Healthcare
Why There is No Right to Health Care (and other Progressive Ideas)
Rights are based on God-created equality among human beings–nothing else. Because men are created equal in their basic worth by being made in the image of God–they are entitled by God to the basic rights of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness (acquiring property through labor). Everyone’s life is equal in intrinsic value; Everyone’s freedom is equal in breadth and beauty; And everyone’s right to pursue happiness (through acquiring property and wealth) is equal in opportunity.
But that’s where equality and rights end. All other things related to human beings are unequal and thus unworthy of the status of a “right.”
This is obviously and expressly true in the area of health–which is why President is wrong to declare health care a right. It can never be a right because too many factors make its demands unequal. These factors include:
- Genetics – some of us are born with great genes that are less susceptible to certain diseases and others more prone to heart problems, cancer, and neurological disorders. Due to our genetic make-ups, there is no way to “equally” distribute the right of health care. Why should someone prone to horrific diseases be able to demand a million dollars in health care over a lifetime and another who is relatively healthy be required to contribute to the tab through taxation? This is a simple matter of fairness. The general public is not responsible for the genetic disposition of others.
- Lifestyle Choices –I shared last week how my Canadian friend, Graham, bilked the Canadian government-run health care system out of hundreds of thousands of dollars becaue of his choices to live most of his life as a chain smoker. He destroyed his lungs over decades by sucking in nicotine. As a result of his poor choices, why should another healthy or wiser choosing Canadian be stuck with his health bills? It is simply not fair to charge someone else for another person’s sins and mistakes. This comes back to basic justice and decency.
- Personal Circumstances – Human beings also encounter many circumstances in life that are neither genetic or a product of their choices. Life just happens–filled with joys and sorrows that are totally non-comparable. One person has a house that burns to the ground. Another loses a child in a terrible traffic accident. From a health perspective, one might have an accident that requires major medical attention, while another is blessed with easier circumstances. Again, because of the inequalities involved in normal life, it would be wrong to ask one person to foot the bill for another. It would be essentially unjust and impossible for a human government to balance.
There is another important reason why there is no right to health care. This one relates to our relationship with our Creator. He is the author and giver of life–and oftentimes uses our personal circumstances to teach us His ways, create humility and obedience in our hearts, and draw our eyes toward eternity. If we remove that important means of personal growth through a government right to health care, we remove one of the greatest incentives to personal growth and drawing close to our Maker.
For seven years–from 1994 to 2001–I suffered with a very painful burning sensation in my throat. It got progressively worse over time and led me to consult over ten doctors, have two rabbit-trail surgeries, and cry out to God with all my heart for relief of pain and understanding of His ways.
During this difficult period, God continually drew me to 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 where the Bible declares that “my grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” I learned during this test in my life to be humble, prayerful, trusting in God and not in myself. I learned to take a deeper measure of my weaknesses and bad attitudes and asked him to produce a greater wealth of his goodness within me.
It was a hard time because I speak for a living. Every time I used my vocal cords, they were painfully sore and the intense burning in my throat got worse and worse. I remember numerous times getting ready to speak to an audience, crying some tears and asking God for the grace to get through the message. He always helped me and I learned to trust him as never before.
Late in the seven year test, I sensed that my deliverance was at hand because of his work in my life. I began to pray fervently for his will to be done, and opened my Bible to a special promise he had given me many years before.
One day in 2001, my wife was talking to her best friend who asked a simple question: “Have the doctors ever checked out Ron’s teeth?” When I heard the question, a bell went off inside of me and I immediately scheduled an appointment. To my dentist’s shock and surprise, they discovered that an abscessed wisdom tooth had created a ping-pong-ball-sized noxious cyst in my jaw–which leaked its poison into my throat every day. I had surgery within days, the cyst was removed and my throat eventually returned to normal. I never returned to “normal.” My life had been changed through this health care test.
I’m glad I didn’t have a “right” to health care during that ordeal. There are many lessons I would not have learned, many character traits that would not have been fully developed. If I’d had a right to everything, I would have demanded that right and forgotten about God. That’s the way we human beings tend to work.
Not having an automatic right to health care is very beneficial from a personal development standpoint. Suffering draws us closer to God. We seek his will and his answers. If the government’s footing the bill, there’s no one to seek but them. They are usually not as helpful as the God of the universe.
Health care must remain a personal responsibility–not a government right. We are genetically different, we make different choices in life, we encounter different circumstances, and we are all involved in a different relationship to our Creator in which he desires to work for our good. If the government and other tax payers become our new fountain of health, then justice will be impeded and many character lessons will be lost.
