yaaaawwwwn

Posted by: skip at August 27, 2004 02:57 PM

Kurt Cobain, unfortunately, was not running.

Posted by: DWC at August 27, 2004 04:22 PM

Their US$175,000 talking public toilets told them to do it.

Ref: http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/local/162784_toilets02.asp

Posted by: Max Darkside at August 27, 2004 05:01 PM

This Newspaper ENDORSES FRAUD!

This Puts The Nail in Kerry’s False first Purple Heart claims. No one except a DISHONEST Democrat can ever say this Kerry behavior is even remotely “heroic”. What a Monstrous Fraud the lefties are trying to run!

Posted by: leaddog2 at August 27, 2004 05:06 PM

Last time I checked Kerry had admitted that his first wound may have been self-inflicted. Notice that this guy just says that there was no enemy fire, not that there was no enemy. Kerry was clearly shooting at something with his M16 until it jammed and then with the grenade launcher. Unless he was just playing around, which even this guy does not claim, then he is entilted to the Purple Heart.

As for heroism, I have not heard anybody claim that the Purple Hearts make him a hero. They mostly just mean that he was unlucky. It is the Bronze Star and Silver Star which make him a war hero.

LD, especially your age, you should calm down !!

Posted by: rdelephant at August 27, 2004 07:10 PM

Rdelephant,

From the U.S. Navy……. are FINALLY beginning to understand what Kerry is, or Not?

I posted a Link to the story on Kerry’s Silver Star on a different thread, which you obviously DID NOT READ.

The facts are these:

Johnkerry.com has already stated as follows:

1) They claimed he was the Vice Chairman of the Intelligence Committe (Oops! That was Bob Kerrey. Sorry! I forgot my name).

2) That Christmas is “seared”, “seared” in my memory. (Actually this was a 1986 Senate speech and IS NOT on the Web Site now that I can see).

3) Well, he was in the watery border between Cambodia and Vietnam that Christamas. (That watery border DOES NOT EXIST. The Mekong River Delta is over 100 miles south of Cambodia).

4) The Silver Star is a honorable decoration. Johnkerry.com is NOT a FActually Accurate source.

I would suggest that you read the articles below.

Why does John Kerry have a “V” for valor on his Silver Star when it is apparently against the law? Is it document forgery or not?

An Update for Alan E.Brain also.

In cmpliance with your comment about obtaining more proof on the Fake “V”, Please read the following:

(4 of us FOUND nothing at all showing a “V” awarded with any Silver Star). Neither has the U.S. Navy.

But according to a U.S. Navy spokesman, “Kerry’s record is incorrect. The Navy has never issued a ‘combat V’ to anyone for a Silver Star.”Naval regulations do not allow for the use of a “combat V” for the Silver Star, the third-highest decoration the Navy awards. None of the other services has EVER granted a Silver Star “combat V,” either.

From Captain’s Quarters

Has the Kerry campaigned NOW backtracked on Kerry’s first Purple Heart claim?

Read the story.

A number of people have written to me overnight stating that a Kerry campaign spokesman has acknowledged on Brit Hume’s Fox news show that John Kerry’s wound on 2 December 1968 came from an unintentionally self-inflicted wound — an accident, in other words.

UPDATE: Here’s the link to the Fox News report from Major Garrett. It mostly covers the Chris Wallace interview with John Hurley and CNN’s interview of Bob Dole. Towards the end, Garrett talks about the first Purple Heart:

GARRETT: And questions keep coming. For example, Kerry received a Purple Heart for wounds suffered on December 2nd, 1968. But an entry in Kerry’s own journal written nine days later, he writes that, quote, he and his crew hadn’t been shot at yet, unquote. Kerry’s campaign has said it is possible his first Purple Heart was awarded for an unintentionally self-inflicted wound. Score another one for the Swiftvets, and another retreat for Kerry, this time on a key contention for both a medal (which some, including me, felt were too difficult to argue effectively) and for his truncated tour of duty. Without that first Purple Heart, Kerry would have had to stay on the Swiftboat assignment past March 17th and remain in combat. Now that the Kerry campaign seems to have retreated from Kerry’s citation, the fact that Kerry pushed this award weeks later up a different chain of command takes on a great deal more significance. Instead of bravely taking on combat, he now looks desperate to get out ahead of everyone else and willing to falsify records to do it — which is exactly the impression that his later assertions have given us.

CQ mentioned the 2 December/11 December conflict back on August 18th in this post, based on a tip from CQ reader Amelia and an article in World Net Daily by Art Moore.

Posted by: leaddog2 at August 27, 2004 07:40 PM

LD2: Ya know — your polemic gets a tad much over time. Kerry was a War Hero. Still is. The USN says he is, so he is.

Those who are neither Swift nor Truthful can’t change that one whit.

Posted by: Don at August 27, 2004 08:07 PM

Sorry to disappoint you LD, but I don’t read alot of stuff that you post. Much of it is juvenile, like your attack on Kerry because some underling got his credentials wrong on his website. It was brought to their attention and fixed. Only somebody like you could hold onto such trivialities like they were proof that the man is evil.

The nonesense about the V on the Silver Star commendation is a similar case. Somebody in the Navy made a mistake in assigning a V to his medal commendation (for a medal that is already a medal for valor), yet you see something evil. Get a life, dude.

And you keep assuming that he was not entitled to the Purple Heart for a self-inflicted wound, which many have pointed out to you is a false premise. You simply ignore them and keep posting your drivel.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 27, 2004 08:22 PM

Well, if it isn’t Kim Jong Il’s poodle, out to defend the Great War Hero.

Let us not for a moment question the motives a guy who shows up in Vietnam the first day and tells his crew he’s going to be the ‘next JFK from Massachusetts”, complete with a Super 8 to record the heroics. A guy who writes up his own Purple Heart recommendations for self-inflicted wounds. A guy with memories ‘seared’ from Apocalypse Now and conveniently juxaposed into his own fiction. A guy who witnessed plenty of atrocities in Vietnam, but not by his fellow Swifties. Doesn’t say who else he was hanging with those 16 weeks, but trust him when he says he say ‘ears lopped off, bodies blown up, villages razed’. He saw it somewhere, maybe it was Christmas - yeah, that’s it, it was Christmas and President-elect Nixon told him to do it. That’s it!

Why are we rehashing an unpopular war and incidents from 35 years ago? Because John Kerry has made this the centerpiece of his campaign. He certainly couldn’t turn to the 19 years of sleepwalking he did in the Senate, so let’s find something exciting.

Question the hell out of GW’s National Guard service, but cry bloody murder when they point the cannon at you. Have your lawyers sue the Swift vets out of existence. Yes, that’s the American way. Crush dissent and free expression with attorneys.

