The proper role of government in health care? Try "none" on for size

Susan Nielsen from The Oregonian has been writing some rather absurd pieces as of late and cannot formulate an argument too well.  Not to say that I am any better, but have disagreed with much of what she has had to say as of late.  The following is in response to her latest editorial "Birth-control fight shows folly of federal mandates."

Susan Nielsen makes some rather broad assumptions (“Birth-control fight shows folly of federal mandates”), and she is largely incorrect.  Concluding the piece she writes that the “mandate debate is one [President Obama] can't and shouldn't win,” yet Ms. Nielsen's writing over the last weeks demonstrates that she is firmly straddling the fence on this issue, having done an about-face on the practicality of the president's mandates, yet firmly ensconced within the left-liberal crowd and the pseudo-morality they peddle to the American public.  She is but 50% correct:  Dr. Obama can indeed win this debate, yet Ms. Nielsen is right when she says he should not.

First, she says the “Catholic bishops may be wrong about birth control.”  The bishops are correct in their position and “about the rest of this month's fight.”  Ms. Nielsen may not agree—and that is her right—yet to say the bishops, relying on 2,000 years of tradition (at the very least), are wrong, and that her view—extant since the ancient days of the radical 1960s—is correct, smarts just a hair.

Next, she claims the debate is “unpalatable” because Catholics condemn contraception and that Republicans are “bloviating about religious liberty.”  Far from bloviating, religious liberty is exactly what this debate centers upon, whether Ms. Nielsen likes it or not.  The First Amendment explicitly forbids the Congress—the law-making branch of the federal government—from making law “respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”  The Constitution designed the federal government to be limited in its scope, and not meddle in the affairs of the people or their chosen religion.

Granted, Ms. Nielsen is simply parroting the left-liberal talking points in order to discredit the genuine argument of traditionalists and conservatives alike.  The Left believes that it knows best and entrusts government to do its bidding (as long as it has control of the institution).  While Ms. Nielsen may think it wise for President Obama “to change the conversation,” the hope is likely for a semantic change rather than a substantive one.  For this brand of liberalism relies heavily on emotion and feelings rather than thought and reflection.

She asserts that birth control “is indeed a basic part of good health care.”  By what measure?  Her own?  How about stop with this and other such euphemistic language and show some courage?  It is quite clear that Ms. Nielsen believes in that induced abortion is some sort of human right.  A sober look at the situation would show that it is quite the opposite.  We are unable to ask the 50 million-plus innocent human lives taken since Roe v. Wade if they believe their right to life or liberty has been exercised properly, but there is no denying that those rights were stripped entirely.

Finally, Ms. Nielsen mentions state-run “coordinated care organizations” and a “regulated online marketplace.”  These are precisely the problems with health care in this country in the first place.  The government needs to get out of the game altogether—nationally and at the state-level.  When the government interferes with pricing—in this case with more regulation—it destroys the marketplace and drives costs perpetually upward, completely phasing-out many folks of modest means from the insurance markets and, as a result, decent health care.

But, they say, if we centralize health care, it would be “affordable?”  Perhaps, to the end user, but the already over-taxed public would have to pick up this burden unless the federal government inflates its way to “affordability.”  Neither approach is sensible or wise.  Rather, it is disastrous for both the nation and its people.

Why not deflate the cost of health care and health insurance by eliminating government and its mandates from the industry entirely?  Poor people would still get care, the middle class could afford to choose insurance that meets its needs without having programs foisted upon them by commissars in Salem or Washington, and the 1% would be able to spend its dollars wisely and with more discretion to create the jobs Ms. Nielsen advocates for.

Ms. Nielsen's ideas are not “promising” as she would like us to believe.  Her idea of the “proper federal role” is incorrect.  That is not simply my opinion, but indisputable based on the American tradition and our Constitution, something she chooses to ignore.

Obama's mandate?

In response to Oregonian columnist Susan Nielsen's latest column, "Contraception and religion: Birth-control mandate full of unpleasant side effects."

I have more thoughts on this issue, as it is a nonsensical one in many ways.  Obama's actions here are purely unconstitutional.  Whether one believes as the Catholic Church does, is another issue entirely.

I sent the following to the Editors of The Oregonian after reading the aforementioned tripe this afternoon.  I welcome any comments, yet note that the debate is not about Church doctrine, but rather the Constitutionality of the latest brand of socialism to be foisted upon the as-of-late passive American public.