This is also why all other “progressive rights” ring hollow. There is no such thing as a right to a job, to a certain level of pay, to a house or car, or any other societal desire–because of the unique differences between people. All of these blessings are privileges–not rights–to be gained by the prayers, hard work, and wise choices of the individual. God is involved in all of these life opportunities also–and wants us to look to him for provision and personal spiritual growth.
It is through our suffering and pain–and very different circumstances in life–that we learn to grow up and put our trust in God. Insurance policies, church affiliations, and other voluntary arrangements–and even government–can be helpful in the process–but never to be depended upon.
There is no right to health care. Creating that right would be creating a new god in America who would not serve us well.
Things Are Not as They Seem
Sometimes things are not as they seem. They appear to be one thing, but in reality they are something far different from how they project themselves.
The United States is currently facing two immense cultural battles that fit in this category of intended deception. What’s an “intended deception?”
That’s the dictionary meaning of a LIE. So what are some areas where we are being lied to–where things are not as they seem?
HOMOSEXUAL MARRIAGE
Seattle’s staunchly liberal newspaper, the Seattle Times, which is in business because it wasn’t as blatantly liberal as the now-defunct Seattle P.I., is in the forefront of pushing the acceptance of homosexual marriage in the state of Washington.
On November 3, Washingtonians will have the opportunity to REJECT Senate bill 5688 through Referendum 71 which would elevate homosexual marriages to equality with marriage through expanded domestic partnerships. On the support side, the Times has been running one-to-two articles a week for some time championing the homosexual cause. An October 4, 2009 front-page lead article on the issue was entitled “Stakes High in Fight over Gay Rights.” To their credit, the article fairly quoted people on both sides of this monumental 21st century debate.
The Times’ Opinion Page was another story. It’s lead editorial said, “The Times recommends Promote Families: Approve Referendum 71. The article went on to applaud homosexual “unions” with the following semantical posturing:
- They called homosexual-led “families” simply “ordinary people with ordinary family lives.”
- They said SB 5688 was about “equal treatment for all Washington residents going about their private lives.”
- They said their cause was about “responsible adults in committed relationships.”
- They said passage of the new law was about “loving couples–our relatives, friends, and neighbors–who own property,, operate businesses, and take care of their children.”
I think you get the idea. This is all about loving, committed, ordinary folks who, by the way, simply want to change the five thousand definition of marriage–and have the state pay for it in benefits.
But on this paramount issue of our lifetime, “things are not as they seem.”
Homosexual marriage is not about family, marriage, love, or commitment. It’s about using legal means to permanently change the moral code that undergirds our civilization. It’s about full acceptance and promotion of homosexual behaviour–which according to every religion on earth is immoral, unnatural, and destructive to people–both in this life and in the next.
For five millennia–and especially two thousand years of Western culture, wise civilizations have accepted the truthful premise that the only responsible form of sexual behavior, designed specifically by our Creator and Savior was between a man and a woman in a covenant relationship we call marriage. All other forms of sexual choice are immoral–and include fornication (sex by unmarried people), adultery (sex with some else’s spouse), homosexuality (men with men or women with women), pedophilia (adults with children), and bestiality (humans with animals).
Homosexuality is not singled out in this list. It is just one form of sexual perversion–“making crooked something that is straight”–which is where the words “pervert” and “straight” originate. The only difference in our world today is that it is the homosexuals who are demanding that civilization change its tried and tested moral code and allow them to be viewed as “normal.”
But homosexual behavior is not normal. It’s lowers your lifespan (to an average of 42 years), it is one of the most promiscuous forms of sexuality (four times that of heterosexual perversions), it doubles your chances of depression, it is often grossly ugly and vile in its forms, and in terms of a person’s relationship with God–separates them from his forgiveness and grace through a refusal to turn away from sexual sin. Never mind that homosexuals cannot produce children, and so they must get them from others–often breaking up real families when one of them comes “out of the closet.”
No, this issue is not about “loving, normal couples.” It is about permanently condoning and legalizing immoral behavior. And because I love people, I cannot accept the lies that will destroy people and our civilization in the name of tolerance.
That’s why I’m encouraging all Washingtonians to not accept this charade of fairness and decency and vote to REJECT Referendum 71.
GOVERNMENT-RUN HEALTH CARE
The Obama administration is pushing radical legislation in our nation that would permanently alter the way health care is received and practiced in the United States. The progressives and their allies would have you believe that this issue is about:
- Compassionately providing health care for all American citizens.
- Cutting the costs of health care and not adding to the nation’s deficit.
- Providing better healthcare than the current system which is the best in the world.
- A right to qualitative healthcare that we all deserve and should demand.
- Not providing for abortions, giving coverage to illegal citizens, nor increasing rationing for health services.
- Not limiting benefits for Seniors via cuts in Medicare.