What a bogus, pompous bag of botox. He doesn’t lie half as well as Clinton, so he should stay away from the war stories and spend a few moments explaining:

• How he’s going to force the European community to shoulder more of the burden in Iraq when they couldn’t even handle Serbia on their own

• How he’s the first politician to believe (simultaneously) that life begins at conception and - the mother has the right to terminate the pregnancy at any point before the entire body is out of the birth canal (Infantacide - an idea whose time has come.)

• How it is that the Ponzi scheme we call Social Security, started back in 1933, which has run it course and on the verge of collapse, is all George Bush’s fault and not that of a Congress paralyzed to make any tough decisions (like privatizing it) in the 20 years John was there.

• How the only problem with our economy is we haven”t taxed the rich enough, ignoring the fact that the bottom 50% of all households pay 4% of all taxes while the top 5% pay 53% - virtually guaranteeing the poor would NEVER BENEFIT from a tax cut (since they don’t pay any taxes to begin with).

• How a guy that voted again and again to defund our intelligence agencies is suddenly for a strong intelligence system.

• How a guy that voted against every major weapons system in 19 years is suddenly for a stronger military.

• How saying we should work smarter and be stronger is as good as an actual plan, like one we could look at and try to price out.

• How the only problem with education is - it doesn’t get enough money, when all we’ve done is throw money at the government school monopoly for the last 40 years - the end result being half our 4th graders can read. Hubba hubba.

• How he’s going to drain the Treasury in short order by ordering Hillarycare for every uncovered citizen - whether they want health coverage or not.

Sure, let’s get Vietnam out of the way. Let’s get John’s sad little lies out of the way. Let’s talk policy and proposals.

Let’s go, there’s 2 months left. Get off your mystery ship and say something substantial. NOW.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 27, 2004 09:52 PM

rdelephant —

The nonesense about the V on the Silver Star commendation is a similar case. Somebody in the Navy made a mistake in assigning a V to his medal commendation (for a medal that is already a medal for valor), yet you see something evil. Get a life, dude.

Unfortunately JFKerry disagrees with you over whether the medal issue is a big deal — or at least he did when he was the critic and someone else was being criticized. In this case, it was Admiral Boorda, who committed suicide when he thought he had disgraced the Navy by wearing V-clips which it was arguable he was not entitled to wear.

What did John Kerry have to say at the time about the matter? Let us consult the Boston Herald of May 18, 1996:

“Is it wrong? Yes, it is very wrong. Sufficient to question his leadership position? The answer is yes, which he clearly understood,” said Sen. John Kerry, a Navy combat veteran who served in Vietnam.

And let us consult the Boston Globe for the same day:

“The military is a rigorous culture that places a high premium on battlefield accomplishment,” said Sen. John F. Kerry, who received numerous decorations, including a Bronze Star with a “V” pin, as a Navy lieutenant in Vietnam.

“In a sense, there’s nothing that says more about your career than when you fought, where you fought and how you fought,” Kerry said.

“If you wind up being less than what you’re pretending to be, there is a major confrontation with value and self-esteem and your sense of how others view you.”

Of Boorda and his apparent violation, Kerry said: “When you are the chief of them all, it has to weigh even more heavily.”

[LINK]

original link found via Hugh Hewitt [Link]

Posted by: ter0 at August 27, 2004 09:59 PM

rdelephant,

To some of us who have worn these decorations, the indiscretions in how they are worn (remember also the pictures of him before the Congressional hearings in his utilities with ribbons? Well that is totally forbidden and comical.) Add to that the theater of throwing any decoration over a wall and you’ve got a serious affront to us all and it does matter… a lot.

Sure someone could have been misinformed, but it is the responsibility of the person wearing the award to get the right gouge and wear the ribbons and devices properly… period. Sure, it may have been youthful immaturity, but I’ve yet to hear that defense on this matter. (They were someone else’s medals is what I heard Sen. Kerry explain.)

Spin it all you want… find holes in the critics’ challenges, but it still boils down to this simple truth: John Kerry embellished his war record and abused his decorations for personal gain or fame or both and he knows it. Unfortunately all this takes away from those legitimate times when he did earn his awards. For some of us, it also diminishes him in our eyes as a leader and makes us suspecious about other parts of his bio as well.

Calling the Swift Boat Vets names and claiming political collusion may provide cover for those who are ignorant to the ways of the military. It may convince some others because there is apparently no major ground swell for or against Kerry… yet. However do not underestimate how so many vets and current military personnel feel about this man. An apparent major mistake is his talking up his combat record to begin with. Most vets cherish and honor the code of silence that is a hallmark among true combat vets. Sen. Kerry has blatantly broken that code for his own personal and polticial purposes. This is not going down well for many of us.

All the blathering about the UCMJ, fog of war, who was on what boat when, etc… it’s so much background noise. The real problem for Kerry is not that the latest polls show 63% believe him… it is that almost a third do not. Further to the point, Vets and the Military who have the most personal impact at stake from the choice of a Commander-in-chief, overwhelmingly choose President Bush. Granted, some in the military and some vets think Kerry is just fine, but many more do not. These folks for the most part do not base their feelings on who wins what debate and who’s lawyers are smarter and who’s slogans are better. They base it on character and integrity. Some of you truly believe that Sen. Kerry is trustworthy and has high integrity. So be it. However, many vets and a lot of the military do not… that can be problematic and is not easily overcome especially with 60 or so days to go in a tight race.

Posted by: steve at August 28, 2004 12:25 AM

Torpedo,

My hero! Finally, a conservative who wants to talk issues and expresses himself thoughtfully. You’ve got Kerry nailed to the wall which is why I support Ralph Nader. I’m not going to get into an extended debate with you here, but your well-stated challenges deserve a response.

 Didn’t support the Iraq War. Still don’t. Get out.
 Government-sponsored sex education and family planning programs prevent abortions. Your Party’s against them.
 Conservatives President’s and legislators are accomplices to the grand larceny going on with the Social Security Taxes and Trust Funds.
 Tax rates on the wealthy are NOT the only problem. The fundamental challenge is to strike a better balance between social and corporate interests. For example, the minimum wage is a slave wage by the governments own standards. It needs to be raised.
 The intelligence community has been badly mismanaged by both parties. U.S. defense and foreign policy, of which the intelligence infrastructure is a part, needs to be overhauled.
 We are unwisely overinvesting limited capital in this counter-productive sector. We seek $200 billion in budget reductions from current levels over the next ten years with an emphasis on higher investments in racing to global dominance in the emergent alternative energy and energy efficiency markets.
 We’ve spent billions of dollars figuring out that parents, not government, are the key to a child’s successful education. It’s time to get off teacher’s back and put the fun, not the whip, back into parenting and learning.
 I’m all for universal health care, but anybody who says they know how to pay for it is a fraud. My personal position, is that it’s a stretch goal we keep on the table as use democratic processes to redefine the “The American Dream” for the 21st Century. It’s not realistic right now.

