GOP Health Care Plan: Stall

[...] Read more: GOP Health Care Plan: Stall | The Washington Independent [...]

[...] Go here to see the original:  GOP Health Care Plan: Stall | The Washington Independent [...]

[...] original here:  GOP Health Care Plan: Stall | The Washington Independent Share and [...]

Now, why d'you think that Scott said: “If they [the National Socialist Party] don’t get it done by October, it’s not going to get done.” hm?

That's interesting, isn't it? Why did he specify October?

Mr. Weigel (that butt-sucking Obamaphile up above) is his usual clueless self about this subject, but, hey, let's speculate.

Does Mr. Scott anticipate that the Messiah's “green shoots” bubble is going to go “Crash!-Boom!-AYEEE!” 'round about the beginning of autumn, and even the most certifiably brain-dead congresscritters among the Blue Party will realize that this job-killing monstrosity being engineered by what we'll call (laughingly) their “leadership” hoists each and every one of them onto one of those spikes with with Vlad Tepes used to impale his enemies?

Jeez, no wonder Barry-boy is in such a sweat to get it passed before the August recess. Once his colleagues in the Congress head back for the hustings to undertake the distasteful task of meeting their constituents, they're going to be pretty firmly convinced that their Messiah is leading them straight to hell.

He railroads this abomination through RIGHT AWAY or he doesn't get to inflict this massive jerk-job on the American people at all.

And wouldn't that be just too damn bad?

Nah!

Right-wing moron alert!

[...] in Congress, Daily life, GOP, Government, Healthcare at 10:11 am by LeisureGuy David Weigel in the Washington Independent: The lengthy speech on health care that Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele [...]

–
“If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free.”

– P.J. O'Rourke

This spring, due to the demand decrease, the highest fuel price came down below $40 per barrel, though, the 'similar' insurance premiums still go on rising, which may imply that health care is not optional, but essential, and the inaction could bankrupt family, business, and government beyond this recession, as all across the board agree.
Earlier, the revised HELP BILL with the public option and employer mandatory has got a green light from the CBO, yet still, a new 'incomplete' analysis of emerging House legislation said it would increase deficits by $239 billion over a decade.
But, CBO does not score any savings from prevention / wellness and the rest, even as Prevention / Wellness is an actual and essential part of the savings, without which the reform would be meaningless.
And I think the other things such as increased productivity / consumer confidence, 'potential stem cell effect', 'decreased mental stress', and 'massive job creation', 'stock price effect' and etc considered, the reform might be within reach. Most importantly, a few years later, if the excessive war and military spending goes toward the health care program, the cost issue does not matter at all, I think.
Edward M. Kennedy argues, the perfect should not be the enemy of the good, “Everyone won't be satisfied and no one will get everything they want. But we need to come together, just as we've done in other great struggles in World War II and the Cold War, in passing the great civil-rights laws of the 1960s, and in daring to send a man to the moon. If we don't get every provision right, we can adjust and improve the program next year or in the years to come. What we can't afford is to wait another generation.”

Thank You For Reading !

[...] Read more here: GOP Health Care Plan: Stall | The Washington Independent [...]

Obama qualifications to reform health care:

No birth certificate

Cannot stop smoking

Difficulty telling the truth.

Therefore, I Igor produce Obama Birth Certificate at http://www.igormaro.org

Compare Obama Care vs Igor Care at Obama vs Igor Care

“There is no moron like a Republican who quotes Republicans.”

- Me, Just Now

Why are they talking about the GOP stalling? Democrats have the votes to pass this. What are they afraid of? I suspect they don't want to take full credit for this marxist healthcare reform, they want some Republican cover for this albatross.

Republicans are not working for the American public. They are still bitter over losing the presidency and will do anything to prevent any positive changes for the better in our country. I hope all of the right wing conservatives will get their heads out of the sand and their asses and get real.

Ah, well, it's gotta be “bipartisan.” Hands across the aisle, cooperative, harmonious, “All you stupid 'citizens' bend over and grab your ankles, 'cause not even those laughable clowns in the Red Party offer you any hope of rescue.”

In a gang rape, ysee, there's a kind of dilution of culpability.

Or that's the way the National Socialist Party stalwarts hope it will work.

