This week the Supreme Court is hearing oral arguments about the Constitutionality of the Health Care law known as “ObamaCare”. The main liberal assertion, articulated better by Justice Ginsburg than by the Obama Administration lawyer, is that, since it costs us all money when uninsured people get health care services, the government should be able to FORCE everyone to buy health insurance.
If all else fails, use force.
Big government liberals have no compunctions whatever about using the Guns of Government to force people to behave the way they think they should. But that is, by definition, antithetical to freedom.
Justice Kennedy, who is the moderate, swing vote on the court, said of the mandate that forces everyone to buy insurance: “This fundamentally changes the relationship between the individual and the government.” I guess that’s what the President meant when he said he would “fundamentally transform” America.
It is becoming increasingly plain that the love of freedom hangs by a slender thread in America. More and more people hear “Freedom” and cheer, but they are thinking “Freedom From Responsibility”.
At the end of the day, that’s what the Health Care debate is about. Those in favor of ObamaCare believe that they shouldn’t be responsible for paying for their health care services. Someone else, their employer, the insurance company, the government, the “one-percenters”, anybody else, should pay for their health care, just not them.
That’s what the Occupy Wall Street “movement” is about, too. They demonstrate against the unfairness of Capitalism, when in reality, nothing is more fair than a meritocracy, where you get and keep what you earn. But you can’t just coast in a meritocracy. You have to get up every morning and boogie.
But it’s sooo haaard!
Yep. It takes hard work to be successful in a free market. Freedom means shouldering responsibility and that IS hard. It would be so much easier to coast through life with someone else paying the bills, making sure I didn’t scrape my elbows on the sharp rocks as I float down the lazy river.
But the price of such freedom from responsibility is slavery. The children of Israel told Moses they were better off back in slavery in Egypt than in the desert where life was hard. Many slaves stayed on their plantations after Emancipation because they didn’t know how to live in freedom. Even some criminals who are released from prison commit new crimes in order to return to prison where they don’t have to earn three squares a day and they are told every move to make.
And if we desire freedom from the difficulties of living a responsible life, the government will gladly make our lives easier. All we have to do is surrender our freedom.