Next time I hope you’ll take a shot at answering some of the doozies I’ve been saving up for a smart guy like you because I can’t get a straight answer from anybody else.

“Of course not,” Bush said. “I’m the commander. See, I don’t need to explain why I say things. That’s the interesting thing about being the president. Maybe somebody needs to explain to me why they say something, but I don’t feel like I owe anybody an explanation.”

Scott

Posted by: Scott at August 28, 2004 04:20 AM

Scott, First off, your false assumption - I am not a conservative. I’m your basic Cato Institute libertarian. I’ve actually met Michael Badnarik at a rally last month. So tell which party you refer to when you say “your party”. And I wasn’t specifically aiming the questions at a Naderite, I was aiming them at Kerry, but since you’ve intervened:

• My statement wasn’t about the legality of abortion - every politician that supports it denies the fetus is a human being (for legal reasons) - that is, until John Kerry. His stance that life begins at conception AND the mother is free to take his/her life - constitutes murder. No one calls him on that - NO ONE.

• The goal of taxes to to raise revenue for government. It is not and should never be, a social engineering tool. It’s application to the public should conform with the General Welfare clause - no one should be ‘punished’ more than others because they make more money. The only equitable solution is a flat tax or a sales tax. A burden commonly shared is one the entire country should accept. It is moral fraud to vote for someone else to shoulder more of MY BURDEN.

• There is NO SS Trust Fund. All SS monies collected are dropped into the general fund. There is no lock box, there is no social contract. The Supreme Court ruled back in the early 60s that the government has NO OBLIGATION to pay back to you the money you put in or it’s interest. This is not social insurance, it is a massive redistribution scheme where the poor pay in their whole life, die before they collect, then the rich take the money. If you don’t believe me, look at the average life spans of poor vs. rich. The populations are self-selecting. The rich live longer and take a larger proportional slice of the SS pie. All I want - all millions of people want - is to get our hands on our own money so we’re free to invest it, spend it, or hand it down to our children. The 12.5% I spend and the 12.5% that my company spends is money down the rathole. We’ll never see it again, certainly not when we need it. I believe the return now is about 1.2% on investment, but that should shrink up to the point (2009?) when collections are surpassed by distribution. Not too far off. And difficult decisions loom. Both parties are to blame. No one wanted to handle a difficult situation so they simply didn’t. More Congressional leadership.

And more later.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 28, 2004 08:59 AM

Scott,

You’re right about the minimum wage, no family should have to rely on it and few do. Most minimum wage earners are teenagers living in their parents’ home. If you’re an adult and you’re making minimum wage, I don’t think the problem is your employer’s - it’s yours. (i.e. how is it you never took advantage of your ‘free’ education to get any skills anyone wanted?)

I am constantly informed about the ‘livable wage’. What is a livable wage? Seven fifty an hour is chump change, resulting in an annual wage of $15,600. How can I afford my alternative-fuel passive solar log cabin in the woods on sustainable acreage on poverty level wages? Let’s make the minimum wage $25/hour. That’s more like it. Fifty-two K/year is more like it. Would you endorse that?

Of course, you have to understand that thousands working now would have to be let go - an unfortunate consequence of paying one unskilled guy $52,000/year.

The basic logic behind “livable” wages sucks because it argues pay from the needs of the employee instead of the needs of the employer. If employers are not free to set the pay for a particular job, if this is dictated from above by a bureaucracy that has no concept of what goes on in your business, you are screwed.

Remember that every mandate thrust down from above has consequences on the entire work force. You pay people more, you pay fewer people. Employers don’t have a magic supply of money to comply with every government mandate. Their supply of money, like mine, is finite.

Leave to to the socialists, who have severely confused economics with religion, to gum up a concept. If you’re alive, your wage is ‘livable’. How livable is totally subjective. This is why the founding fathers considered Jeremy Bentham’s “greatest good for the greatest number” only for a moment and rejected it. No one person can determine what your ‘greatest good’ is for you. Only you can. The individual. The centerpiece of our form of government.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 28, 2004 10:27 AM

Kerry can persuade the Europeans to participate in Iraq in two ways. One, he is not Bush, whom they hate. Second, he can offer them economic particiaption in the reconstruction and other benefits they are currently being denied.

Kerry’s views on abortion are totally mainstream and fully in accord with Roe v. Wade. Whether life begins at conception or at some later point is a semantic/metaphysical question which does not change the practicalities of abortion one iota.

I am not aware of Kerry blaming Bush for the ills of the Social Security system, maybe you have a cite.

Bush’s tax cut benefited the wealthy at the expense of future generations, as he funded it by deficit spending. Kerry is absolutely correct to criticize it.

Mr. Kerry has supported $200 billion in intelligence funding over the past seven years — a 50 percent increase since 1996.

“He voted against a proposed billion-dollar bloat in the intelligence budget because it was essentially a slush fund for defense contractors,” Kerry spokesman Chad Clanton said. “Unlike George Bush, John Kerry does not and will not support every special spending project supported by Halliburton and other defense contractors.”

Numerous variants of the message claiming that Senator John Kerry “voted to kill every military appropriation for the development and deployment of every weapons systems since 1988” have been circulating since at least February 2004. The message’s implication — that Senator Kerry distinctly and specifically voted to kill upwards of a dozen different weapons systems — is inaccurate and grossly misleading, however.

A 22 February 2004 Republican National Committee (RNC) research briefing includes the list of weapons systems found in this message and citations that purportedly support the claim that Senator Kerry voted to kill each one. But all the citations stem from votes on three Congressional bills, none of which were about a specific weapons system or group of weapons systems.

The three votes cited — regarding S. 3189 (1990), H.R. 5803 (1990), and H.R. 2126 (1995) — were bills covering fiscal year Department of Defense appropriations, all of which Senator Kerry voted against. (Two of those three votes were not technically on defense appropriations per se, but on House-Senate conference committee reports for defense appropriations bills.) As the text of a typical defense appropriations bill shows, such bills cover the entire governmental expenditures for defense in a given fiscal year and encompass thousands of items totalling hundreds of billions of dollars — including everything from the cost of developing, testing, purchasing, and maintaining weapons and other equipment to personnel expenses (salaries, medical benefits, tuition assistance, reenlistment bonuses), medical research, hazardous waste cleanup, facilities maintenance, and a whole host of other disbursements. Members of Congress ultimately vote “yea” or “nay” on an entire appropriations bill; they don’t pick and choose to approve some items and reject others.