Aw, c'mon! Not even a dead-from-the-neck-up Obamaphile could possibly try to pass off this cyanide suppository as “positive changes for the better in our country.”

Whose leg are you pissing down, and how strenuously are you insisting that it's raining, Pat?

This POS is the most horrendous job-killing, economy-destroying, child-raping National Socialist abomination since the National Recovery Act.

Even the hapless, clueless, brain-damaged rank and file of the Republican Party – the worst “so along to get along” crowd since Neville Chamberlain – aren't dumb enough to give your Messiah cover on this one.

Nope, you're gonna have to watch your own beloved Blue Party take the total responsibility for this glorious clustercopulation, and face the fact that it's coming home to roost next year like a flock of velociraptors.

Suck it up and take the blame, Patrick. You and yours have certainly earned it.

Isn't it strange how gluttony and greed has so corrupted our politics that we will probabbly not get health care passed. Each of those that oppose a health care bill should have their names posted next to the insurance and pharma donation that they have received. And if they accept a position uponleaving either house, like Tausan and Brau, they should be jailed on bribery charges. The stench of corruption is so strong that we can smell it all the way to Canada.

Nah. “Government is the great fiction by which everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else.” (Frederic Bastiat).

You, james, want somebody else to pay your personal bill for top-tier health care. You voted for your Mombasa Messiah because he promised you he'd get it for you. Barry's former colleagues of Socialist Party “A” in the Congress realize that it's a horrible job-killer, will swiftly grow unsupportable, and will absolutely ruin our domestic economy, and that once it's passed, their constituents (remember them?) will come for those congresscritters with hot tar, pitchforks, torches, and blood in their eyes.

Your “gluttony and greed” must remain unslaked, james. And I'm not sorry about it at all.

Sorry Tuci I'm paying my own way no thanks to idiots like you who belong to the great wilderness of yesterday. Yup I voted for the most intelligent of the candidates running and thanks to people of your ilk he will probably be the most intelligent one running in four years but keep on keeping on little mind we need more rattle can sniffers like you out there quoting less than minimally intelligent people. You probably voted for the idiot that got us into this 2.4 trillion dollar war. I think socialism is preferable to fascism. May I suggest that before you get off preaching at people that you know wha your talking about.

Oh, “the most intelligent of the candidates running.” Yeah, sure. And the girl who wandered into the dark alley liked best the one of her rapists who'd bathed most recently.

As if the polish and dash displayed by a con artist is a reason (rather than a hangdog excuse) for getting suckered out of your socks by him. Absolutely no powers of discrimination in your teensy little noggin at all, right, james?

Ah, but the apparently “intelligent” quality of your Kenyan Keynesian matters to you, does it?

And there's yet another Obamaphile logical fallacy, implying that because I hate the living hell out of your pet socialist, I had “voted for” that spectacular schmuck, Dubbya.

It's called the fallacy of the false dilemma. “You're either this, or you're that,” with gorgeous suppression of any other alternative. Wotta maroon, you are, jimmy. Really.

And you “think socialism is preferable to fascism,” do you? So one form of “top-down” dirigisme or another is all that impinges on your tiny, crippled, rotten little mind, eh?

How about freedom? You know, capitalism (Marx and Engels cobbled-up pejorative term for the economic system everybody else in the world simply called “the free market”). No government “picking winners,” bailing out the banksters, telling you where you can and can't go, what you can and can't buy or build or grow for yourself, no bureaucrat telling you what you're allowed to do for a living, or for your own pleasure, as long as you don't violate the equal rights of the other people around you.

You think your goddam “socialism” is better than that, you sanctimonious little weasel?

Sell it, then. It hasn't worked yet, and it won't work now, but if you want it, you're going to have to ram it down your neighbors throats at gunpoint.

And watch it, jimmy. A helluva lot of them have guns, too.

[...] opponents of healthcare reform legislation have openly stated their determination to derail Pres. Obama’s proposed reforms, aimed at bringing “quality, affordable care” within reach of all Americans. Yet they [...]

And in this corner we have Tuci the featherless little parrot from the Michael Steel school of “repeat these trite little phrases over and over again” pronouncing great rhetorical phrases of the fantastic virtues of the free market while borrowing trillions from the Chinese, a red commie country, you creepy rabbit humping little retard. And speaking of maroons don't eat that stuff leaking out of your nose.

