Whether you agree with healthcare reform or not, this is a good video on our Constitution limiting powers of the Federal Government. Enjoy
The S.T.A.R. Forum
Save The American Republic — Educating in and Advocating Constitutional Principles
The S.T.A.R. Forum 
Good thing Obama is pushing for a Public Option then, hmm?
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Really? You mean there would be no opting out once you opt in? That’s strange, and I hadn’t heard that. Thanks – I’ll look into that.
Yep, birds are my passion. The large raptors are a treat to see for sure. 🙂
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Okay, so you have some problems with the details of those, but not with the Constitutionality of their concept, especially if they were less mandatory (just trying to distill your reply down to the question I was specifically asking). I thought, with your Constitution-based opposition to a public option (not mandatory) on health insurance, you would have answered the other way.
Thanks for answering.
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The current health care bill that is in place is mandatory, in that if you decide to switch plans, or you are brought on by your employer after the change has taken effect, you have no choice except the public option. It would actually be illegal to choose a private plan. There are many things in this bill that are not the Federal government’s responsibility. To be honest, I even have problems with the Education Department of the Federal government. This should all be handled on a state level. The problem I have is that government is not the answer to our problems. We are the answer. We may need to have tort reform to bring down insurance costs. We may need to do a better job of regulating the insurance industry, but it is not the government’s responsibility to be involved in many of the issues of the day. They tax the citizens, and usually end up helping very few at the expense of many, with the guise of helping all. There is a lot of waste and mis-management, and the government continues to gain more control. Our Constitution was designed to allow men to rule over themselves for the most part, and have the government involved as little as possible, especially on the Federal level.
By the way, I noticed you are a bird lover. We have many bald eagles, osprey, and golden eagles in my neck of the woods.
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Dan, if mandatory gov run healthcare is passed, the first thing i have to do is lay off my staff, as I will not be able to afford to pay it. Many small businesses will do the same. In this economy it would be a job killer.
Then propose taking 30-48 million Obamas own words, how come he doesnt know the REAL numbers) and adding to a system that needs 10 years to train a Dr and 5 for a nurse and it will be overnight able to handle it? No way.
Post office is broke, as you said, SS and medicare are broke… gov run…. go figure…..
I grew up in UK. The health care started as 3% tax, now its 7% and they had to come up with Value Added tax (15% on EVERYTHING you buy) along with 40% tax rate making a total of 60% tax rate
If you want to live that way keeping only 40% of what you make, then go for it, vote it in.
That gives no incentive to work and do better, which is #1 reason I moved here only to find the same crap all over again
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Can I ask you just one more question – Do you think that Medicare and Social Security are unconstitutional too?
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Actually, if it had been done the way it was originally intended, maybe not. But it became a mandatory tax, rather than a true savings account option for our elderly. Also, the retirement age should be raised in order to take into consideration the longer life-span we now have. The other problem is that it has been borrowed against and never repaid. Now it is a ponzi scheme no different than what Bernie Maddoff went to jail for. (Take money from the new investors to pay off the old ones.) These programs, like many programs, cannot be immediately removed. That would be devastating to too many people. But, we’ve come to a point in time that the truth needs to be faced. Social Security is going broke. (Just request your Social Security statement from the government. Read the front page. It tells you right there, that the Social Security program runs out of funds in just a few years.) It is time shrink the power and size of our Federal government. Our Federal government has an important role, but not such a big role in the day to day activities of it’s citizens. We must turn more control back to our States, and to ourselves. We need personal responsibility and charity in the private sector.
I really believe that if more people were left to their own rather than being carried from cradle to grave, a new people would emerge, responsible, charitable, and accountable. When you ask government to take over, you are giving your opportunity for personal growth away to your master, rather than being a master of yourself.
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We are to support our Government, the government is not meant to support us.
Now THAT would be tyranny.
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“You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it.”
— Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931
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We are to support our Government, the government is not meant to support us. There are other methods of covering individuals besides government run health care. There are many free-market, responsibility based ideas, that do not trample on our individual liberties.
I am saddened that anyone in America would want to choose a socialistic society in any form, over the free society we are supposed to have. But, since this is America, we are all free to voice those opinions. (At least for now.)
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I have shown in the Constitution that it is written to PROMOTE welfare, not provide it.
Exactly, except that if our duly-elected Congressional representatives agree that it is necessary to provide it in order to effectively promote it, then promote and provide become one and the same.
Sad that you don’t see that.
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I have shown in the Constitution that it is written to PROMOTE welfare, not provide it. Pre-existing conditions are not the governments responsibility to change. I am not cold, and I have a great deal of charity in my heart, and through my pocket book, to support worthy causes that help individuals. These must be private sector, and not government funded in any way.
The AMA, I understand, has said they would cover EVERY single person that needed insurance, if the government would allow the write-off for tax purposes, saving our country BILLIONS maybe TRILLIONS of dollars. There are other options.
In a Rasmussen Report on August 10 (just 11 days ago) there is this report.
“When it comes to health care decisions, 51% of the nation’s voters fear the federal government more than private insurance companies. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 41% hold the opposite view and fear the insurance companies more. Seven percent (7%) are not sure who they fear the most.”
You obviously have a lot of faith in government programs. I do not share your belief, and 51% of Americans do not share your belief either. I believe, and history is on my side, that a government plan of any kind, in any field is usually worse for it’s citizens. No one wants people to go without care, but government is not the answer to make everything better.
