Health Care Trojan Horse (Episode 35)
Via Maggies Farm, Dr. Melissa Clouthier:
y biggest concern with Government Run health care is that the government will run it and run you. That is, your life will be controlled from cradle to grave. You will eat a certain way"¦or else. You will do certain things"¦or else. And the government will have every motivation to force you down a path.
Ultimately, this is a civil liberties issue. Some people say that not having health care for all is shameful in such a wealthy country. Shameful is the notion of a bureaucrat deciding whether you live or die based on the metrics of a chart. That's shameful. And that would be our future. It is a future I don't want to see.
Just look at the big government, totalitarian groups that are for this mess. It should give you an idea of what you'd have to look forward to in the future.
Yep. It is still amazing to me that the National Organization for Women, who have built 80% of their history on "Keep the government out of my body" is a huge supporter of national health care.
TJIC described the problem well:
The art of socializing everything under the sun, in four steps:
- For no reason at all, have the taxpayers deal with situation X.
- Declare that people who create situation X are imposing a negative externality on others.
- Tax and spend even more on cleaning up mess X, and make it illegal to create situation X, or put high taxes on X.
- Create winners and losers. Winners (those collecting tax dollars to clean up mess X) donate to politicians to keep the gravy flowing. Losers (those paying taxes and getting penalized) donate to politicians to lighten the yoke.
One example of application of this approach:
Old school:
- Some people overeat and get fat. Some of these people have heart attacks. No problem.
New school:
- Decide that taxpayers will pay for socialized health care.
- Declare that people who overeat are enemies of the state.
- Tax affordable, healthy-in-moderation food that does not appeal to NPR listeners.
- Collect the campaign donations.
Chris Gillham:
Many will disagree with me because of their entrenched belief on this topic, but I've regularly encountered the philosophy of medical socialism/fascism since I began pointing out the dangers of mandatory bicycle helmet laws well over a decade ago.
Anybody with an open mind and an ability to research can check my website, http://www.cycle-helmets.com, to ascertain that helmet laws are as much a threat to public safety and health as they are to individual liberty. Regardless, I maintain helmet laws are a breach of liberty as there cannot be a victim of the "crime".
Australia has had a socialised medical system for decades (Medicare) and helmet law supporters have repeatedly argued my belief is wrong because their taxes must pay for the hospital treatment of head-injured cyclists. Their argument, however, does not seem to apply to bungie-jumping, skydiving, swimming, diving, horse riding, driving a car or any other recreational pursuits that kill and injury far more people than does cycling.
The irony is that mandatory helmet laws increase the hospital admission rate of cyclists by about 30% - e.g. in my home state of Western Australia, cyclist hospital admissions increased from ~640 per year pre-law to more than 900 by the year 2000, at which time road surveys show cyclist numbers had recovered to pre-law levels following a decade of cycling discouragement.
The evidence is clear that my tax contribution to Medicare must cover the hospital treatment of an additional 300 cyclists per year as a result of socialised cycling - that's in my state alone.
Further, the law continues to discourage huge numbers of people from regular cycling exercise and there is ample evidence this has a disastrous long-term impact on the health of Australians, who are rated the most obese in the world.
A study and health benefit model from Macquarie University in Sydney this year put a dollar value on the health cost to Australia resulting from the helmet law - about half a billion dollars per year.
Unfortunately, these proven facts have never been published by the Australian media. Being a helmet law skeptic is much worse than being a climate change skeptic, who has at least some chance of having his/her voice heard.
It rankles that so much harm is caused to society yet free speech is denied by an unelected media. At least the internet provides an avenue for the facts to be made available to people who are interested in facts.
Anyway, it's heartening to read an opinion piece warning of the dangers of socialised health care and I trust this blog honours free speech sufficiently to allow publication of this comment.
P.S... I have no problem with Australia's Medicare system, although I'd happily take out private health insurance if I wasn't already paying so much Medicare tax.
June 8, 2009, 2:14 amAngioplasty:
I recently had angioplasty and it went great. My doctors and nurses were top notch. I'm still a little nervous about the idea of a public option when it comes to health care. I just want to know that I'll HAVE good health care either way. I think that's what most people want. Really like the blog, keep up the good work!
July 7, 2009, 5:56 pm