Tuci is typical of the gun toting, racist, conservative, bible thumping idiots out there. He probably likes Sarah Palin. The fact is that my country (USA) is in a transition period. The right wing wack jobs are losing ground and will do anything to stop progress (yes, progress!). Most liberals are ok with people who don't have the same beliefs, but unfortunately we all are in a fight to prove who is right or wrong. When did the process of representing the “people” stop? When Reagan became president! He was a terrible president who started this divisive mood of our country. W was by far the worst president ever! His cowboy tactics have destroyed not only our country, but the world. I don't think Obama is a mesiah, but I think he is trying to bring us together. Tuci seems to be very angry.

I’ve run a business before and hired employees. Health insurance was the biggest bill that we had. If you don’t think something has to be done, you don’t understand.

The GOP isn’t fighting for a better alternate vision, they’re fighting for the status quo. My proof of that is when they were in power. Did they make health care affordable? I must’ve missed it.

Who's Michael Steele? I think of myself more as a “Murray Rothbard” type (“Hatred is my muse”), and repetition of valid information or argument is certainly no sin.

Hm. What gives you to think that we have a “free market,” jimmy? Certainly the Republicans don't want that, and have opposed such freedom since before the days when they began passing themselves off as “Republicans.”

Look up Henry Clay's “American System.” I'll expect a report of at least 500 words from you by Monday.

Oh, now I'm “gun toting,” too? Well, thank you. But how do you come to the “bible thumping” bit? Given that the right wingnuts hate the hell out of me for my explicit atheism, and I've not mentioned (to my memory) any Holy Writ except in irony, aren't you sliding into even more egregious flights of stupidity, Pat?

Anything more in your post worth playing with? No…. You seem to think I'm a Republican, don't you, Pat? Tch. “Wotta maroon!”

Sorry aboout that>>you just sound and write like a right wing conservative Republican. Why don't you give Obama a chance and see how he can correct the last 8 years? I have fallen into the trap of name calling and am not proud of it>>it just seems like nobody is giving my president an opportunity to get anything done. I will try to refrain from future blasts on you.

Mr. Tuci is Libertarian (whatever that means).

And regardless of what emotions his arguments inspire in you, he makes a good point.

Small “l,” please. Using the capital “L” implies support of what's currently going on in the Libertarian Party, and that would give an entirely erroneous impression of my political sentiments.

No one little goddam bit, Pat.

And asking me to “give Obama a chance” is like asking me to give a convicted sadistic pedophile a long week-end with my eight-year-old grandson.

Not gonna happen, kid.

Lol, take care yourself and the grandkids. I’m gonna curl up with my book in bed.

Moby Dick, believe it or not. I’ve read lots of classics, but some reason not that one.

What a terrible analogy! By the way, the majority of pedophiles are male heterosexual family members! I would not have my 8 year old grand kid spend one minute with you Mr. Tuci. You will most likely brainwash him with your non-inclusive and divisive ideals. You probably are opposed to the “sacred” ideals of marriage, not being open to same sex marriage. I have every right to be divorced many times over like the majority of the heterosexual community (well over 50% of hetersexuals have been divorced). Have you ever been divorced Mr. Tuci? If so, why did you agree to the vow “Till death do us part”? You scare me!

Well, thanks. I have my hands full keeping the grandkids I've got (and the neighbors' kids; never should've let them talk me into buying that friggin' Wii) from demolishing the house.

As for “brainwashing” any child of yours, Pat….

Well, we know that intelligence is tightly linked to heredity, and though there's always the possibility that your get will escape whatever sad tricks your genes have played on you, Pat, there's not much chance that even your grandchildren would have perceptible brains to “wash.”

No doubt [the National Socialist Party] is yet another attempt to make people think that fascism is left-wing thing. Anyone who believes that Nazi party was lefties because of one word is falling for 1930s Nazi propoganda, which in the light of history, is not even close to the reality.

I've run a business myself, and hired employees. I know about the costs of health insurance (actually, pre-paid health care plans), and I'm pretty certain that I know more than you do about the history of “health insurance” in these United States, dating back to World War II. It's something you would do well to study.