Pardon me if I object to Susan Nielsen's spurious claim that “Obama had logic and morality on his side” in the president's latest decree.  He had neither.

Furthermore, the insane political environment she alludes to has nothing to do with “women's health,” but has everything to do with religious liberty—a core principle of this republic.

It is neither logical, moral, or legal for a president of the United States to foist such personal beliefs upon the country.  In short, it is the Congress that makes laws, the president is to enforce them.

At hand is a president whose actions appear to be that of an ancient king rather than the Constitutionally-defined and limited duties he is bound to as the office-holder.

Simply, the First Amendment states that “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.”  Where does the president or Ms. Nielsen get the idea that it is any concern of the Executive Branch to interfere with the religious liberty of a voluntary organization—in this case the Catholic Church, of which no one is compelled to belong or follow its rules unless one chooses?

Nevertheless, if people do choose to join the Church or follow its teaching, why now is it the federal government's place to compromise teachings and a message that have existed for 2,000 years and shaped Western Civilization as we know it for a yet ever-dynamic social program—I shudder to think it is moral in any way—handed down to a passive public by commissars within the Washington Beltway establishment?

Frankly, one is not legally required to receive the care of specifically-Catholic hospitals, nor is one compelled to be employed by or educated by any other Church institution.  This is the matter of choice that should be discussed, not the take-it-or-perish approach considered wise by the sociopaths in government and their surrogates in the media.

In this case, Mr. Obama's arrogance and Ms. Nielsen's ignorance are both affronts to logic and morality.

Oregon should nullify No Child Left Behind

I tend to disagree with the Editorial Board's stance on education reform, for I believe government's influence in education must wane, not wax.  Yet calling for “more clarity and simplicity” is on the right track.

First, the State of Oregon must push back against the federal government.  Oregonians—not overlords in Washington, D.C.—should be trusted to run state affairs.

Along these lines, Oregon's intent for a No Child Left Behind waiver is a good idea, yet it can go much further.  The real play is for Oregon to nullify NCLB as unconstitutional and invalid.  Nullifying a patently unconstitutional law—look to the 10th Amendment for guidance—will send a message to the nation that Oregonians stand for freedom, not subservience.

Furthermore, what is the sense for Oregon to be bound by such federal laws that affect our children in a profoundly negative manner?  Money...And for whom or what?

The federal largess attached to education is simply a means for D.C.'s bureaucratic monstrosity to keep pesky states subservient.  Sounds more like totalitarianism rather than the principle of Liberty that Americans are supposed to champion.

This state may have to find alternative and creative means to finance schools in the meantime, yet nullification will be a courageous act and Oregon will set the tone for states—rather than commissars in the nation's capitol—to start managing their own affairs.

Ron Paul: The Choice for Liberty in 2012

What is America?  It is a nation born of tradition and the pursuit of liberty.  Out of the Revolution came a separation from Great Britain and the tyrant King George III, then the Constitution.  The challenge is to restore these traditions in our next presidential election.  The choice is Ron Paul.

President Obama called the Constitution “an imperfect document,” was chastised for it, yet it is probably true, for it was written by imperfect men.  Whatever the reality, it does not give the President—or any other American—the license to ignore the Constitution.  If not for the Constitution, America is but a blind amalgamation of political boundaries.  If satisfaction is not met in this regard, there are indeed measures by which to change or amend the document, something that has only been done 27 times during the history of the American republic.  There are some reasons for this, including: the reality that the system is fairly good in the first place; that Congress tends to be an institutional coward that lacks salt, its members favoring re-election over principled governance.

While the document may reflect “some deep flaws,” as Obama maintains, this president, his judgment fogged by the cloud of meliorism, cannot and should not be trusted to “fix” what he thinks is wrong, especially without adhering to the processes codified in law.  The simple belief that a hasty approach to lawmaking without the consent of a “dysfunctional Congress” is the danger inherent with this president.

Ron Paul has another tact entirely.  He has a deep love for America, her traditions, and her Constitution, flawed as the document may perhaps be.  Dr. Paul believes in governing by the founding principles of the American republic, for the traditions and adherence to the principle of Liberty once allowed for a thriving national character.  The American Revolution began as the greatest political experiment in history, yet the country has fallen away from the maintenance and cultivation of liberty as the paramount cause of this nation.  Ron Paul has not.