Senators and Representatives might vote against a defense appropriations bill for any numbers of reasons — because they object to the presence or absence of a particular item, because they feel that the government is proposing to spend too much or too little money on defense, or anything in-between. Maintaining, as is the case here, that a Senator who voted “nay” on one year’s defense appropriations bill therefore voted to “kill” a variety of specific weapons systems is like claiming that any Congressman who has ever voted against a defense appropriations bill has therefore also voted to abolish the U.S. military.”

http://www.snopes.com/politics/kerry/weapons.asp

John Kerry and John Edwards will:

Meet Our Responsibilities To Our Schools
John Kerry and John Edwards will establish a National Education Trust Fund to ensure that schools always get the funding they need. They will also ensure that No Child Left Behind works for schools, states, and teachers by rewarding those who meet higher standards and rewarding schools that turn around and improve.

Continue Reform And Put A Great Teacher In Every Classroom
Great teachers are the foundation of a great school. As president, John Kerry will enact a new bargain that offers teachers more, including better training and better pay in troubled schools, and asks for more in return, including fast, fair ways to make sure that teachers who don’t belong in the classroom don’t stay there.

Offer 3.5 Million After-School Opportunities Through “School’s Open ‘Til Six”
John Kerry and John Edwards are strong supporters of after-school programs. They give students extra help, keep them out of trouble, and offer peace of mind to working parents. The Kerry-Edwards “School’s Open ‘Til ‘Six” initiative will offer after-school opportunities to 3.5 million children, through programs that are open until 6 p.m. and offer safe transportation for children.

Make College Affordable For All And Expand Lifelong Learning
As president, John Kerry will offer a fully refundable College Opportunity Tax credit on up to $4,000 of tuition for every year of college and offer aid to states that keep tuitions down. And he will launch a new effort to ensure that all of our workers can get the technical skills and advanced training they need.

http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/education/

To make affordable health care a right - not a privilege - for every American, John Kerry and John Edwards will:

Cut Your Premiums
John Kerry and John Edwards will cut family premiums by up to $1,000. That’s $1,000 in real savings people can use to buy groceries, pay the bills, and save for their children’s future. And that will mean more jobs and more competitive American businesses.

Cover All Americans With Quality Care
The Kerry-Edwards plan will give every American access to the range of high-quality, affordable plans available to members of Congress and extend coverage to 95 percent of Americans, including every American child. Their plan will also fight to erase the health disparities that persist along racial and economic lines, ensure that people with HIV and AIDS have the care they need, end discrimination against Americans with disabilities and mental illnesses, and ensure equal treatment for mental illness in our health system.

Provide Affordable Prescriptions
The Kerry-Edwards plan will reduce prescription drug prices by allowing the re-importation of safe prescription drugs from Canada, overhauling the Medicare drug plan, ensuring low-cost drugs, and ending artificial barriers to generic drug competition.

Cut Waste And Inefficiency
Today, approximately 25 percent of health care costs are wasted on paperwork and administrative processing. The Kerry-Edwards plan harnesses American ingenuity to cut waste, save billions, and take new steps to ensure patient privacy.

http://www.johnkerry.com/issues/health_care/

This all sounds pretty good to me. A whole lot better than what George Bush has to offer. The Seattle Times agrees.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 28, 2004 10:48 AM

Jesus, rdelephant, you really need to read up on things before you go shooting your keyboard off.

Just an example: no country is excluded from participating in the rebuilding in general. What is somewhat exclusive, although it’s been loosened up a lot, is who can receive money from the US.

Also, you have listed a set of laudable goals voiced by the Kerry campaign, with absolutely no details as to how those goals will be achieved or paid for (other than repealing the tax cuts — which will likely be revenue negative after the first year). I know that none of this is your fault, since Kerry hasn’t given any of those details, either.

Posted by: TL at August 28, 2004 12:33 PM

“The Bush administration has banned countries that didn’t support the U.S. invasion of Iraq from competing for prime reconstruction contracts valued at more than $18 billion. The new policy will prevent Russia, France, Germany and Canada from playing much of a hands-on role in rebuilding the war-torn country.”

http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/1203/121003h1.htm

I understand that the ban on Canadian companies was later lifted, but to my knowledge it has not been as to the others. Seems like basically what I said above (that you were so quick to criticize).

Posted by: rdelephant at August 28, 2004 02:33 PM

RD

nice cut-n-paste from the kerry site; however I find it ironic that Kedwards is touting a “$1000” back in a family’s budget to use while sneering at the $$$ that actually already did go back to families with GW’s tax cut, let alone their disdain for Medical Savings Accounts. I guess when there is a “R” after a President’s name, those tax cuts are “inauthentic” (just as Viet Vets who criticize Kerry are “faux” “inauthentic” “so-called” Viet vets.)

I have a feeling you missed Lileks Parable of the Stairs when it he was confronted by an eager Kerrybot

Then came the Parable of the Stairs, of course. My tiresome, shopworn, oft-told tale, a piece of unsupportable meaningless anecdotal drivel about how I turned my tax cut into a nice staircase that replaced a crumbling eyesore, hired a few people and injected money far and wide . . . . Raise my taxes, and it won’t happen – I won’t hire anyone, and they won’t hire anyone, rent anything, buy anything. You see?

“Well, it’s a philosophical difference,” she sniffed. She had pegged me as a form of life last seen clilcking the leash off a dog at Abu Ghraib. “I think the money should have gone straight to those people instead of trickling down.” Those last two words were said with an edge.

“But then I wouldn’t have hired them,” I said. “I wouldn’t have new steps. And they wouldn’t have done anything to get the money.”

“Well, what did you do?” she snapped.

“What do you mean?”

“Why should the government have given you the money in the first place?”

“They didn’t give it to me. They just took less of my money.”

That was the last straw. Now she was angry. And the truth came out:

“Well, why is it your money? I think it should be their money.”

And that’s the basic difference between the Left and the rest… Does an earned $ belong to the earner, or to those brave, noble, selfless souls who dedicate themselves to ruling the rest of us for our own good?

Posted by: Darleen at August 28, 2004 03:21 PM

rdelelphant,

Thank you for validating my point. The $18 Billion is the money the U.S. is spending on reconstruction — which is what I said. There are a lot more funds than that being spent, and those contracts are open to all bidders that the Iraqis want to include.

Now a question for you. Why do you think that the participation of the French, Germans and Russians will do to improve the situation in Iraq? Are they better at peacekeeping and nationbuilding than our guys? Their record in the Ivory Coast, Afghanistan and Chechnya doesn’t bode well.

Posted by: TL at August 28, 2004 03:35 PM

Hi Torpedo.

Thanks very much for correcting the false assumption. Your Libertarian stance confirmed my hunch that you are indeed an intelligent guy and you’re rising in my esteem.

That doesn’t mean that I agree with you, but as a progressive I find myself in agreement with many more points of Libertarian policy positions than I do with conservative or liberal positions even though I arrive at those positions from a very different set of philosophical or political premises.

