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The editorial in today’s Denver Post laments some state legislators’ hesitation to submit to federal requirements in order to obtain money to implement the Affordable Care Act. The Post headline declares “ It’s foolish to stall federal aid.”
I will tell what is really foolish: A system of federal government that takes money from individuals throughout the country, takes a cut off the top (you know, for “expenses”), then dangles some of that money in front of states that must agree to jump through whatever ridiculous hoops the policy makers in the District of Columbia have deemed necessary in order for the state to get back a small portion of the money taken from it when the process began.
Lewis Carroll would have had a hard time imagining such absurdity.
“Federal aid” is Newspeak. It is no “aid” to get back your own money. “Federal aid” is simply extortion. The feds say they’ll return some of the state’s money if the state does what it is “asked” to do. Organized crime figures say they will let you keep your business and your knee caps if you do what you are “asked” to do.
It’s an offer we can’t refuse.
Luckily, legislators like Rep. Jim Kerr, who is quoted in the Post editorial, are at least mulling it over before accepting the offer.
The Post goes on to say that state legislators are entitled to their opinion about Obamacare but “they also need to accept the reality that it’s the law of the land.”
Applying that misguided logic, the Post would tell a battered spouse that she should just accept the reality that she is in an abusive relationship. You will only make it worse if you resist, right? Accept the abuse. It is the reality.
No. No more.
It is time for Colorado, and other states that are tired of submissively accepting unlawful federal expansion of power, to stand up to the unlawful usurpation of power exercised by the federal government. It is time to assert the Tenth Amendment. It is time to resurrect these dead letters:
The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.
There is no constitutional authority for the feds to tell any state that it must implement a system to facilitate the mandatory purchase of a private product. If the United States Supreme Court says otherwise, that there is such authority within the commerce clause, they might as well say that the sun is the moon and that black is white. It will be just as true.
It is time to listen to Thomas Jefferson, who, in the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798, wrote:
… where powers are assumed [by the federal government] which have not been delegated [to it by the Constitution], a nullification of the act is the rightful remedy: that every State has a natural right in cases not within the compact, (casus non fœderis) to nullify of their own authority all assumptions of power by others within their limits
Nullify now.
by David K. Williams, Jr.
A.
One of my adamantly “progressive” Facebook friends recently said opposing universal health care is “unchristian.” It is not an uncommon charge.
The accusation, however, shows both a fundamental misunderstanding of economics and Christianity. The economic fallacy is that universal health care will result in universally better health care. This assumption is belied by recorded history. That, however, has been widely explained. This post is not about the economics.
This post is about Christianity. Jesus’ summed up his teachings in Matthew 22:36 – 40. He was asked by a Pharisee “what is the greatest commandment in the law?” Jesus replied:
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”
Consider Jesus’ answer the Cliff’s Notes on all of Christianity. In sum, Jesus said to be Christian is to “love God” and “love your neighbor.”
This is where progressives get lost. They mistake Jesus’ command for us to “love our neighbor” with a command to make OTHERS love their neighbor. See, progressives want to take other peoples’ money – via forcible taxation – and give it to their neighbor. That’s not what Jesus said.
In short, Christianity is about helping others voluntarily. It is about charity. Jesus said you should help others – and if you do not, you have to live with it and the consequences.
Progressivism is the opposite. Progressivism – indeed, all statism – is brute force, nothing else. Progressivism says that, by government dictate, some of us must help others – or go to jail.
The two could not be more different.
I’ll make a final comparison: Walking next door and giving your neighbor in need some of your bread is Christian. Walking across the street, taking bread out of the window, and then giving it to your neighbor in need is progressivism. They are opposites. One is love. The other theft.
B.
Can a case be made that Christians are not voluntarily loving their neighbor, as Jesus commanded? Absolutely. The answer, however, is not to abandon Christianity and institute force to make Christians love their neighbor.
How absurd is that notion? You will love your neighbor or we will MAKE you! It is nonsense.
George Washington was right when he said, “government is not reason; it is not eloquent; it is force.” One might add that “government is not charity; it is not love; it is force.”
The progressives, therefore, make a fundamental, and crucial error: They equate love with force. They equate compassion with force. They equate charity with force.
They might as well equate war with peace, day with night or lies with truth.
In fact, they do.
God is love. Government is force. Using one in the name of the other is not only futile, it is destructive.
The State of Colorado spent $223 million in 2004 on a computer system to streamline the Medicaid and foodstamp programs in the state. It did not work.
So the State of Colorado spent another $44 million with Deloitte to consult on how to fix it. It still does not work. (See the Denver Post article “ Feds target delays in aid.“) So the feds are coming in to audit. According to the Post:
In announcing the review to state officials, federal Medicaid managers said one point of focus would be pharmacy-based systems that tell dispensaries whether a client seeking drugs qualifies for aid. In the summer of 2009, 9-year-old Zumante Lucero died after a pharmacy allegedly wouldn’t fill his asthma prescription despite proof the family qualified for Medicaid help.
And yet compassionate, statist, “progressives” think it is benevolent to force a similar, government run system on all of us via Obamacare.
George Miller, Democratic Representative from California, had this to say on the House floor in defense of Obamacare and against the House vote to repeal it:
Has anybody, any family in America, any single mother, any spouse, any child, any grandparent, met a more bureaucratic system than the American health care system? There is no more bureaucratic system!
