JrL – “Free public education” isn’t really free, right? It costs money. Although health care is provided to certain groups, how far do you feel the government should go in providing these services for the rest of society (for reference, see the History of Socialized Medicine in America)? Especially since the uninsured already pay half of their health care costs (Economic Research on Direct-Purchase Health Insurance: New Models for Real Health Care Reform).

frankg – You’re welcome. Hijacked, indeed.

Floyd – Thanks for taking note!

Mike S – . . . and who should be providing us access to all these “rights”, huh? Where does a person’s responsibility begin? (rhetorical)

Paul – Some of the problems of the welfare state are noted in Richard Ebeling’s Christian Science Monitor article referenced in Political Paternalism, Big Government and the Welfare State. There was no secret about Obama’s political ideology.

Sharon – Exactly! For whatever reason, agency or the freedom to choose is not part of the public debate over health care. It appears that U.S. citizens are being forced to make a decision to be “all in” or not.

This rhetorical ploy rings hollow to me. I think about the poplulations in our country that have not been free — Native Americans, Blacks, Women.

I think about US Labor History and mine and steel mill owners at the turn of the 20th century. Their workers were just as enslaved by corrupt hiring and compensation practices as those in England, where workers were in perpetual debt to the company store, unable to leave.

It’s great to talk about freedom of potential except that education and opportunity are not freely distributed in our free country.

Make no mistake: I love our country and the freedoms it affords. I favor private ownership of property and a climate that is generally pro-business. But socialism in and of itself is not evil. There are, for instance, many faithful and successful latter-day saints who live in the so-called socialist countries of Europe, and they probably think of themselves as reasonably free.

There are several options:
1) The person pays for it themselves
2) The cost is shared between other people who currently have healthcare insurance by raising their premiums
3) The cost is paid for by the government, which basically means someone else pays for it through higher taxes.

If the argument is that there are people who can’t get insurance who want it because of some of the games insurance companies are currently paying for, then I am 100% for insurance reform. I agree completely with that.

If the goal is to make me pay higher taxes and/or insurance premiums so someone else has the “right” to healthcare, then the question is when the cost-shifting stops. When does the government decide that they can take my money because someone also has the “right” to housing or something else?

Other freely-elected governements the world over have chosen to expand health care coverage. That Obama wants to do this is not secret: it is part of the platform on which he campaigned and by which he was elected.

The government, despite Ronald Reagan’s protestations to the contrary is not necessarily the problem; the government exists because we allow it to exist, because we, the people, elect those government officials. We empower it.