While I could quibble productively with some minor points of fact or emphasis on your statements about abortion, taxation, and SS, I appreciate that you’re wrestling thoughtfully with some of the tough core issues and will point to your comments as representing the value of having alternative choices in the Presidential race to raise vital perspectives and offer the voters meaningful options about them.

I really hestitated to address the economic issue in my first post because it’s so huge that it simply can’t be addressed in sound bites. At least not by me. I raised the minimum wage simply to illustrate one of the dimensions, besides taxes, which need to be considered in an even larger economics discussion. I submit that discussion should be start on the topic of global competitiveness, including the awful wage bind we’re in relative to China et. al. I think if we’re honest, we’ve got to consider the possibility that what “The American Dream” means in the 21st Century, our standard of living may be DIFFERENT, not worse, (unless money is your God) than what we’ve come to expect as an entitlement. That, in my humble opinion, is one of the TRUTHs that Ds and Rs portray like a three dollar bill. The key word there is American, meaning maintaining social and political unity while encouraging and rewarding as much economic incentive for the inventive as possible. We would probably disagree quite a bit about terms like “equitable” and “incentive” but the debate would be a healthy one for our country to hear.

In this regard, I had a thought. You know that Citizens Debate Commission, the one that isn’t run by the Corporate Party? They really ought to get Badnarik and Nader together to talk about their view this stuff on national TV. Forget Bush and Kerry. I think their debate would be WAY more informative than the gobbleygook the Dems and Reps will be dishing out.

You know, I fantasize about what would happen if progressives and libertarians could pull their stuff together, make some compromises to leave some controversial small points off the table, and go after some core principles they agree about it to get the Third Way out of the blocks for the sake of America. It IS a totally impractical fantasy, of course, because I’m probably the only guy in America will to suggest this. But I throw it out there anyway because there’s really no telling what patriots are capable of doing if they set their minds to it. If they could pull it together enough to launch this country, they should darned well be capable of finding a way to pull it together long enough to save it, too.

Scott

Posted by: Scott at August 28, 2004 04:14 PM

Darleen,
There is nothing inherently wrong with tax cuts. But they are crazy when you cannot afford them (as our current deficits show). It would also be nice if they were not so heavily weighted to the wealthy. Spending by middle class folks creates just as many jobs as “staircase building” by the wealthy. But the biggest problem, in my opinion, is that we effectively borrowed the money to buy that staircase from future generations.

TL,

To answer your question, the participation of others helps this look less like a unilateral American occupation of a Muslim nation. It also spreads the economic burden and human toll on our soldiers. It is not about them being any better at reconstruction or nation-building.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 28, 2004 04:20 PM

Scott, Having manned the libertarian booth at county fairs and farmers’ markets I’ve spent several hours discussing things with Naderites. I like them because they’re always animated, educated and motivated. Unfortunately, there are some major sticking points between the Nader view and the Cato view that tell me we’ll probably always be on opposites sides of the street. That doesn’t mean we can’t both contribute to the political system in this country, just that we have different ways of going about things.

I have to step away here, but I’d like to come back and address fallacy behind certain ‘rights’ which have been discovered recently way outside the golden penumbra of the Constitution.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 28, 2004 06:24 PM

From the open portal rdelephant linked over to the Kerry website: “To make affordable health care a right - not a privilege - for every American, John Kerry and John Edwards will:” blah blah blah.

Before we venture very far here - health care is neither a right nor a privilege. It is an expense. Many people do not have health care coverage in this country. Many choose not to carry it. Because you do not have health care coverage does not mean you’re in trouble - it means you don’t have health care coverage. Way too often the lack of coverage is portrayed as some huge short coming of compassion amongst the Haves.

Against that backdrop, understand that many poor children in my city have still not received their vaccinations. Is it because the rich doctors and hospitals refuse them treatment? Not at all - the vaccines are FREE. Their parents have simply neglected to ever bring their kids to the clinic to have it done. Do we measure this against the lack of compassion of the Haves - or the simple irresponsibilty of people - the kind of irresponsibilty that leads to poverty?

To say that I have a right to something - that it’s my Right because I have a Need - opens up a Pandora’s box of ‘rights’ that can never be closed. The words ‘health care’ appear nowhere in the Constitution. People are not guaranteed ‘life, liberty and free health care’. Only the socialists would propose such a deal. Remember, if you have a ‘right’ to another’s goods or services - coercively, against their will - these ‘rights’ are commonly referred to as theft and slavery.

For instance, we all have a need for clothing. Do I have a Right to Clothing? Wait, I only want Abercrombie & Fitch - I deserve to get the same clothes the rich kids hook their parents into buying for them. Tell me how long A&F stays solvent as one freeloader after another claims their Right to Clothing.

What about food? Can’t go long without it. In fact, you can go longer WITHOUT health care coverage than you can food. I have a Right to Food. Wait until Ralph’s, Piggly Wiggly, A&P and Krogers finds out about this one. Food is not a ‘privilege’ any longer, just for the rich. I claim my fair share of the food. I have a RIGHT to eat. And I want NY Strip, not bologna.

Shelter? Transportation? A good-paying job (regardless of my qualifications)? Well, you can see what a wonderfully Dystopian world I’ve created. Welcome to the world of the Two Johns. Start flushing.

But we’re not done!! “John Kerry and John Edwards will cut family premiums by up to $1,000.”

Wonderful. They’re going to force insurance companies to cough up $1000/family in premiums. And how do the insurance companies make up the losses? Maybe they just fold? Stop writing that book of business? Ask the people of Florida or South Carolina how easy it is to find an OB-GYN doctor to deliver their baby. Malpractice hacks like Edwards have driven a great deal of business away from these states through punative lawsuits. This is a good thing? When my wife had terrible morning sickness, she was told the one drug that would have helped her was pulled from the market because of lawsuits. And now lawyers are going to fix our insurance problems? I don’t think so.

Why don’t Kerry/Edwards promise everyone a $1000 tax cut? Then they wouldn’t have to be generous on the private sector’s dime - they’d have to make the cuts themselves (I know, too logical).

There’s lots more Break the Bank pie-in-the-sky promises in rdelephant’s Advertisement, but this should be enough to bust the Treasury all on its own. Those of you with short or selective memories - don’t forget the Middle Class Tax Cut Clinton promised in 1992 - which turned into the largest single tax increase in American history (with Gore casting the deciding vote).

The democrats will promise everyone a $50 and a bottle to get the votes they need. But their delivery is always the same. What promises? You have us confused with some other candidate. We never promised you X - are you on crack?

Don’t believe me? Vote for Kerry and watch your cornhole, Peter.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 29, 2004 12:31 AM

rdelephant says:
“There is nothing inherently wrong with tax cuts. But they are crazy when you cannot afford them (as our current deficits show). It would also be nice if they were not so heavily weighted to the wealthy.”

