A "right" to health care?

Taking a step back -- again -- and looking at the health care debate from a more philosophical view. Do we, as American citizens, have a "right" to health care?

I can't imagine where this would come from.

As human beings on planet Earth, we have a right to take care of our own health if we want. That is, eat for nutrition, get enough sleep and exercise and all that. You have a "right" to create or purchase and use what you feel is medicinal, a "right" to seek medical advice and treatment. But I don't see how we can have a "right" to a doctor's time and expertise or the services of a hospital or clinic without expecting to fairly compensate them for it. I mean, how are they supposed to survive?

Like, do you have a "right" to plumbing services if your toilet backs up? This is also something you might "need," but do you have a "right" to it? Try telling a plumber about this "right." Better still, write to your congressman about it.

By the way, the Osama regime's new buzzword for socialized medicine seems to be "comprehensive health care package," as of the Sunday morning political shows. However, use of the word "comprehensive" gives it away. That means "all-encompassing," and would tend to eliminate any partial and surgical -- though possibly extremely effective -- fixes to the existing system.

Anyway, apparently Osama or his Health Care Tyrant -- I mean czar -- or commissariat or local party council -- appointed to this role, would make the contract with health care professionals and facilities for American citizens. The only problem with this is, the government has demonstrated its capacity on several occasions lately that it only honors those contracts that it finds convenient for its own purposes. Consider the way the feds shafted the secured bondholders in the GM takeover. Would doctors and hospitals fare any better if the federal government claimed that their services were "needed" by citizens, and that every citizen has a "right" to those services? They'd be slaves of the state. Or they could go into teaching, maybe, or plumbing.

Anybody read or see Dr. Zhivago? He was a doctor in the civil war between the white and red political factions during the communist revolution in Russia. Dr. Zhivago was dragged out his home and sent with one or another army to the front lines of combat. They needed him. That was more important than anything else he might have wanted to do for himself. He had no redress, except to eventually run away. That's what happens when governmental power is unrestrained and does not respect the rights of the individual, but only those of one or another collective.

The idea that the opinion of six people is more important and has more weight than the opinion of one person is marxist on the face of it. The idea that what 15 people need is more important than what one individual needs is marxist. The idea that a majority can trample on the rights of the individual is totally marxist and absolutely diametrically opposed to the philosophy behind the USA and its established constitution. This isn't a democracy, but a democratic republic. There's a big difference.

The government of the USA is based on individual rights, not majority rule. In the USA, we trade value-for-value with each other, compromise where we disagree, or agree to disagree. We do not take "from each according to hs ability and redistribute according to need." Without the concept of individual rights, the lives, rights, and the opportunities of every minority of every kind in this nation would perennially be at risk. They'd have no legal protection at all. And that has in the past, and will in the future result in one type of slavery or another.

Another fallacy the Comrade and his cohorts are deploying is that the health care system is irretrievably "broken" and needs a massive overhaul. They present the argument as either "comprehensive" reform, or nothing at all.

Well, the reason the health care system is messed up is largely because of existing government giveaways -- Medicare and Medicaid. They've skewed the free market system and soak up a lot of resources without fully compensating those who provide the resources. It's kind of like they've tapped an artery and bleed out resources without giving enough back to the system to sustain itself. If it's a crisis, it's one the government itself has created.

So is the solution to this to give the federal government control over the remaining, productive and profitable part of the health care industry and bleed it dry? Establishing a system that reflects public "need" and not necessarily the facts of reality and the limitations of existing resources is absolutely absurd and totally destructive.

Solutions to improve the health care system are not necessarily all-or-nothing propositions, as those promoting socialized medicine claim. Both the Cato Institute and Heritage Foundation have proposed some useful free market solutions that can help. Newt Gingrich at the www.healthtransformation.net web site offers six points that would also solve many of the problems. We don't need a "comprehensive" approach and the nationalization of the health care system. As a matter of fact, the whole notion is counter to the idea of individual rights and political liberty.

And what do you hear from the liberals and socialized medicine advocates about this?

1. "It's not socialized medicine. You can keep private coverage." Yeah, sure. If you make $1 million-plus a year, maybe.
2. "Take the profits out of health care. That's where the waste is." Yeah, right. Take the doctors and hospitals out of health care while you're at it. I mean, the United State Postal Service went to privatized, for-profit operations in order to improve efficiencies and services. That should tell you something. Canada relaxed its restrictions on its single-payer system because it couldn't adequately serve citizens. France keeps hiking up the number of co-pays for more and more health care services to the extent that those French who can afford it, buy supplemental insurance on top of seeing payroll deductions for the public program.
3. "It's all the administrative costs for insurance companies that drive up health care costs." Sure it is. Uh-huh. But you know, "Medical Billing" nowadays is a pretty good-paying career option that requires special training and in many states, certification. It can take a couple years to learn how to properly understand the federal billing system, and that system leaves a lot of loopholes for fraud and even honest error. Patients are largely unaware of this because patients don't hire medical billers, but doctors and hospitals do. And many criminals actively search out and exploit the loopholes.
4. You tell the socialists to look at Canada and the U.K. as models for what will happen here. They say, "We aren't using those models. We'll still have private insurance." Either they lack any foresight whatsoever or the capacity to think rationally. Like, I don't believe Canada and the U.K. sat down and said, "Yeah, let's devise some system of providing mediocre-at-best, rationed care to the vast majority of the population." That's just the way it's turned out. So what the liberals are doing is denying history and reality and sticking to their story in point #1. Reminds me of Natalie Wood in "Miracle on 34th Street," when questioning the existence of Santa Claus, she repeats over and over, "It's silly, but I believe."

And I don't know what the hell "I-MAC" is supposed to be. Clever name, though, maybe the Comrade can pass it off as something coming from Apple Computer Corp. I mean, Apple's profits were up, iPods are fun, so it must be something positive, right?

Just exactly how stupid do they think we are?