Copenhagen

The Worst Ideas of the Decade

When the best you can say about a 10-year span is that Y2K was overblown and that at least our downturn wasn’t a Depression, you know it was hardly the best of times. We’re not particularly sorry to leave the Aughts behind. And if you need any more reminders of what makes this decade so worthy of finally ringing out, here’s a look back at some of the really, truly bad ideas that it inflicted upon us.  Read More…

Motivation

Obamaville

A welcome sign recently posted in front of a homeless camp in Colorado Springs, CO, says it all. Read More…

Democrats Ensure America Will No Longer Be the Last Best Hope of Earth

via: patriotpost.us

As the passage of the bill that will start the process of nationalizing health care in America becomes almost inevitable, so, too, the process of undoing America’s standing as The Last Best Hope of Earth will have begun.

That description of America was not, as more than a few Americans on the left believe, made by some right-wing chauvinist. It was made by President Abraham Lincoln in an address to Congress on Dec. 1, 1862.

The bigger the American government becomes, the more like other countries America becomes. Even a Democrat has to acknowledge the simple logic: America cannot at the same time be the last best hope of earth and increasingly similar to more and more countries.

Either America is unique, in which case it at least has the possibility of uniquely embodying hopes for mankind — or it is not unique, in which case it is by definition not capable of being the last best hope for humanity — certainly no more so than, let us say, Sweden or the Netherlands.

Indeed, President Obama acknowledged this in April, when asked by a European reporter if he believes in American exceptionalism. The president’s response: “I believe in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism.”

The president was honest. In his view, as in the view of today’s Democratic party, America is special only in the same way we parents regard our children as “special.” We all say it and we all believe it, but we know that it is meaningless except as an emotional expression of our love for our children. If every is child is equally special, none can be special, in fact. If every country is exceptional, then no country is exceptional, or at least no more so than any other.

With the largest expansion of the American government and state since the New Deal, the Democratic party — alone — is ending a key factor in America’s uniqueness and greatness: individualism, which is made possible only when there is limited government.

The formula here is not rocket science: The more the government/state does, the less the individual does.

America’s uniqueness and greatness has come from a number of sources, two of which are its moral and social value system, which is a unique combination of Enlightenment and Judeo-Christian values, and its emphasis on individual liberty and responsibility.

Just as the left has waged war on America’s Judeo-Christian roots, it has waged war on individual liberty and responsibility.

Hillel, the most important rabbi of the Talmud (which, alongside the Hebrew Bible, is Judaism’s most important book), summarized the human being’s obligations in these famous words: “If I am not for myself, who will be for me? But if I am only for myself, what am I? And if not now, when?”

What does this mean in the present context? It means that before anything else, the human being must first take care of himself. When people who are capable of taking care of themselves start relying on the state to do so, they can easily become morally inferior beings. When people who could take care of their family start relying on the state to do so, they can easily become morally inferior. And when people who could help take care of fellow citizens start relying on the state to do so, the morally coarsening process continues.

There has always been something profoundly ennobling about American individualism and self-reliance. Nothing in life is as rewarding as leading a responsible life in which one has not to depend on others for sustenance. Little, if anything, in life is as rewarding as successfully taking care of oneself, one’s family and one’s community. That is why America has always had more voluntary associations than any other country.

But as the state and government have gotten bigger, voluntary associations have been dying. Why help others if the state will do it? Indeed, as in Scandinavia, the attitude gradually becomes: why even help myself when the state will do it?

Barack Obama, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are right about one thing — they are indeed making history. But their legacy will not be what they think. They will be known as the people who led to the end of America as the last best hope of earth.

Lincoln weeps.

COPYRIGHT 2009 CREATORS.COM

Less Health Care for More Money: What’s the Catch?

via: patriotpost.us

The New York Times’ Nicholas Kristof recently wrote a column about John Brodniak of Oregon, who developed a cavernous hemangioma, causing him great pain as blood leaks into his brain.

According to Kristof, Brodniak can’t get medical help because we don’t have universal health care. Senators who vote against ObamaCare, Kristof said, are morally equivalent to someone who would walk past a man “writhing in pain on the sidewalk.”