You obviously support government run care, and a socialized society. I support a strong, free America.
The quotes I gave you have everything to do with government run programs. Even the sensitive ones, like health care. Please watch this video if you are interested.
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Napolitano reads over the ‘powers of Congress’ excerpt from the Constitution, including the provision for Congress to provide for the *welfare* of its citizens. Why did they ignore this provision? Does not ‘welfare’ of Americans include providing for their general health and well-being?????
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Dan — Thanks for commenting. One of the 28 Principles of Liberty as described in The 5,000 Year Leap is to provide equal opportunity not equal things. The general welfare of our country is good. Can it be improved? Yes. But it is not always the government that is responsible for those actions. We all have a RIGHT to bear arms according to the 2nd amendment. Just because we have that right, does not make it the governments responsibility to provide weapons to it’s citizens. Healthcare is given to all in emergency situations, health insurance is not. There are private solutions to our health insurance situation. Tort reform would be a great thing for Congress to tackle, in my opinion.
If you do not have the right to do something, you cannot give that right to the government. The people begin with the rights and loan those powers to the government. Many programs in our country are actually unconstitutional in they take rights never given them, or even impossible to give them. For example: If you as a citizen do not have the right to take by force your neighbors extra car and give it to your poor neighbor with no car, then the government cannot either. And yet they take money from many to give to those who have not. Charity, religious organizations and private social groups must be established to care for our poor and needy. But these are donations of choice. The governments taxation is a tax by force. Unless we moved to a consumption tax, or a flat tax, there is no equality in the taxing system, or choice.
Caring for our families, neighbors, and friends through health insurance is an important issue. But it is a social issue not a government issue. And putting government health care in place will destroy the very fabric of our Republic, by giving more control, and taking liberty away from the people it is intended to protect.
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If you could simply point me towards information describing how there can be equal opportunity when people are hindered by, say, pre-existing conditions and the like, it would be very helpful to resolving this. I mean, for ‘welfare of its people,’ you’re comparing the right to bear arms (hardly a requirement for their well-being) with their health (an obvious requirement for their well-being). What am I missing here?
Again, it just seems to me that ‘welfare of the people,’ the life part of ‘life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness,’ and the peoples’ general health and well-being, are all one and the same. The Constitution clearly provides for the first two, and if the third is the same thing, which I think it is (and judging from polls, a majority of Americans agree), then clearly Napolitano is wrong and this reform is Constitutional.
It’s not rocket science.
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Every man is born equal in this country. But what a man does with his station is his choice. A poor man can become wealthy. My father is proof of that. A rich man can lose his fortune, but if he wants, he can earn it back again. Anyone can overcome anything. Have you seen the movie “Pursuit of Happyness” starring Will Smith? There are examples on both sides of the fence, but the important thing is government isn’t in the way of the pursuit of happiness. There are a few who truly will require assistance. Those who are truly unable to provide for themselves. These are the exception, not the rule. But we have allowed our society to turn into a victim society. Those individuals should be aided by family, then community, then state. Churches, and other philanthropic organizations will fill the gaps if not over taxed.
On your second point, the right to bear arms could very well be a requirement for their right to life, which would obviously influence their well-being. The pre-amble to the Constitution says “promote the general welfare.” They can promote, but they do not have the right to PROVIDE it. This is the difference between liberty and tyranny. Congress can create laws that regulate, that influence tort reform, etc., but they do not have the right to provide a new system (that already exists in the free-market) by taxing all to provide it, no matter what it is. The government has proven itself to be a bad manager of everything it touches. i.e.: Social Security, the Post Office, Medicare, Cash for Clunkers, etc. The only exception would probably be the military, which the Constitution actually says it should do, with the words “provide for the common defence.”
Also, you are correct, Dan, in that the American people believe the healthcare system needs work, but the polls do NOT show support for a government option of health care. The bill that is currently out there has programs and plans that the American people are aware will change everything. Do you want the government to have access to your bank account to handle medical transactions? Do you want the government bureaucrats to determine what treatment you are allowed to have, rather than a doctor deciding that? Do you want it to be illegal for someone to switch to a different private plan once the government option is in place? These are the things in this bill. Freedom is a precious thing. Healthcare is an important topic, but government intervention into the system by way of take-over is not the answer. Benjamin Franklin said “Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.”
In the words of C.S. Lewis, an amazing philosopher, “Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.”
FREEDOM CAN WIN!
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Last I checked, pre-existing medical conditions aren’t a choice. And, while yes any poor man may through hard work and being in the right place at the right time become wealthy. But we can’t all be wealthy. And many hard-working middle-class Americans are just one serious illness away from bankruptcy, through no fault of their own. Are you going to look them in the face and say that they can’t receive medical attention because they’ve already spent their life’s savings and aren’t (yet) in the emergency room dying?
That’s cold. It’s also still contradictory to the provision which I’ve been repeating, and which Napolitano ignores – the Congressional provision for the welfare of the US people.
Re: Needing firearms to live… you’ve got to be joking. I know I certainly DON’T require a firearm to go to work, pay the bills, feed my family, etc. And I’m pretty certain that you don’t either. Both of us, however, cannot do any of those with certain serious medical conditions.
Re: Public support for the public option… you’re right, only 72% of Americans support “a government-run insurance plan to compete with private insurers.”
And what the h___ does Franklin’s or Lewis’s quotes (on liberty and tyranny) have to do with the well-being of the American public? Are you even talking about Health Care anymore??????????
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