Obama’s speech about socialized medicine
September 10, 2009 – 10:08 pm by JohnI didn’t watch the Savior of America’s speech to Congress about further socializing our health care and insurance industry because I already knew everything he was going to say. Why would I waste my time with it? He probably said our health care system is broken, that it’s too costly and denies too many people, left out the fact that this is entirely the fault of the thousands upon thousands of governmental perturbations in the market, and concluded that the answer is more government, but wise, just government.
I am flabbergasted by people’s complete ignorance of the laws and trends of economics. It is damn near impossible for the free market to make anything more expensive or worse in quality, in the long run. Only coercion and redistribution can do that. Most of the things we consume as necessities or luxuries in our modern lives—houses, cars, computers, food, even medicines—tend to become better, cheaper, and more abundant over time. This is despite, not because of, the interference by government in the free and voluntary exchanges of peaceable people. The fact that we are supposedly spending more on health care (health insurance) than we used to should raise a red flag that something is preventing the market from working as it always does and as we all want it to, and that this thing is the State!
I don’t know why other countries seem to spend a lower percentage of their GDP and a lower amount of money per capita on their health care than the U.S. does. It is definitely not because our health care system is the best in the world. It must be because of the nature of the federal government’s interference in the health insurance industry and its history of regulations and so forth. If the alleged success of other nations’ health care industries is any guide, it is possible that complete and total socialization will actually decrease per capita expenses on health care relative to the requisite decreases in the quality and quantity we will receive. On the other hand, if the history of our government’s interference in the health care market is any guide, Obamacare will end up costing many times more than expected. (According to Peter Schiff, in 1966 it was predicted that Medicare would cost the taxpayers $12 billion in 1990. Instead, it cost $107 billion in 1990, and it’s four times that now!)
Something about the Imperial Federal Government would have to change, drastically, for American taxpayers to evade a similar fate from Obamacare. It is very possible that a mixed economy is worse in some ways for this and other industries than a nearly completely socialized one. Maybe not in the long run, though.
One entertaining part of the speech that I heard on the radio was when he vehemently denied that Obamacare would ever cover illegal immigrants. Obama can say that all he wants, and he can hold true to that promise with flying colors during his regime, but I predict that taxpayer-funded health insurance will cover illegal immigrants and visitors who didn’t pay for it, sooner or later. Quite possibly, the Republicans will let it happen to pander to Hispanic voters.
I wonder how many non-libertarian-minded people considered this: One reason people oppose the coverage of illegal immigrants’ health care with taxpayer money is because the immigrants didn’t pay for it with their taxes, and we can’t have people coming here and bankrupting our treasury by, basically, stealing products and services from the taxpayers. (Perhaps the main reason people oppose giving health care and other things to illegal immigrants is because they suffer from the misconception that the place where your mother was lying when she gave birth to you has any bearing on your rights or your freedom or your character as a human being.) But the whole point of Obamacare is to take money from people who earned it and give it to people who didn’t! It is a wealth-redistribution program in the form of mandatory insurance policies and taxes! Millions of people, like me and probably you, do not want to be forced to pay for other people’s health care, or anything else, for that matter. It isn’t charity and it isn’t altruistic! It’s bald, shameless theft! The supporters of socialized medicine are being inconsistent and hypocritical by endorsing the theft of tax money from captive Americans to pay for other Americans’ health care but opposing the theft of tax money from captive Americans to pay for foreigners’ health care.
One Response to “Obama’s speech about socialized medicine”
One thing I forgot to add was the inane comments by my friends on Facebook: “for us, for teddy, for our character.” Others said, “Amen, sister!” and “Go Obama!” I imagine the first comment referred to something specific in Obama’s speech, but it could just as well have referenced the socialists’ clamoring for socialized medicine in honor of Ted Kennedy.
It’s a crying shame that so many smart people are so easily drawn in by emotional rhetoric. The fact that someone recently died is a terrible reason to pass an expensive and stifling piece of legislation. I called Obama an opportunist many times during his presidential campaign; his use of Ted Kennedy’s memory to try to convince people we should pass his health care legislation is good evidence of that.
By John on Sep 11, 2009