I agree. So when do we start taxing the poor?

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 29, 2004 12:35 AM

“Health care is an essential safeguard of human life and dignity and there is an obligation for society to ensure that every person be able to realize this right.”
- Cardinal Joseph Bernardin, Chicago Archdiocese
http://www.pnhp.org/

The Bush administartion has let a contract to provide universal health care coverage to the people of Iraq. “The contract by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) seeks to “help facilitate rapid, universal health service delivery to the Iraqi population” including “basic health care available to 12.5 million persons” after six months and “25 million persons” after one year of program implementation. The Administration also requires all 25 million Iraqis to have maternal, child health care, and health information and education after six months of program implementation.”

http://www.house.gov/commerce_democrats/press/108nr17.htm

In an extensive ABCNEWS/Washington Post poll, Americans by a 2-1 margin, 62-32 percent, prefer a universal health insurance program over the current employer-based system.

http://abcnews.go.com/sections/living/US/healthcare031020_poll.html

Millions of Americans lack any insurance protection at all, and many of these are middle class. Many poor and non-working Americans are eligible for a wide range of benefits, while others struggle to keep their families just out of poverty yet lack any insurance. A worker may have coverage one week, arranged by his employer, yet lose it the following week because he switched jobs to a firm without coverage. Similarly, workers who are perhaps forced in to early retirement by economic conditions, or their health, are not eligible for Medicare or any other program and can find themselves suddenly in dire straits for lack of affordable coverage.

http://www.heritage.org/Research/HealthCare/test031003.cfm

“A new study by researchers at Harvard Medical School and Public Citizen estimates that national health insurance could save at least $286 billion annually on paperwork, enough to cover all of the uninsured and to provide full prescription drug coverage for everyone in the United States.

We’re already paying for universal coverage. We’re just not getting it. We’re pouring a large portion of every health care dollar into the waste of the private insurance companies, their executive salaries and stock options, their lobbying and advertising.”

http://www.kucinich.us/issues/universalhealth.php

Posted by: rdelephant at August 29, 2004 08:43 AM

There’s no doubt in my mind that Cardinal Bernardin (God rest his soul) would have wanted everyone to be covered by some sort of insurance, but note he didn’t profess it as a Right. Healthcare as a Right is what I object to, as with any redistributionist scheme, it involves people working for nothing or giving away their services in order than others may enjoy said Rights.

However, when you fundamentally misunderstand the Constitution and the concept of enumerated powers, such fantasies as ‘Free Universal Heathcare’ and ‘livable wages’ become a government project and not an individual responsibiltiy. You may think cedeing your rights away to bureaucratic authority makes you safer, but it does not. Remember what Franklin said about people who trade their liberty for security.

“A new study by researchers at Harvard Medical School and Public Citizen estimates that national health insurance could save at least $286 billion annually on paperwork, enough to cover all of the uninsured and to provide full prescription drug coverage for everyone in the United States.” - a totally laughable assertion.

My wife has worked on the benefits end of hospital administration for 25 years, and almost all paperwork is generated by government regs. Now the Mafia proposes to clean up Sicily? I think not.

One example: the new privacy laws went into effect this year, so when the hospital contacts an insurance company the only info the insurance company HAS TO provide is whether the patient has coverage or not. That’s it. The hospital then has to call to see if the patient needs to be pre-certified before the procedure is begun. It has to call on every single patient or run the risk of not being paid by insurance. This is the type of thing that used to be handled routinely by registration prior to admittance, on-line as part of the process.

Do I have to tell you how much time is wasted calling insurance companies on every single patient? Government isn’t going to reduce this burden, they’re going to ADD TO IT. And anyone you tells you otherwise is totally ignorant of the current situation or delusional.

Speaking of delusional, how does the money saved on paperwork convert directly into paying for everyone’s prescriptions? (LOGIC!!) Money not spent is NOT equivalent to money saved - should these expenses disappear tomorrow (which they will not) - they will not leave behind mountains of cash to shovel into the pit that is prescription drug benefits (another Right I can’t find in the Constitution or its Amendments).

Harvard Medical School should have been there last summer to witness the Universal healthcare Solution to a heatwave in France. An avalanche of elderly overwhelmed a system better suited to helping people in onesies and twosies and resulted in 15,000 deaths from over-heating. Is this what Harvard Medical School longs for? Another socialist utopia where everything’s free, comrade?

Isn’t Kucinich due back on his planet now?

Don’t you have a thought of your own? Or are you just cut and paste?

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 29, 2004 10:33 AM

We are the richest nation on earth. We can afford to cover everyone and we should. Quibbling over whether that is technically a “right” is an exercise in semantics.

Nobody said anything about the healthcare being free. Since individuals are finding it harder and harder to find jobs which provide the insurance protection which most of us take for granted, yes the government should make it its job to fill that gap. Among the enumerated powers is to provide for the general welfare, or did you miss that day of Constitutional Law.

I will take the Harvard Medical School study over your uninformed opinion any day. If we went to a single payer system, the money saved on paperwork would automatically be available for prescription drugs (or whatever).

Your claim that the heat wave deaths in France are the fault of socialized medicine is ridiculous. Even here in the land of air conditioning, elderly people die during heat waves. The French system is no more prone to being overwhelmed by mass catastrophe than is our own.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 29, 2004 02:05 PM

Torpedo,

OK, you’re right. There are just too many differences in progressive and libertarian thinking for a rapproachment. Take health care, for instance.

Statistics from highly credible sources, including the very same Harvard sources you cite, show that rationed managed care prescriptions based on profit rationale, not medical need, cause about 100,000 deaths per year. That’s nearly twenty 9/11’s. Each year.

I would also point out that a recently released study shows that nearly one-quarter of the annual cost of the $1.5 trillion health care industry is due to extremely well-documented questionable or downright fraudulent health care billing practices perpetrated on powerless victims by profit-motivated institutions.

Many eminent and honest doctors, who have sworn the Hippocratic oath, testify that the breakdown of the current health care system due to these and other causes is imminent.

Your position saying that corporate interests should basically be allowed to do whatever they want, for whomever they want, unfettered of responsible governmental oversight, is preposterous. The U.S. CONSTITUTION you claim to defend EMPOWERS CONGRESS TO REGULATE INTERSTATE COMMERCE including HMOs and insurance companies who malpractice and steal from their customers without recourse. These powers were granted by the founders for very good reasons, and I for one, am not willing to cede another inch to a shameless corporate apologist like you.

By the way, the interstate commerce power also underlies Congress authority to set livable wages. I don’t care if you peddle that Cato Institute “individual responsibility” line in the marketplace of ideas. I’ll reject the idea of performing appendectomies on myself or lobotomies on you because the logic is flawed. But, don’t insult me and embarrass yourself by basing the heart of your case on confident ignorance or brazen distortion of the Constitution.