Often derided by the War Party on his foreign policy positions and erroneously characterized as an “isolationist,” Ron Paul stands with the great Americans from history: Nanos gigantium humeris insidentes.  In our nascent republic, Presidents argued for a strong national defense, rather than a marauding global offense, just as Ron Paul does today.

George Washington declared that it is America's “true policy to steer clear of entangling alliances with any portion of the foreign world.” Such alliances and guarantees for war on behalf of other Continental powers led to the onset of World War I.  Without the dubious British war-guarantee to Poland, World War II may not have evolved into a worldwide affair in the first place.  Thus, diplomacy without regard to national sovereignty has led to colossal missteps for world powers.

One job of the President of the United States is to be the nation's chief diplomat.  Diplomacy has certainly known many faces, but Thomas Jefferson figured “Commerce with all nations, Alliances with none should be our motto.”  These statements of policy from both Washington and Jefferson were not off-the-cuff, either.  These men and others of the Revolutionary period were a scholarly and reflective bunch with a keen grasp of world history.

Today, Barack Obama may be scholarly, but he is reflexive rather than reflective.  Ron Paul is the antithesis of President Obama in demeanor.

There is a place for the Constitution, for at the very least, the text itself insures a modicum of order and affirms liberty in the face of meddling state intervention within the lives of citizens.  In essence, the Constitution buttresses freedom and liberty against the forces of anarchism and authoritarianism.  It was written as a document to preserve liberty.  Ron Paul believes this.  It is not apparent that this is a particular concern of Barack Obama's.

Dr. Paul and others within movements such as the Tea Party, believing in the legitimacy of the Constitution as rule of law, are accused of such nonsense as the “Repealing of the 20th Century.”  The notion that Big Government programs established outside the scope of the Constitution—such as Medicare, Social Security, the alphabet soup of organizations began under FDR and the New Deal, and now Obamacare—are spendthrift and significantly contribute to an inevitable U.S. bankruptcy lest the path change, is pure apostasy to these statists.

The programs are largely well-intended, but potential results poorly considered.  Human progress in this regard is not limitless.  Such radical beliefs tend to lead to authoritarian and totalitarian states.

Yet the radicals themselves say an authoritarian regime would be ushered in if the behemoth federal programs were to disappear and a constitutionalist like Ron Paul were to become president.  But doesn't a smaller government with more limitations put upon the government class sound like a return to more expansive liberty?  Large federal programs that tack on cost to the current $15 trillion-plus debt—that citizens are coerced into joining—sounds more like the authoritarianism they talk about.

Now ensconced are a War Party and a Party of Government.  While the GOP and the Dems may not get along so well, these parties of War and Government practice bipartisanship quite famously.  Power is the prime motivator, not principle.  Ron Paul exists outside of this realm.

While the neoconservative push is to act as a “moral force of good” in the world by fomenting global war, Ron Paul holds the words of Thomas Jefferson dear: “I hope our wisdom will grow with our power and teach us that the less we use our power the greater it will be.”  This is the prudent and moral position.

War should be reserved as a defensive act.  The War Party would therefore not exist to the degree it does in this age, while the Party of Government would have at least one leg cut out from under it.  Far from something to be worried about, Americans should rejoice with such a turn in policy.  This is Ron Paul's aim:  for a steadfast defense at home rather than a haphazard offense abroad.

For the “means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home,” according to James Madison.  A constant state of war is both a threat to freedom and liberty on the personal level while also a risk to national sovereignty, having to sort out all the entangling alliances Washington warned of.

As the American government prosecutes undeclared war-like missions abroad, her citizens face eroding liberty on the homefront.  Ron Paul's firm opposition to one of the most visible affronts to personal liberty—the PATRIOT Act—is well documented.

Yet, says the neoconservative, what good is liberty when it cannot be practiced because one will be dead (without benevolent interventions)?  Comes the reality:  it is nanny-state war-mongering at its finest and their “help” to keep us “safe” only serves to erode liberty to say nothing of a less desirable life.

Belief in liberty is patriotism.  For it was the American patriot, Virginia's Patrick Henry, who declared, “Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!”  Ron Paul is a patriot with a zeal for liberty, the likes of which is rarely seen, and is certainly not seen amongst the other candidates of the Republican Primaries or our sitting president.

