N. Commission on Human Rights was a travesty, recognized -- even by U.N. leadership -- as a Petri dish of moral decay and political corruption. It was the foremost, though far from the sole, U.N. agency dedicated to the defamation, demonization and destruction of Israel. It was closed down in 2005, only to be replaced the following year with the Human Rights Council. Not surprisingly, the transformation was as superficial as it sounds. Once the ink was dry on the new stationery, the world's worst human rights abusers flocked back to run the council.

Initially, reformers had the wacky idea that the new human rights body should have as members only countries that actually care about human rights. Preposterous, responded diplomatic flacks for dictators from Asia, Africa and the Middle East. Then there was the idea that the council should regularly review the human rights records of every U.N. member, not just Israel. But the "universal periodic reviews" became a joke, as countries such as Egypt and Russia received glowing reviews that might as well have been written by their tourism bureaus.

The council's membership is determined by region, which has allowed the Muslim countries from the African and Asian blocs to hold majorities, while most European nations have been too scared to block their agenda. This means that when the U.S. does get a seat at the table, it will merely replace a Western nation that already respects human rights.

Anyway, the old crew scurried on board the new ship as the old one sank. Joining the Muslim countries are such stalwarts of human rights as China and Cuba. The only reason Mordor didn't make the list is that J.R.R. Tolkien forgot to have Sauron denounce the "Zionist entity" in "The Lord of the Rings."

Perhaps such glibness seems out of place, but it is hard to take the complaints of some of these women-oppressing, homosexual-executing, free-speech-banning countries seriously. Just last week, the Arab League, which constantly condemns Israeli "genocide," welcomed Sudan President Omar Hassan Ahmed Bashir to its summit. It was intended as a way to chastise the International Criminal Court for bothering to indict the Butcher of Darfur when it could be putting Jews in the dock.

At the UNHRC, Israel's defensive war against Gaza was treated as history's greatest crime, while the deaths of 16,000 Somalis at the hands of invading Ethiopians were ignored. Since 2006, the council has opted to shut down investigations of Congo, Cuba, Liberia and Belarus. The agency hasn't even been a speed bump on Zimbabwe's descent into hell. It passed a nonbinding, Pakistan-sponsored resolution condemning "defamation of religion" that 180 groups from around the world cautioned could help Islamic theocracies crush dissenters in the name of protecting Islam from insult. And it has condemned Israel more than it has condemned all other U.N. member countries combined.

The Obama administration, which passionately believes in the U.N. as a force for good, thinks it can change the council simply by being on it. "We have a record of abject failure from having stayed out. We've been out for the duration, and it has not gotten better. It's arguably gotten worse," Susan Rice, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N., told Politico. "We are much better placed to be fighting for the principles we believe in ... by leading and lending our voice from within."

But such thinking is only possible if you think the U.N. is a democratic, deliberative body. It isn't. Some of the member nations are liberal democracies. Some are backward, cruel regimes with well-coiffed front men who only do their masters' bidding. Valuing villains as equal to democrats is a recipe for moral rot.

No doubt the U.S. will "succeed" in tempering the UNHRC's actions. But such victories will pale in comparison with the unearned validation we grant the council by our participation.

Copyright © 2009 Salem Web Network. All Rights Reserved.

Republicans On The "Other Side"

Republicans are realizing what it's like to be on the "other side" of the power game. Unfortunately, it is a game. One party manages to capture the White House, or the Congress (or both), and for just awhile, they swagger in their invincibility. But eventually, the dice land on the other side, and those who were in power now feel the sting of public rejection and the every-present Monday-morning-quarterbacking.

The sad thing is, for a huge part of our country's history, the democrats have been in the positions of power. What's funny about that is they should have been able to solve all our problems, since they always get back into power by claiming if you only elect them and give them a majority, they will fix everything nice as pie. So what do they do all that time they have the reigns in hand? They do what they always do -- they pass more laws, spend more money, take away more freedoms, and try to insure that the majority of the people become dependent upon them for everything in their life. Then when election time rolls around, they go out and remind everybody how dependent they are upon the benevolence of the government.

I'm angry about the media (or what passes for the media these days.) It used to be a reporter "reported" the news -- didn't try to "shape" the news. Commentators were left to give their opinions. Reporters were supposed to give ALL the facts. I don't see that happening very much anymore. When the same dishonest congressmen and senators can stay in office, year after year, stealing from the public, and the media allows them a pass, you know somebody's not doing the job they are supposed to do.

I'm tired of hearing the previous administration blamed for all the problems with the economy because anybody who has been alive and breathing knows that the over-inflated housing market is responsible for the majority of the financial problems. And guess who was instrumental in making SURE the housing market became as flimsy as a paper airplane? Why our illustrious democrat representative who is chairman of the Banking Committee, and a democrat senator, who took more campaign contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac than any other politician, that's who. The American public should be given the facts about this unholy group every day until they understand that the very people who did this to us, are now in charge of "saving" us -- from THEM!!

If you are angry about all this too, jump in an say so. You'll feel better for it!