Making a Killing, HMOs and the Threat to Your Health, Jamie Court and Frank Smith

Your Money or Your Life: Strong Medicine for America’s Health Care System;By David M. Cutler;

Scott

Posted by: Scott at August 29, 2004 02:58 PM

Let me paraphrase Roger Pilon here, the Enumerated Powers of the Constitution refers to the fact that anything the government is allowed to do MUST be explicitly spelled out in the document or its Amendments.

If, in fact, the General Welfare clause granted Congress the authorization to to tax and spend for the ‘general welfare’ - it would have been granted virtual unlimited power - thus negating the whole concept of ‘enumerated powers’. The passage must be read as permiting spending only as it relates to the general welfare only, not to the welfare of particular parties. In the same vein, the interstate commerce clause would render the entire concept of enumerated powers (and the 9th & 10th Amendments) null and void if it truly was meant to regulate anything that ‘affects’ commerce. The original idea (before FDR sodomized it) was to make ‘regular’ (to regulate) state-to-state commerce, so that no state could place tarriffs, fees or barriers to trade from neighboring states. It was one of the concepts that made the US grow so quickly.

I am well aware of the ‘penumbra’ opened by 20th century socialists in the Constitution, but because a law is broken does not mean that it no longer in effect. I would suggest to elephant he consult the Federalist Papers and the writtings of John Jay.

To say we are the richest nation on earth says nothing of what our government is and isn’t allowed to do. Either we have a government bound by the concept of enumerated powers, or we have this socialist utopia where the government is responsible for feeding you, clothing you, blowing your nose and buying your Prozac.

At least when the Carrie Nations wanted to ban alcohol once and for all, they went to the trouble of passing the 18th Amendment. Back when people used to go to the trouble of amending the document instead of reading in their own agenda where there wasn’t any - back when Congress used to declare war instead of giving Presidents blank checks to cash later.

Rationed medical care is not killing people, doctors are. Drug interaction, misdiagnosis, unnecessary surgery, hospital-induced infections and human error now accounts for about 250,000 deaths/year - making iatrogenic death the 3rd leading cause in this country (after heart disease and cancer). This has nothing to do with rationed care, but if you nationalize the system, I can bet you this number will grow.

Do doctors and hospitals have a profit motive? Yes, it’s called being around next year. You have one too. You don’t work for free, do you, Scott? Or are you one of those Trust Fund babies? What’s so wrong with earning a living? Lots of people are doing it - even surgeons.

elephant - So socialized medicine is superior? Is that why more people fly from countries with socialized medicine fly, drive, walk to countries without socialized medicine for treatment? Waiting over a year for an MRI sounds wonderful. Sign me up.

If you are - indeed - a lawyer, I certainly hope its not in the area of Constitutional law (or I weep for your clients).

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 30, 2004 12:33 AM

“These powers were granted by the founders for very good reasons, and I for one, am not willing to cede another inch to a shameless corporate apologist like you.” - Scott

The founders did not ‘grant’ powers. They stressed our rights came from God, granted to individuals and these individuals grant government the power to rule. Not the other way around. A fairly fundamental error, but not all that unusual, given the practices of modern education.

“I will take the Harvard Medical School study over your uninformed opinion any day. If we went to a single payer system, the money saved on paperwork would automatically be available for prescription drugs (or whatever).” - rdelephant

Let me illustrate your illogic. A couple plans to wed. The whole plan spins out of control and they finally end up with a wedding that will cost $500,000. They have a sit-down with their parents and decided they really can’t afford a wedding that costs that much.

They have a much simpler wedding. Question: where is the half million they didn’t spend? According to you, it’s buying seniors prescription drugs. Having an expense is not the same thing as having the money. But then again, you’re one of those people who talk about how the government can ‘afford’ to let people keep their own money. I never knew it cost me anything not to steal your car - but it’s clear to me now.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 30, 2004 12:48 AM

Your reading of constitutional law was rejected 60 years ago. Get over it. The fact that you can’t deal with modern industrial society is a personal problem, if you ask me. You are asking people to give up their Social Security, their Medicare, their Medicaid, their student loans, their disater emergency assistance etc. etc., and why ?? Because John Jay said so ??? I don’t think so. John Jay had no way of predicting the needs of a modern state. The Great Depression was the ultimate rejection of your conception of a government of enumerated powers. With the possible exception of Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt was our greatest president. He and the Supreme Court got it right. You and your Libertarian pals are the ones stuck in the 18th Century.

Your theory that we will have more iatrogenic death as the result of securing health insurance for the uninsured is baseless, bordering on laughable.

Socialized medicine is better because it covers the uninsured. I never said that it was better on a per procedure basis, I just don’t think its worse. Maybe you have a cite for your waiting a year for an MRI ??

Your argument about the paperwork savings doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. Unlike your wedding analogy, we are ALREADY spending that money on paperwork today. If we don’t have to spend a dollar on paperwork we can spend that same dollar on prescription drugs. It really isn’t that tough a concept.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 30, 2004 06:06 PM

Nicely put, elephant.

Torpedo, I truly respect your right to free speech.
By all means PLEASE keep quoting Roger Pilon and yourself as often as possible in your quest for Libertarian votes.

Scott

Posted by: Scott at August 30, 2004 10:10 PM

The President of the Canadian Chamber of Commerce thought he had an aneurysm. So did his doctor. He was still on the waiting list for an MRI when he passed away - from an aneurysm. It happens all the time - ask any Canadian. When you make all medical services free, there is no way to limit consumption of said services without rationing. In Canada, any given hospital has a number of procedures, services and operations it can perform per month. They don’t get paid for any more - so the service stops. Once that number is satisfied, the overflow is scheduled into the next month. I live in a medium-sized Midwestern city - in this city we have more MRI machines than all of eastern Canada. Check out the patient lists in Cleveland, Erie, Detroit and Buffalo - they’re full of Canadians who don’t want to wait any longer for medical help. And that’s the beauty of socialized medicine - it doesn’t just say no to the poor, it says NO to everyone - whether they have the money or not. Increase the number of people each doctor is seeing each day and pay the doctor less for each visit and see if the iatrogenic deaths plummet. (Hint: use the part of your brain north of your hippocampus).

And you’re right, the Constitution is a dated instrument that just never changed with your modern state, comrade. It’s not a document that lends itself to ‘readings’. It says what it says and there was never any intention that more would be read into it than what’s written. Concepts like enumerated powers, limited government, liberty and the supremacy of the individual are so 15 minutes ago. Tell me why the founding fathers would spend so much time fashioning a concept of limited powers and then place GIANT LOOPHOLES in the General Welfare and Interstate Commerce clause. Maybe because they never intended giant loopholes? Maybe because Joe Stalin’s favorite President put them there?