Where the War Party is dismissive of Ron Paul's foreign policy, the Party of Government actively encourages state control of institutions and behavior in order to create a better society going forth.  They cling to the notion that Government is a better steward of a life than the individual is.  While the sentiment is real and heartfelt, this attitude and subsequent policies have failed or are failing everywhere they have been put in place.  On the other hand, when an exercise in liberty has existed in this world's history—the United States is the prime or only example—liberty has flourished, however briefly, before being co-opted by larger statist claims to power.

The 20th Century English theologian and writer C.S. Lewis noted that “of all tyrannies, a tyranny exercised 'for the good of its victims' may be the most oppressive.”  The road to hell, as they say, is paved with good intentions.  And perhaps that is why, when faced with a vote in the United States, the average voter will pick between “the better of two evils.”  In 2012, however, the choice is clear: Ron Paul and liberty over the status quo.

Yet, Ron Paul cannot save the world or even save the country by himself—we'll leave that to Chuck Norris or to one of Stan Lee's creations—but as president, Paul's ideas and dedication to constitutional principles will shine like a beacon to the rest of the free world.  A Paul presidency, while embracing liberty, will encourage those who believe in the principles of the Constitution to be heard.  It will provide some redemption to the students—current and former—who have learned about the history and traditions of our country, but who have not seen such positive traditions outwardly practiced in their lifetimes.

Barack Obama promised hope and change.  Ron Paul is not making such foolish, open-ended promises which can only be measured by warm-fuzzies or by a wet-finger in the wind.  That hackneyed notion of “Change” ushered one erstwhile bartender and part-time thespian, Woody Boyd, into Boston City Hall some years back.  'Twas hardly an intellectual movement or dedicated to principles of any kind.  Fantasy indeed.

Ron Paul's record of standing with liberty speaks for itself.  He is a 12-term congressman, serving in the House of Representatives on-and-off since 1976.  Today, on the other hand, sits a president who does not demonstrate that he holds liberty in high regard.  There is now a pool of largely neoconservative and progressive candidates in the Republican Primaries—though trying to claim conservatism as it is the apparent litmus test for the nomination—where war-mongering is of utmost importance and personal liberties are disregarded in favor of the claim of safety and protection.

Ron Paul is a fine American who believes in a great America, yet that greatness is only possible if the country becomes again an earnest practitioner of liberty.  No other candidate can hold up to the most American of standards better than Dr. Paul.

The choice is apparent.  The challenge, however, is for Republicans to vote for Ron Paul in their state primaries or caucuses and for independents and Democrats to change their party registrations and do the same.

Peaceful by Someone's Definition: Occupy Movement

The Occupy Wall Street crowd and its disciples set up camps across America within our cities claiming to be peaceful protesters representing the 99 per cent.  Problematically, much of the 99 per cent—intended to be among the represented—are disinterested in the movement and what it has devolved into.  While the Occupy cause started out as an ostensibly non-violent one, it was never peaceful.

A myopic view of peace defines it as the cessation of violence, yet the meaning runs much deeper.  Mutual harmony amongst people and public order both expand the definition.

Reflect: Agitation in the streets, alleged sexual assaults, reports of a rampant illicit drug trade, human waste in open-air buckets.  Peaceful, one asks?

Came the urban terrorism in Oakland.  First, a former Marine wounded in a skirmish.  The Port of Oakland barricaded by chain link and forced to shut down.  Banks vandalized.  Chaos ensued.

What becomes of such peace?  A renunciation by the amorphous Occupy leadership of these rogue “anarchists.”  Eighteen percent of Oakland Unified's teaching force skipped school with substitutes largely unavailable.  Mayor Quan is still encouraging the misplaced rage.

Is this what Occupy is to become?  In Portland, where this writer had the misfortune of observing the Occupy encampment earlier this week, Lownsdale and Chapman Squares no longer appear to be a part of the City of Roses, but a Third World enclave.  Is our destiny to become Ciudad Terra Puerta?

Is living, nay existing, angstroms apart from each other in a squalid tent city a peaceful existence?  What of hectoring the Portland Police—who came out with a formal repudiation of Occupy Portland on Thursday—or the stifling of downtown business and tourism?  This now stands as a peaceful approach in the Portland of Sam Adams.

Clearly, the sentiment of Occupiers is understood by much of that 99 per cent.  Our country is in a bad place.  Yet the camps offer no solutions.  Grousing for months at a time without a message of any cohesion begins to fall on deaf ears.