In another article in the Times, William Yardley wrote about Melvin Tsosies — also of Oregon — who ended up with $200,000 in medical bills after having a heart attack.

As of March 2008, Yardley reported, Tsosies was waiting to find out if he would win the Oregon lottery for health insurance. But with 600,000 uninsured state residents and a “universal” health care program with only enough money to pay for about 24,000 of them, Tsosies is more likely to win a Powerball lottery.

How can this be happening? Oregon already has “universal health care”! (Probably just a coincidence, but isn’t Oregon also the only state with physician-assisted suicide?)

Once again forgetting about the existence of the Internet, the Times neglects to mention its own erstwhile enthusiasm for Oregon’s universal health care plan, introduced back in 1990.

Back then, the Times published an editorial titled “Oregon’s Brave Medical Experiment,” hailing this technocratic monstrosity as an example of “hardheaded compassion” designed to make “health coverage available to many more families.”

Ron Wyden — then a congressman from Oregon, now a U.S. senator at the forefront of pushing “universal health care” onto the nation — said: “This is a strong dramatic step toward universal access of health care.” He predicted, “this is going to be copied everywhere.”

No wonder Wyden is such an ardent proponent of national health care — it will force states that didn’t adopt these idiotic universal health care schemes to bail out the ones that did.

Liberals cite medical horror stories from the very states they once cheered for enacting universal health care in order to argue for a national health care plan that will wreck the entire nation’s medical care the same way liberal states already wrecked their own medical care.

Only Democrats could propose fixing one Bernie Madoff-style scam with an even bigger Bernie Madoff-style scam.

Maybe when national universal health care fails, we’ll be able to go international. Then interplanetary — then interstellar! Why should I pay for my gall bladder surgery when some Venusian could?

Eighty-five percent of Americans are happy with their health care, but Democrats have a plan to make it worse for more money. As a bonus, national health care will add trillions of dollars to the national debt, and your insurance rates will skyrocket.

Democrats are being utterly disingenuous to say that you won’t have to leave your current plan under national health care. Maybe, but it won’t be your choice: Your employer will be making that decision for you.

Recall that one of the big selling points of national health care is that it is supposed to reduce costs for American businesses. The only way national health care will make American companies “more competitive” is if they dump their employees into the public health care system.

It’s so weird! We expected X number of people to show up for health care and instead 75X showed up! Yeah, just like every other government program in the history of the world.

Ten years from now, we’ll be talking about cost overruns of $6 trillion — but by then, national health care will be an untouchable “third rail” of politics, just as Medicare is now. (Ironically, injuries sustained from actually touching the third rail won’t be covered under ObamaCare.)

As with Medicare, voters will be terrified to go back to even the wisp of a free market system we have now, afraid that they’ll never be able to get health insurance without the government providing it. Having been dragged unwillingly into the government plan, how will a 58-year-old be able to leave the public system and get insurance on the free market?

Speaking of which, how many of you are planning to retire on your Social Security benefits? Just you there, with the shopping cart full of cans?

The only solution will be for the government to keep running up gigantic deficits and raising taxes on “the rich,” which, in turn, will stifle job creation and economic growth in a phenomenon known to economists as “the Carter years.”

In addition to forcing Americans into dealing with surly government workers in order to obtain medical care, sooner or later, there’s no free lunch. (And if government X-rays are anything like the photos the DMV takes for your license, count me out. I don’t want my lungs looking like they had a bad hair day.)

Even if national health care puts the screws to doctors and pharmaceutical companies by reimbursing them below cost — so all future doctors will soon resemble DMV employees and no new drugs will ever be invented — the government is still going to have to cut services and pay for the system with massive tax hikes.

Which is exactly what happened with Oregon’s “Brave Medical Experiment.”

COPYRIGHT 2009 ANN COULTER DISTRIBUTED BY UNIVERSAL UCLICK

What Are President Obama’s Actual Objectives?