You don’t like my analogies, you don’t understand the difference between a debt and revenue and you’re implying the consumer is going to buy their own prescriptions now? - I thought that was the government’s job in the Modern State. It’s not a tough concept because you’re not thinking.

Why don’t you stick to defending Kim Jong Il, you really had that down to a science.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 30, 2004 10:37 PM

“The quality of medicare earned a B grade overall and around 60 per cent graded the health care system an A or B, according to the survey commissioned by the Canadian Medical Association.”

http://64.233.161.104/search?q=cache:sirzitS9VpgJ:www.cbc.ca/story/canada/national/2004/08/16/healthcare040816.html+canadian+health+care+system&hl=en&ie=UTF-8

“But despite problems in Canadian health care, the principles enshrined in the Medical Care Act remain sacred to Canadians. As one doctor puts it, “Today a politician in Canada is more likely to get away with canceling Christmas than he is with canceling Canada’s health insurance program.”“

http://www.newrules.org/equity/CNhealthcare.html

Keep in mind, as well, that we are 50% wealthier than Canada as a matter of per capita GDP. Thus, we can afford a 50% better system than they can.

Call the interstate commerce and general welfare clauses loopholes if you like, but they have served our needs nicely. Maybe the Founding Fathers foresaw the need for flexibility in the future, maybe these were just oversights. The fact remains that they are there and we would not have had Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, student loans, disaster emergency assistance, or many other programs without them. Maybe that would be okay with an ideaologue like you, but most people would find your restrictive reading requiring them to give up these hallmarks of the modern state positively anathema. That is why this is not a even a matter of debate any more by thinking people.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 31, 2004 06:09 PM

The Founding Fathers were nothing if not logical men. As Jefferson said, it was the natural order of things for government to grow at the expense of liberty. Therefore they instituted a system of checks and balances that almost guaranteed a level of gridlock, the idea being that fewer laws would be passed - with impulse and emotion marginalized by the slow speed of legislation. Fewer laws created a better government.

In order for the concept of enumerated powers to hold any water, there was NEVER any intention to read into the ‘penumbra’ of Interstate Commerce clause an absolute right for the federal government to regulate EVERYTHING. That flies in the face of ‘limited powers’, it flies in the face of limited government. But FDR found powers that weren’t there and when the other branches of goverment raised their objections, he threatened to pack the Supreme Court with his appointees. He created the loophole - I’m just reporting on it. This may upset you and your ‘thinking people’, but think about it for a moment.

Perhaps he was a great wartime President, but there’s little doubt FDR did more damage to the Constitution (the instrument he swore to defend and protect) than any other President before or after him. He scared the crap out of people and triggered the 22nd Amendment.

Consider for a moment why Americans are twice as rich as Canadians. Could it be the Canadian government looks more to Berlin than Washington? Europe would kill for our growth rate and unemployment stats, but with everyone firmly on the tit of government, it will never happen.

Systems of entitlement sap the lifeblood of any economy to fuel their redistribution schemes. They compete for capital in the marketplace and discourage entrepreneurial spirit.

These “hallmarks of the modern state” you tout are, in fact, the trappings of the modern welfare state (aka The New Europe). If the US continues down this road, we will end up just like France, happy to see our unemployment down around 12% and hoping to hold onto about 38% of what we earn. And while this may sound like Nirvana to slugs on the dole, but its a big hammer in the balls for the American economy.

I know, who cares? It’s just you and me out here now - no one else is reading this.

Look for Kerry to shake up his campaign staff.

Posted by: torpedo_eight at August 31, 2004 09:08 PM

I actually have some sympathy for the original intent argument, but sometimes the ends do justify the means. Roosevelt was faced with an economic calamity and he needed to get the economy moving again. That was the driving force behind his actions.

I also agree that he and every American politician since him have adopted socialist policies, from Social Security to student loans, the whole litany. That label does not scare me. Pure capitalism disappeared with Herbert Hoover, except in countries like El Salvador, where very small wealthy minorities lord it over large majorities living at subsistence level. The welfare state policies which have been pursued by both sides of the aisle in this country since Roosevelt has created the large middle class and general prosperity which we enjoy. I agree that this can be overdone — that the capitalist engine must be allowed its fuel, but I don’t think that insuring the uninsured will seriously affect that engine.

I am almost ashamed to admit that as a youth I considered myself a Libertarian. I still remember the simple illustration my economics professor used to explain why progressive taxation is fair. He said that if you can take from the rich man what he would spend on a fancy bell for his boat and spend that same money on buying food for a poor family for a year, shouldn’t you do so? I had to admit that you should. I have never second-guessed my change in viewpoint.

The Libertarian economic view that what I earn is necessarily “mine” in some God-given way, is in my view erroneous. It ignores the contribution that society makes to those earnings, by the education it provided, by the history of ideas that it contributed, by the markets it contributed, by any number of other economic conditions that it provided to make those earnings possible. It is this context for the economic transaction that, in my view, makes it morally acceptable for society to do what my professors “bell/food” example argues should be done for the greater good.

Posted by: rdelephant at August 31, 2004 09:57 PM

Just scott here still following with interest until the thread closes.

I agree with elephant with a couple of twists. The meaning of the “General Welfare” clause does not derive from the founders intent, the Court’s interpretation, the Congress, the States, or Cato Institute. These are merely checks on the ultimate power, the highest authority, “we the people,” who constantly refine the Constitution in the fire of elections. The many cases cited by elephant, such as Social Security, provide ample precedent that these powers are broad and will be validated by checking institutions unless and until Libertarians sweep to power. If and when you do, I’ll vote with my feet and move to Canada because the great egalatarian nation that I know and love will be dead.

The notion that an unregulated free market is the “perfect” system doesn’t hold up because human beings are not “perfect.” Regarding health care, the Interstate Commerce clause has been properly expanded and applied in recognition of the need for mechanisms to keep folks selling quack cures or performing unlicensed procedures, to hold insurance companies liable for improper billing practices, and so on. The unrefuted evidences of this need, torpedo, stand in stark contrast to your scary and unsupported assertions that the system would get better if only we would let private industry loose to do as they please.

The main issue was universal health care. I took the liberty of reading the Libertarian position on the issue. It’s truly a frightening Darwinian vision of anti-community. Only the strong survive. Dog eat dog. Every person for themself. In this selfish black world, private money rules over all. I see that vision as a much greater threat to my liberty than the pro-community vision I freely choose and that has already been chosen by most of the free and developed nations of the world. The case for universal health care has been well-stated here and a majority of Americans polled are willing to pay even higher taxes to realize it. I’m with them and we will prevail.

Posted by: Scott at September 1, 2004 01:38 PM