November 26, 2007
by Clay Barham

The political appeal today is that all Americans need to be cared for.  Political leaders want us all managed and taught how to assimilate and live better in community.  The implication is that we are not doing very well at it now, as free individuals.  Many say we are unable to keep our heads above water while we are able to pursue our own interests. 

The care and management of our lives is too important for it to be in our hands, and our own choices.  That is where we stand today, at a crossroad.  One direction leads us to remain with incompetent freedom and the other is toward competent dictatorship.

This is why so many well-meaning politicians tell us we need government-managed health care.  The progressive nations, like Canada, Great Britain, Scandinavia and others in Europe rely on employees of government, like the Post Office or DMV, to be in charge of necessary health care services.  They tell us the people who are in the health care business are bad, greedy, incompetent and government can do things better.  It is because they are profit-oriented, like UPS, FedEx, and Wal-Mart, the people who get us the stuff we need and like to have. 

Political leaders tell us that the world of free commerce is a mystery.  It baffles the minds of social engineers and planners who want to organize it so everyone knows what is happening and why.  They tell us free people, following their own choices in serving and using services, cannot possibly do the right thing without help and direction from government bureaucrats who specialize in such things.  We are supposed to believe that government can do all things better.  They can make things better.  They can deliver things better. 

Let us look closely at some of the areas they have moved in to control.  If schools are supposed to produce competent young people able to pursue their own interests, use their skills and talents to work for others better, or for themselves, are they succeeding?  No!  They are trying to mold all children to fit snug and tight in their communities as good neighbors who do not achieve or excel beyond their neighbors. 

Let us look at our big disasters and the record of FEMA.  The government fails here as well, because the needed care for repair is at the local level, not the Federal level. Even now, our health care services, infected with the lethargy and incompetence that comes with central government meddling and intervention, is failing and more expensive.  The need for health care is with the individual, not some bureaucrat in Washington.

(Article Continues Below)

National Health Care programs must be a rationed program because of the numbers of people on the rolls against the number of health care providers.  There are far more in need, especially when out of pocket costs go down, than people and places where care is given.  Any illness, and the people with it, cannot avoid prioritization.  The aged will be on the lowest level of priority because they have the least to offer community.  Those with crippling deformities will also be on the lowest level.

The scarcity problem may not be as pronounced with general practitioners as much as specialists.  For example, how many heart transplant surgeons are there?  How many kidney transplant surgeons are there?  How many specialists will be available at any given time for any special need?  Relegating medical professionals to the stature of a mail carrier will reduce the number who elects to pursue such a poor-paying career.  As the illness becomes rarer, specialists able to treat it declines.  The waiting time for treatment grows longer. 

Even government cannot squeeze more milk out of the cow than a free American can.  Those in charge have no recourse but to apply prioritizing limits.  The bureaucrat goes to the head of the line, because of his or her value to community.  The young are next, because they have many years of contribution left.  The aged and those with degenerative and birth-related conditions will bring up the rear.  This is the case in all those great-socialized systems now, the ones we are to copy.

Scarcity opens the door to such programs as euthanasia and birth-selection through pre and post birth abortion.  It opens the door to eugenic and blood-quality selection, of ridding the community of those born with deformities and degenerative diseases.  It rises to the level sought by Hitler in purifying society and the race by government edict.  Those who are not affected will not object, as in the case of early 20th century Germany. 

Many will scoff at such projections, but it makes sense when elite who care, instead of free people who cope, manage community.  Look at America in the first half of the 20th century compared to Germany of that period.  Which provided the greatest happiness for the greatest number?  In every case, when government is out of the loop, freedom prevails and everything works better.

If you enjoyed this post, please consider the following:

1. Make a donation of $1 or more to help keep this website active.

2. Click Here to Subscribe to the Free Populist Party Newsletter

3. Share this page or get the Populist Party RSS Feed

Clay Barham [send him email] has been a candidate for the California legislature and a stand-in talk show host for ABC.  He was educated in physical and behavioral sciences, with a Ph.D. in sociology.  He is the author of five books, with his latest being Foundations of Modern American Conservatism and Liberalism: The Roots of Freedom and Tyranny.  Visit his website at http://www.claysamerica.com.