The problem with your “Do something, I'm desperate!” attitude is that you haven't studied with anything like reasoned and thoughtful concentration the proposals being rammed down the nation's throats by Barry Soetoro and his sputniki in the big, bipartisan Boot-On-Your-Neck Party (both Democrat and Republican wings).

You're right. The Republicans are NOT “fighting for a better alternate vision.” They're not even “fighting for the status quo.” They're perfectly willing to go along with the socialist unworkability, but the want their Democratic Party rivals to take all the responsibility for it.

When it comes crashing down, the Republicans want to be able to leverage that horrible mess to their political advantage. Not that their “See? We told ya so?” crap will do this country any good at all when that crash comes.

Look, if you want real alternatives to the “Gubb'mint gonna do it all for ya!” bullshit of Barry and the Obamaphiles, get the hell out of here and go to Web sites like Mises.org and FEE.org and the like. There are honest economists who have been working in this area for decades, and you can benefit from their labor and persistence to get a clearer idea of what caused the problems that concern you and how those problems can be workably and sustainably (gawd, don't you just love that “sustainable” word?) addressed.

Oh, but fascism WAS a “left-wing thing.” Haven't you any knowledge whatsoever of the personal histories of Benito Mussolini and his followers? Or of the National Socialist German Workers' Party? Have you no familiarity with their literature throughout their rise and flourishing? The fascisti began, took power, reigned, and went down as socialists.

And what is a “Liberal” in today's America but what Greg Costikyan has so aptly characterized as “a milk-and-water socialist”?

Good heavens, one of the slang terms applied to the early SA squads in Berlin – because they were almost all “converted” Communist thugs – was “beefsteaks.”

“Brown on the outside, but Red in the middle.”

Noobie, you barely know enough about history and poltics to be dangerous, don'tcha?

“We the People” making policies that suit us is not communism. 'Red Party' is radically over the top.

As far as Socialism goes, what you really complain about is that 'We the People' from time to time regulate how 'We the People' do business, and what -to the whole of us- affects our safety and happiness. Anti-trust laws and regulations go back a long time.

Pity that Saint Reagan stopped enforcing the Sherman Anti Trust Act, or perhaps we wouldn't have banks 'too big to fail' Once upon a time in America, if it was 'too big to fail', it was too big to be private. (In this century you can thank the commie Republican Teddy Roosevlet for that.) Coupled with radical deregulation and huge 'starve the beast' immoral public usury, it was you right wingers that caused the economic crisis we face.

Either the political system rules the economic system, or the economic system rules the political system, pick one. The American people will, en masse, begin to remember that they rule… and that thought is what terrifies your think tank masters.

You libertarians do not know our history, or you wouldn't be espousing the feudalistic utopia that you suggest is the history to which we should return. We can't return to that history because it never once existed outside of the CATO institute.

Communism is only one form of majoritarian tyranny.

Whenever a majority of folk get together to vote themselves the labor, property – and even the persons – of a minority, that's not government. That's banditry, no matter how you dress it up.

What genius there was in the federal government created as the result of Hamilton's conspiracy to “revise” the Articles of Confederation, that genius lies in the mechanisms devised to protect the rights of the individual from the depredations of “factions” and “combinations.”

What you appear to be espousing right now, jjfitz, is a system of government in which “We the People” are an unchecked, unrestrained, uncontrollable force bent upon plunder, enslavement, and the destruction of public order and civil discipline in this nation. Are you SURE you want to go with that?

“Either the political system rules the economic system, or the economic system rules the political system, pick one.”

Okay. I pick the economic system. The role of gun-toting uniformed goons in “the economic system” is to protect people's rights to their lives, their liberties, and their property. In “the political system,” the people with the guns aren't so constrained, and that's dangerous.

In “the economic system” people choose what they want, trying to strike a balance between the resources at their disposal and their priorities in terms of wants and needs. In your “political system,” they get what the majority votes for. And (as Heinlein once wrote) “Does history record any case in which the majority was right?”

You socialists really don't know history of any kind, do you?

Well, hell. If you did, you'd turn libertarian.

If you had something to say you probably wouldn't need all the cheap taunts.

Socialist was a very popular term in the '30s Europe. The Nazi simply co opted the term, but the vast majority of the power went to corporatist like the old Bush family friend Fritz Thyssen, a German industrialist. It was the wealthy financiers that built up the reich.