But again–when it comes to the truth about the health care bills now being voted on and discussed in the United States Congress, “things are not as they seem.”
Though I’m sure some well meaning people might believe the ideas listed above, the real force behind the move to government health care is the power to control–not the desire to provide. This health care debate is all about government power to squelch freedom in our beloved nation.
Here’s the plain and simple truth:
- Government run health care will decrease innovation and service and greatly multiply deficits.
- It will not be better than private care–it will enforce mediocrity on all.
- There is no right to healthcare–only to life (they can’t murder you), to liberty (they can’t enslave you), and to happiness or property (they can’t heavily tax you.) Everything else is a privilege and differs among human beings due to their gifts, choices, and circumstances in life.
- The bills being considered will include abortion (they say it’s just a medical procedure), provide for illegals (it’s all about votes!), and will lead to rationing (there aren’t enough doctors who will remain at their posts).
- The only way the government option (control) will work is to sqeeze $500 billion dollars out of Medicare.
The essence of this debate is not about health. It’s tyranny versus liberty, control versus choice, government further perverting its role from being rightful protector of God given rights to assuming the role of God in “providing” an all powerful Nanny State to its slaves, er, citizens.
There’s that word perversion again. Perverting marriage and perverting government’s role in our lives.
Things are not as they seem.
I pray to God that our eyes will be opened.
America to Politicians on Health Care: Keep the Change!
The message coming from grassroots America to the DC politicians in town halls across the country and is loud and clear:
We don’t want government-run health care. This is change we don’t believe in–so don’t vote for it, or you will do so at your own peril. I’m proud of the American people for rising up and speaking out on this issue over the past few months. Every opinion poll shows that everyday Americans believe we’re going a wrong direction –with the average margin on all health care polls being 54%-46% against the government getting involved. A new American revolution has begun that could bring great renewal and blessing to a nation that’s been torn between two opinions for at least a generation. Those two differing opinions, or worldviews, are ultimately what the health care debate is all about.
On one side is the secular or humanist worldview which is promoting government health care. Why? Because when you reject the God-factor, the true basis of human rights, and our Creator’s defined roles for individuals and spheres of society, a God-substitute must take its place which is normally an enlarged state. The call for universal, government-run health care might take place under the guise of compassion and caring, but it’s ultimately about power–the government controlling the masses through assuming the ultimate Provider role that enlightened civilizations have always ascribed to the God of the Universe. This is the road to tyranny–as evidenced by every socialist revolution in history.
The American Revolution of 1776 represented the opposite revolution–an amazing configuration of the Judeo-Christian view of God and government in human society. According to biblical faith, it is God who is our Provider–and through personal faith, morals, character, ethics, community, creativity and industry, we can reap the blessings of his provision in every area of life. The early American concept of the God-given rights of men and limitations on human government, limiting its role to the proper sphere of protection of not provision for its citizens, was the Christian expression of political and economic ideas. That view created the greatest amount of freedom and prosperity in the history of the world. This is the surest path to liberty or human freedom.
But as Thomas Jefferson wisely stated during those days, “the price of liberty is eternal vigilance.” In the 20th century a rebellion against Christian values began to eat away at the foundations of the American family, work ethic, sexuality, and finally the role of government in society. The engine of this secular revolution was the government schools and universities which began to toss out all remnants of the faith and character that made America great. The secularists knew what Abraham Lincoln had predicted in the 19th century, that “the philosophy of the schools in one generation will be the philosophy of government in the next.”
Which is where we stand today. For a generation, the teaching of the government schools has left out God, morals, freedom, limited government, the basis of human rights, etc. and replaced these sacred pillars with an all powerful-and-providing centralized government. They’ve even invented the “right” to health care–and it is the responsibility of the government to provide it through a single payer system.
But thanks be to God!–the American people are waking up and realizing that their very civilization is at stake in this boondoggle called national health care reform. For the past couple of months, the American people have been speaking out loudly in town halls, e-mails, letters to the editor, and various rallies around the nation that we Americans don’t want to go down the road to socialized medicine. Here are some of the many reasons for the outcry:
- Both the House and Senate bills under consideration are loaded with ambiguities and lack of details–yet the bills are being “rushed” through Congress. At the very least this is bad government process which will give us very dubious results. Read Chuck Norris’ recent commentary on this.
- The “government option” will, of necessity, lead to to many people leaving their private policies for the government plan which will decrease competition and choice–thus raising costs.
- The senior citizens of the nations–including 70,000 people who left the AARP in July over their disastrous flirting with the national health care plan–understand that the government take over of health insurance will be the end of Medicare as they’ve experienced it.