The banks and Wall Street may be at fault for much of our mess, but are they to blame?  These institutions were simply playing the game that presidential administrations from Clinton through Obama had set up with a complicit Congress.

Economic policy of the united States has paid lip-service to the American worker during this time.  Within this current century, over fifty-thousand manufacturing plants and factories have shuttered and with it, the 6 million jobs, the towns, and the cities dependent upon them.  The Chinese have picked up this slack.

This debasement of the American economy is more devastating than war or financial shenanigans on Wall Street.  It is time the Occupation realize that many of our politicians—democratically elected—are to blame.  Circle the wagons and move toward substantive political solutions, rather than embracing the effects of mob psychology.

The call is to elect candidates who put America and her jobs, her cities, towns, and states first.  Vote candidates encouraging trade and tax policy which repatriates capital into the only Free Trade Zone our founders envisioned:  The one defined by the borders of the United States of America.

The specific hope and particular change this country needs is in how its citizens think and act.  Complaining about the symptoms of our crisis rather than attacking its source will lead to a long stalemate.  Our country cannot afford such a path, for our crisis will turn swiftly from immediate to existential.

If this occurs, peace may become but a relic within this republic.

Radicalism in Portland: A conflagration forthcoming?

Though Mayor Sam Adams and Commissioner Amanda Fritz advocated for—and the Portland City Council subsequently created—the Office of Equity and Human Rights, wherefore the need? As a principle, equity is fine, yet by legislating equal outcomes rather than equal opportunity, this melioristic fancy of theirs will simply serve as another protracted disappointment, wasting both time and treasure along the way.

Three scant years ago in the United States, “change” became the coin of the realm. Portland City Commissioners, ideological disciples of the 2008 movement, latched on to this and ran. Is such a tact so prudent? Twentieth Century political theorist Russell Kirk cautioned that “hasty innovation may be a devouring conflagration, rather than a torch of progress.”

Hasty and far from principled, the five are a radical bunch. As such, and again to borrow from Kirk, the radical believes: “that education, positive legislation, and alteration of environment can produce men like gods; they deny that humanity has a natural proclivity toward violence and sin.” City Hall has long been devoid of leadership which can combat such efforts—“good-hearted efforts,” as Adams and Fritz say—which lead exactly nowhere.

Well-intentioned though the commissioners may be, perfect human beings and perfect societies cannot be legislated or planned into existence.

A human being is, by his or her mere nature, flawed—imperfect. A society is, by 18th Century Irish statesman Edmund Burke's description, “joined in perpetuity by a moral bond among the dead, the living, and those yet to be born.” Imperfect souls thus constitute an imperfect society, yet the Council concerns itself with legislation for Portland to become a perfect city, paying no mind to maintaining that moral bond of which a society requires.

In this regard, scattershot legislation and the latest “livability” standards will either lead to public backlash or an apathetic public will relent to the power-hungry on Fourth Avenue and go along for the bumpy ride. Disappointment either way.

The new office is likely to achieve exactly the opposite of its stated intentions. One class of people is more apt to become favored over another, only it will be a class that the Council and its bureaucrats intend it to be. The program is iniquitous at its core.

On the other hand, it is disingenuous to claim that unabated freedom and a laissez-faire marketplace can or will provide for all of the needs of the public at large. Leaders and true statesmen are called for. Presently, there is a void of leadership at City Hall, no matter the amount of Tweets, press releases, or photo opportunities emanating from within.

An abstraction such as this latest expansion of city government only serves to enlarge an already bloated bureaucracy and de-emphasize leadership, while encouraging City Hall's wanton pursuit of power.

This nation already recognizes equality before courts of law, so the Council's latest adventure is simply unnecessary duplication. Being created equal, and having equal standing under law, does not dictate that the equality of condition follows, yet this is the ultimate goal of the Council. Mandating and regulating equal outcomes will ultimately translate into an equality of apathy and subservience.

Do Portlanders want to be bound by the power wielded by an oligarchical Council?

Consider moderation. Plato noted that it “consists in an indifference about little things and in a prudent and well-proportioned zeal about things of importance.” The Council inhabits the negative space around this concept: zealous over little things while indifferent about the important ones.

Where does this all lead? As for the hasty innovation of the “good-hearted” Council—its constituent members largely free of principle, discipline, and moderation—one may want to note the approaching seven score anniversary of the bovine misstep in Mrs. O'Leary's Chicago barn.

[The writer is a descendent of Massachusetts O'Learys.]