But in larger terms I'm not suggesting that you are a fascist, nor am I a socialist or communist for that matter.

Cheap word games won't change the character of the genesis of the reich. If you need to believe that tyranny has one source, than that source would be unchecked power. Americans understand this, hence your frustration.

Just because a liberal, doesn't atomically mean I'm the mobocracy type, or that I dont understand what a constitutionally-limited democratic republic is. Maybe there are rational shades too subtle for you. :)

Aw, I like using the “cheap taunts.” It gets the “Liberals” to chattering and screaming and jumping up and down like a band of howler monkeys. What, you don't find the entertainment value in that?

Socialism, jjfitz, “was a very popular” political movement in 1830s Europe, too. Read Bastiat, why don'tcha?

And the National Socialist German Workers' Party didn't co-opt the term. They were socialists. They advocated national socialism, and their troops fought and murdered and died for National Socialism for a couple of decades until they got mostly stomped out. That the big-money types in Germany and Italy and Spain and Argentina and elsewhere opted themselves in should be no surprise. Think of them as Republicans, and you've got their mindset solidly.

But we can define you as a socialist or a non-socialist with wonderful ease.

Answer this question:

What is the purpose of government?

On the other hand, if I just ran opposite to you for the sake of it, I might parse your words for the seeming abhorrence to 'We the People.' Isn't there something in between?

Tsk. That's the THIRD Reich. There were two before that one.

And tyranny has always had “one source.”

Little though I favor Lincoln, like the proverbial stopped clock, he came up right if you were looking at him at the pertinent moment:

“It is the same spirit that says 'you toil and work and earn bread, and I'll eat it.'”

“What is the purpose of government?”

Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness… that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men. Deriving their just power from the consent of the governed.

But the essence of today's “Liberal” is inescapably “the mobocracy type,” son. And from what you've written, there's nothing BUT evidence that you don't have anything remotely like a handle on what a representative republic really is, or how the concept of “individual rights” really works.

There are “rational shades” to which you're pretty obviously blind, kiddo. Sorry about that. Want some recommendations for remedial reading?

Thank's for the quote, I like it. My Abe quote would be?

Labor is prior to, and independent of, capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights, which are as worthy of protection as any other rights.

You wouldn't be wrong. Consider that “We the People” in light of other instances of majoritarian tyranny down through the pages of history, and please explain why there's anything about that phrase that should give comfort to any individual who has no predatory intentions upon his neighbor's person, property, or freedom?

Good. Hamiltonian in its weaselry, but it's a beginning.

How do the officers of government secure those rights? How are they to be restrained from violating those rights?

Laws. Judiciary. And ever and anon, elections.

Or maybe your definition has become a bit narrow, child.

No problem. Just don't delve too deeply into his first Inaugural Address. Not if you value your illusions about him.

Bear in mind that Lincoln was an “old Clay Whig” and therefore a flaming protectionist (as in the Morrill Tariffs, which is really what caused the southern states to secede). When he talked “protection,” he was talking government arm-twisting, extortion, and outright goonery.

But how is it that depriving “Capital” of its rights supposed to promote the welfare of “Labor”? Aren't both necessary for the functioning of an economy?

Tsk. You lost it. “Laws” formulated and enacted and enforced by government goons are supposed to keep those same government goons from violating the rights of the private citizenry?

And more government goons – in judges' robes – are supposed to keep the government goons in the legislature and in the executive branch under control?

Finally, “elections.” Oh, yeah. You get your choice between typhus and typhoid, right?

“If voting could really change anything, they'd make it illegal.”

Try again.

I believe that you must protect both, as in Hamilton's Report on Manufacturers, capital has to flow into investment, but it is labor that adds value to the natural wealth that we have. And we may never agree on how to tip that balance, but it may be enough to admit there may be one.

If you don't protect capital, there is no reason to ascend; if you don't protect labor, there is to means to ascend. Without both, you have neither.

And how “broad” is your definition of the term “Liberal” in its modern usage, youngster?

Or, for that matter, the concepts of “representative republic” and “individual rights.”

Well it's fun, but I'm not here to answer loaded questions for which i'm sure you'll only accept certain narrow parameters. The fact is that most of civilization would accept my answer.