- The “crisis” under which the national health care balloon has been floated is way overblown. During these necessary months of debate we’ve learned that actually 80% of Americans are satisfied with their current health care plans and don’t want to see them changed.
- The number that have been used to justify the move to socialized medicine is that there are “47 million uninsured people out there that need insurance.” That number has now been thoroughly analyzed and soundly rejected. The reality is that nearly ten million of this number are illegal aliens, fifteen million are those who live above the median American income of $46,000 and simply choose to spend their money on other things, and another ten million are eligible for current government programs but don’t sign up for various reasons. That leaves under nine million citizens that can’t afford health coverage out of 304 million Americans–or 3%. Hardly a crisis–simply an opportunity to improve our help for the poorest among us.
- The arrogance of our current political leaders has stunned the electorate. Rep. Anthony Weiner D-NY told an August town hall meeting that he didn’t care what his people wanted–he knew what was best and would vote for government care. Now that’s representing the people! It appears that the current administration and Congress might just be the most arrogant collection of leaders that the US has seen since the Nixon administration (arrogance is non-partisan). After the August recess, the Senate is considering passing the “hell care bill”, against the will of their constituents, using a parliamentary procedure called “reconciliation” which avoids the normal sixty votes necessary to stop a filibuster. So much for representative government.
- A national health care plan will give the Federal Government control of an additional sixteen percent of the multi-trillion dollar US economy. The folks aren’t buying this power grab of their liberty. We don’t need another “Freddie Mac of Health Care” to bring down our medical system as they did to the housing and real estate industries.
- Everybody knows by looking around the world that socialized medicine or national health care options increase the cost of health care through government waste and lack of competition and lead to the greater rationing of goods and services. The UK and Canada are prime examples. We don’t want to repeat their mistakes.
- The people’s greatest concern right now is the burgeoning federal deficit–which is due to the dubious 787 billion stimulus package, the omnibus bill filled with thousands of earmarks, and the refusal of the current administration to use tax cuts to create jobs and economic recovery. The people know that nationalizing health care will add trillions of dollars in the coming years to an already precarious national debt load.
- The mammoth 1000 page bills floating through the halls of Congress are loaded with both labor and insurance company perks, will lead to tax-payers footing the bill for abortions (against their will and conscience), and contain provisions that–thank you, Sarah Palin!–look very much like “death panels” to most of us. It was interesting to see the liberal press ridicule the former VP nominee on this one while at the same time the Senate quietly pulled out the sections dealing with “end-of-life counseling.” If this wasn’t about pulling the plug on Grandma, why the deletions?
Many diverse voices are making sense and generating momentum for rejecting national health care in America. The best article I’ve read in the past month was featured in the Seattle Times written by Dave Herbold, the retired COO of Microsoft and Scott Powell, the director of capital markets for Clarus Capital. You can read this excellent article here. It concludes with these words:
“More bureaucracy, greater dependence, higher taxes, more debt, fewer choices, lower quality. Get real. Fool us once with the stimulus plan, shame on us. Fool us twice, shame on our political leaders. This is less about reform and more about collectivist political power to redistribute wealth, expand federal government control, weaken individual and states’ rights, and create a permanent power base through entitlements and dependency.”
“It is time to take the first step in restoring the primacy of personal choice and responsibility. It is time to say “no” to Washington elites and “yes” to the people who deserve real reform based on a competitive system with incentives to contain costs while assuring choice, quality, and flexibility.”
Amen and amen.
So what is needed to improve health care in the best health care system in the entire world? Here are a few positive suggestions that have emerged during the debate:
1. Pass extensive tort reform currently affecting up to 16% of all medical costs. Doctors need to be set free from fear-based practice so that they can truly “do no harm.”
2. Allow health plans to go national like car insurance and other services. This will greatly increase competition and lower costs for all.
3. Do away with the politically-driven state mandatesthat drive up the costs of local insurance policies. In the state of Washington there are nearly fifty medical insurance mandates that stifle choice, competition, and the cost of various medical policies. One size doesn’t fit all. You don’t need the same coverage in your twenties that you do in your eighties.
4. Adopt the best practices of private business such as utilized by Whole Foods in the business sector or Group Health in the medical portion of society.
5. Encourage personal, portable Medical Savings Accounts through a variety of tax incentives.
6. Take responsibility for your own health and that of your family through good eating habits and lifestyle choices.
And continue to prayerfully and respectfully speak out until government-run health care is a thoroughly discredited topic of a wise and free people.
After the August recess, there will be an attempt to jam this legislation down the throats of the American public in both the house of Representatives and the US Senate. So, before your representatives return to Washington D.C., make sure they understand that you want them to read your lips on the subject of national health care.
If they don’t, make sure they read your votes in 2010 and 2012.