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Politics : View from the Center and Left -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Lane3 who wrote (16101)	4/5/2006 11:37:02 AM
From: Dale Baker	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541515

Painting social support programs as a "right" can confuse the issue; providing them has always been seen by most as a public policy choice. We choose not to let large numbers of people starve or die of exposure or treatable medical conditions. That's because we can afford it, and we believe it is the decent thing to do. That notion - and the means - didn't exist outside of church charities in the 18th century. Since then, many people have come to believe it is a noble and decent thing to do. It's funny how I have never heard anyone who needed that aid to eat or live complain about it, just those who can afford it very easily. You can say it should all go back to private charities and eliminate state coercion, but that's really not practical in a society our size, particularly emergency medical care. If we don't like the choice we made, why don't we vote out the Congressmen who made it all possible?

To: Lane3 who wrote (16101)	4/5/2006 11:37:51 AM
From: JohnM	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541515

The real tragedy for our nation is that any politician who holds the values of liberty that our founders held would be soundly defeated in today's political arena. You would hope so, since the times do change. It's not the late 18th century any longer (irony widget here). The best frame to use to think about universal health insurance is a social policy one, not a rights one. There are two other bases, in my view: a moral one and a self interested one. The moral one is that we are clearly a wealthy enough society to provide health care for everyone with minimal sacrifice. The self interested one is the importance of reducing contagious diseases and the hope that providing better medical care reduces the much more expensive use of emergency rooms. Just my thoughts.

To: Lane3 who wrote (16101)	4/5/2006 12:04:50 PM
From: thames_sider	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 541515

Three-fifths to two-thirds of the federal budget consists of taking property from one American and giving it to another. Were a private person to do the same thing, we'd call it theft. When government does it, we euphemistically call it income redistribution, but that's exactly what thieves do -- redistribute income.. His argument is greatly weakened by his repeated inability to recognise the difference between theft and taxation. The latter has been agreed upon by a majority (OK, maybe a plurality) of the chosen representatives of the people, using the powers it's agreed that they have. If he wants to live in the US he needs to accept its laws, or work within legal bounds to change them, not misrepresent them. You don't get to pick and choose. Government is necessary, but the only rights we can delegate to government are the ones we possess. Here is where he goes wrong IMO. Because we can and do choose to create laws which do not involve natural 'rights', one way or another. Why can we not collectively decide to give to our central government powers which we might not grant to any individual? Pity: I agreed with both his definitions of and his criteria for 'rights' up until then. Someone does not have a right to anyone else's money: we may, however, choose (more or less voluntarily) that the society in which we live shall redistribute money from some residents to others. And I'm happy for that not to be called a 'right' - it's a privilege. However, I strongly disagree with his apparent premise that all that government should be able to do is enforce 'natural law', not least because there is no law in nature, save what we choose to perceive... no time for more but a thought-provoking piece.