But if you want to say something on that, by all means go ahead.

Hamilton's *Report on Manufacturers* was the root of Clay's “American System” and the foundation upon which the Republican Party has been operating for the last century and a half. You LIKE that? I sure as hell don't.

Wasn't Hamilton's brand of mercantilism precisely what the founding patriots fought the Revolution to get quit of?

Let's turn that around. If you don't protect ALL individual rights – to life, to liberty, and to property – there is no real reason to live in any sort of social system, for that “society” is nothing more than a milieu of plunder.

Not all of it, no. As in your previous argument about the tariffs that preceded the civil war for example. But as for Hamilton.. opposed to the libertarian view, I don't think public infrastructure is Utopian.

But what protects the individual from what Adam Smith warned of the monopolist, one who controls the supply to create an unnaturally high price for a thing? What force has the power to intercede when markets are dominated?

At some point, balance dictates that the people, en masse, need some power too.

You're also not here to reveal yourself, are you?

Ah, well. Socialists always SOUND so nice and warm and fuzzy.

Until you ask them: “What about people who refuse to obey you?”

And then they get all beady-eyed and sweaty and their nostrils flare and their “inner Nazi” comes out.

There is much anger in you young padawan, and anger leads to the dark side.

Hell, I'm a married man. I've been on “the dark side” since before they made the first one of those stupid movies.

Depends on what you mean by “public infrastructure.” Much of what Hamilton (and Clay's) followers intended by their “public improvements” programs was a long and recurring series of raids upon the taxpayers for the same sorts of “bridge to nowhere” boondoggles that we've seen both Republicans and Democrats perpetrate throughout your lifetime and my own.

As for the monopolist, consider that without government suppression of competitive options – the essence of both mercantilism and protectionism – monopolies simply don't happen.

True, there will always be strong actors in certain market segments – Alcoa before its forced break-up is the classic example – but attempts to exploit “monopoly” positions lead invariably to ruin for the monopolist in a free market because the margins he might gain immediately draw competitors into the market after him.

Without government goons to keep his customers “protected” from his competition, the monopolist gets hoist on his own petard.

That “the people” need power I do not deny. Their power, however, is best vested in their ability to say “No,” and to walk away from what they view as a bad business.

Government does not let them walk away, and because of this, every aggrandizement or expansion or intrusion of government in the lives of “the people” does injury to their freedom and violates their rights.

Mr. Tuci is one smug piece of work! Do your neighbors know what kind of crap you are shoving down your grandkids. How many kids have you molested lately Tuci? Molestation comes in many forms, such as mental abuse! It is an honor to be exchanging thoughts with such the brilliant person you think you are. I bow to your extreme intelect and great usage of words. Wow, what a great American you are.

Tsk. Do your neighbors know that you're a thieving socialist, Pat?

If “community notification” were to have any positive effect upon public safety (of course, it does not), advertising the places where statist predators sleep and work and congregate would be a measure that our government's “Malevolent Jobholder” could undertake with perfect fulfillment of his duty to protect the lives, liberties, and property of the citizenry.

And thank you for the “great American” accolade.

Though, considering the source, that's worth about as much as everything else you've offered, Paddy. Zilch. Darn.

The more I read your foolish comments, the more I realize that you have been stuck in some kind of time warp. You’ve gotten yourself mixed up with the McCarthy era, the Russian and German versions of socialism, and some how mixed it all up with fascism. If you weren’t so busy insulting your own countrymen, you might just make some sense. Worse yet, you are UN American!! You do not value our history, and you posess no sense of patriotism or love of country. You are valueless, sterile and empty with no visible attachment to your fellows. You have made a fetish of “socialism” and feel satisfied to judge everyone by your narrow lenses. You are really a pitiful person.

Oh, socialism goes back a helluva lot longer than “the McCarthy era.” Back a couple of decades before our own War of Southern Secession. It originated (more or less simultaneously) in England and in France. Read von Mises’ Socialism, which can be found posted in toto online at multiple sites.

Also read von Hayek’s The Road to Serfdom (a much shorter work, and more engagingly written than von Mises’ rather stuffy text). Henry Hazlitt’s Economics in One Lesson is also brief, and even more accessible.