“He campaigned against private sector economic mismanagement, and the ‘harsh realities’ of global capitalism. He pledged during his campaign to end corruption in both the government, and the private sector. He campaigned against private sector economic mismanagement, and the ‘harsh realities’ of global capitalism. He pledged during his campaign to end corruption in both the government, and the private sector. After he took office, he claimed that he had ‘inherited’ the worst economic situation in his country’s recent history. And then, the new President sought to consolidate his power. Once privately-owned enterprises became government-owned and operated entities, and were ‘restructured’ so as to become, essentially, ‘workers’ cooperatives.’ Not surprisingly, unemployment remained persistently high, even as the new was implementing his much-celebrated ‘reform’ measures. And while private citizens had to struggle with the worsening economic conditions, government officials nonetheless continued to exert increasing levels of control over the nation’s wealth, and also continued to enrich themselves from that wealth, despite the suffering of ‘the governed.’ Does this seem like a description of the first 11 months of the Obama Presidency? What I’ve described here thus far portrays the conduct of President Obama and members of his Administration fairly succinctly. Yet, this is actually a description of the ascendency of Hugo Chavez, the once freely elected President and now rapidly-morphing-into-a-dictator of Venezuela.” –columnist Austin Hill

The Paradox of Partisanship

“Barack Obama and Democrats in Congress have drawn sharp ideological lines with Republicans — divisions understood best by each side’s strongest partisan supporters. For Democrats, Republicans are ’standing in the way’ of needed reforms. For Republicans, Democratic policies represent European-style government meddling. To many Republicans and conservatives, ‘bipartisanship’ in this type of environment is code for government doing even more. After a year of bailouts, czars, government takeovers, spending sprees and huge debt, many self-identified Republicans and conservative-to-moderate-leaning independents think more bipartisan success is not necessarily accomplishment or a positive outcome. So expect the paradox of partisanship to continue. While many will undoubtedly call for the machinery of Congress to operate smoothly, many important constituents will reward those who throw sand in the gears.” –columnist Gary Andres

Corrupting expectations

“Assume you are a scientist and have been given a major financial grant to prove that the mythical unicorn really did exist. You know that as long as you can demonstrate some progress in showing the unicorn might have existed, your financial grant will be renewed each year, provided some other scientist does not come out with substantial evidence that the unicorn could not have existed. Under such conditions, you would have a very strong incentive to disregard much of the evidence that the unicorn could not have existed and each year provide only the data that could demonstrate that the unicorn might have existed. You also would have a very strong incentive to attack any scientist who raised serious questions or provided evidence that the unicorn could not have existed. You even might go so far as to refer to them with the disparaging term ‘unicorn deniers’ and attempt to use your influence with other scientists who also are receiving grants dependent on the existence of the unicorn to try to prevent the unicorn deniers from publishing their findings in well-regarded scientific journals. The recently released e-mails (by whistleblowers or hackers, depending on your prejudice) between some of the best-known scientists behind global warming showed that they succumbed to the all-too-human tendency to protect their turfs and pocketbooks, despite the evidence.” –columnist Richard W. Rahn

Have We Stopped Trying to Make Good People?

It is, of course, good to be environmentally aware, to fight AIDS and breast cancer, and to oppose bigotry. But before training young people to be social activists, they must first learn character traits — truth telling, financial honesty, humility, honoring parents and, above all, self-control. Before learning to fight society, people need to fight their own nature. The world is filled with activists of all varieties who are loathsome individuals.

“The most important question any society must answer is: How will we make good people? That is the question Judeo-Christian values have grappled with. There are many and profound theological and practical differences between Judaism and Christianity. But in the American incarnation of Judeo-Christian values — and America is really the one civilization that developed an amalgamation of Jewish and Christian values — the emphasis has been on individual character. One cannot make a good society if one does not begin with the arduous task of making good individuals. Both Judaism and Christianity begin with the premise that man is not basically good and therefore regard man’s nature as the root of cause of evil. … When society blames evil on forces outside the individual rather than on the individuals who perpetrate evil, society will work to change those forces rather than work to improve the character of individuals. That is a key to understanding why the left constantly attempts to radically change society — how else make a better world? … There is no federal budget, no Senate or House bill, no social policy, no health care fix that can do as much good as a society that is filled with decent people.” –columnist Dennis Prager