…
Everyone has been run around the block by their insurance company, it’s something they all share. It’s almost the problems they share with their cable company. Not quite, it’s not as dramatic here. Because this is life and death, this is the security of your family, this is whether or not you can change jobs, this is whether or not your children will be protected, this is whether or not your parents will be able to afford the prescription drugs. Because that is what this legislation enables and gives the freedoms to American families to have. Repeal, we’d go back into the clutches of these bureaucrats spread across the world.
…
Nobody wants to go back there, ladies and gentlemen. They’ve been there for 50 years and health care costs have gone up faster than any other segment in our economy. Faster than anything you can imagine. Faster than a speeding rocket, faster than a speeding airplane, faster than Superman. Health care costs have gone up because of the insurance bureaucracies.
This may be one of the most asinine statements made in D.C. Ever. I know that is a high bar, but Rep. Miller managed to clear it. Here is how:
1. He rails against the private insurance bureaucracy. He fails to recognize that the private insurance bureaucracy is the product of massive government regulation and mandates.
2. Obamacare forces people to buy private insurance, the same system he lambastes. He therefore denounces the very system that he wants to force people into.
The mind boggles.
In today’s Denver Post:
Social workers across the state say that attempts to fix the long-troubled Colorado Benefits Management System — a database that processes applications for public assistance like Medicaid, food stamps and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families — are actually making the system worse.
…
Instituted in 2004 under then-Gov. Bill Owens, the CBMS, with an initial cost of $223 million, has a long history of communications problems, crashes and failures — including overpayments and underpayments to recipients.
And somehow the “progressive” statists that want to force all of America into another government run program claim to be “compassionate.”
Lewis Carroll would not dare be so absurd.
According to the Associated Press:
Emergency rooms, the only choice for patients who can’t find care elsewhere, might grow even more crowded with longer wait times under the nation’s new health law.
And it is the “compassionate” people that support this nonsense.
In today’s world, the “compassionate” hurt the poor. The “caring” do more harm than good. The “greedy” hire people and provide jobs. The “selfish” produce value and increase the overall quality of life.
We really are living in Orwellian times.
Army investigators at Arlington National Cemetery have found more than 100 unmarked graves, scores of grave sites with headstones that are not recorded on cemetery maps, and at least four burial urns that had been unearthed and dumped in an area where excess grave dirt is kept.
The investigators found that these and other blunders were the result of a “dysfunctional” and chaotic management system at the cemetery, which was poisoned by bitterness among top supervisors and hobbled by antiquated record-keeping.
And somehow it is the “compassionate” progressives that want these same government bureaucrats and political appointees to run health care.
The sanctimonious self-righteousness of the statists is completely misplaced and dangerous.
Here is an email from Ralph Nader criticizing the Democrats on the passing of Obamacare. I think it appropriate to foment this discontent from the Progressive statists.
================
What do these people and organizations have in common?
Michael Moore
MoveOn
John Conyers
The Nation
Arianna Huffington
Daily Kos
Dennis Kucinich
AFL-CIO
What do they have in common?
They all put the demands of the Democratic Party ahead of the needs of the American people.
They all knew that the health care bill that just passed into law is a bad bill.
An insurance industry bailout.
But they all said – can’t let the Democrats lose this one.
They all said – it doesn’t matter what’s in the health care bill.
Just as long as we pass something.
But of course, it does matter.
That’s why Single Payer Action stood without compromise – against the Democrats’ bailout bill.
And for single payer.
That’s why we will keep exposing, agitating, and organizing for single payer.
District by district, neighborhood by neighborhood.
Until we prevail.
And we will prevail.
Why?
Because we will never put the interests of any political party ahead of the interests of the American people.
We will push aside the corrupt Democrats.
And build an uncompromising movement for single payer from the grassroots up.
To help us build, please donate now – whatever you can.
And if you donate $100 or more, we’ll send you a copy of In the Shadow of Power – this poignant and haunting collection of photographs of the other Washington, D.C. – with an introduction by Ralph Nader.
And we’ll send you a copy of In Pursuit of Justice – the classic collection of columns by Ralph Nader.
Both signed by Ralph Nader.
So, donate now – whatever you can.
And stand with us.
Against the insurance industry.
Against the Democrats and Republicans.
For single payer – health care for all, everybody in, nobody out.
Let’s get ‘er done.
Onward to single payer.
Russell Mokhiber
PS. Remember, only three days left on this special two book offer.
Offer ends 11:59 p.m. Wednesday, March 31, 2010.
So donate now.
Whatever you can afford.
And if you donate $100 or more, we’ll ship you In the Shadow of Power and In Pursuit of Justice.
Both signed by Ralph Nader.
Thank you for your ongoing support.
No retreat.
No surrender.
According to today’s edition of the Denver Post:
A Montbello mother says her 9-year-old son’s death from severe asthma could have been prevented had Denver Human Services resolved problems with his Medicaid pharmacy benefits.
Zuton Lucero said she called Human Services every three days for months last year when she was suddenly unable to get prescription drugs for her son, Zumante.
The boy’s health deteriorated without the medication, his doctor said, and he died at Children’s Hospital in July after losing consciousness at his house after an attack.
“I don’t want anyone else to be sitting where I’m sitting,” Lucero said.
Unfortunately, “compassionate” progressives want us ALL to be sitting there, Ms. Lucero.
They want the same government run system that neglected your little boy to take care of all of us.
And somehow those of us that don’t believe the government is the answer to all problems are the “callous” and “uncaring” ones.
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