If you don’t understand why socialists are the enemy of mankind and to be both hated and opposed wherever they rear their ugly heads, perhaps it’s because you don’t know enough about their malignant objectives and their nefarious methods.

Healthcare, period, has never been free and never will be. Switzer said: “No man may close his eyes and think that the pain, which is therefore invisible to him, is non existant”.

Mr. Tuc–I have been a history teacher for over 23 years. During that time, I have become quite well acquained with socialism and why socialists systems eventually turn into dictatorships,etc. It was Chruchill who noted that England could never embrace such a system, because a socialistic society would eventually need a Gestapo to enforce it–which is exactly what happened in Hitler’s Germany. Why you obsess over socialism confounds me!! As an educator I just don’t look definitions up for the kids to absorb; we learn about how systems work in different societies and cultures; and this is exactly what your “missives” lack, because socialism takes different forms at different times and places. “Socialism” is very hard to pin down, because of the nature of the beast. Oh-you have plenty of definitons to hand around, but you can’t supply any knowledege of the history of a country or the people. We teach critical thinking skills these days. The things you write make little sense because you don’t understand how to apply them to living societies. Your taunts and foul language would discredit any individual envolved in the business of showing students how to “apply” history; how to relate men and events through time. You totally prejudice your case by dismissing the views and values of others. Anyone can look up definitions of which you have a large supply. History does not unfold in a vaccum, Mr. Tuk. You are too old not to have learned these things through life experiences. And stop putting your country down, for god’s sake; and quit making fun of people. Remember, that socialists are not the only enemy of mankind. I believe it was Pogo who said: “We have met the enemy, and they are US!”

Doubtless it will surprise you to learn that there was a period early in the history of America (as a republic) when there was medical professional licensing, when it was struck down as “antidemocratic” and eliminated, and then again when the AMA got it reinstated, state by state, and used it (as all government-protected oligopolies use such market entry blockades) to crush their competition and prevent “too many doctors” from engaging in the practice of their privileged profession.

Dr. Benjamin Rush of Revolutionary War fame, a significant figure in American history, was a physician and reported to have been an opponent of licensing as a means of restricting the practice of medicine. A decent summary article on the subject of medical licensing in America can be easily reviewed.

That the services of health care providers “has never been free and never will be” is something against which I won’t contend, except to put you mindful of caritas (“charity”), the medical profession’s less stodgy equivalent of the shysters’ pro bono publico.

We don’t do it “for the public good.” When we work for free, we do it for the patient.

But you don’t get paid for the work you do, jackie? Or are you independently wealthy?

Sir:
 
I am going to have to pull rank on you, being from Texas, my family were loyal southerners and we gave many a good man to the Confederacy.  My professional paper addressed the reconstruction period in Texas.  Remember, a good history teacher never stops reading, studying and researching the subject; and this goes for American history as well.  I had to pass two educator exit tests to be able to teach at the secondary level.
 
Now, as to Lincoln and the movie about him.  I remember it well–I didn’t think there was too much Hollywood included.  But again, let’s keep Lincoln in the context of his times.  Naturally, Lincoln believed in a protective tariff as being beneficial to the Union.  Recall that Lincoln embraced totally, the Constitution and the reasoning of the Founders–he was Union all the way until his death; it was his love and devotion to this Nation that saved us.  God bless his memory.  The National Banking System, as authored by Hamilton was Union!  I don’t see anything counterfeit about it.
 
You are focusing on the south land, which had, from its beginnings,relied entirely on King Cotton the cash crop which kept the Confederacy going.  The lifestyle which developed over time, was kept alive by slaves, and it was slavery that supported the lavish lifestyles that only a few could have.  But this is common knowledge. The south was doomed, however, and by her own faults.  The idea of “states rights” which is still alive and well in the old southern states (Texas included) could not continue on as a reason to continue the horror of slavery.  It is still difficult for me, even today, to reread books about slaves and their treatment.  It was not President Lincoln, the Union, or the abolitionists that destroyed the south. Naturally, like today, there were plenty of folks who hated Lincoln, oddly enough even the poor whites who could never dream of having a slave or a plantation. But putting it all together takes the historical knowledge of the
many aspects of development in both the north and south==social, political, economical to bring it all together.
 
 bell

And just who are you calling a “sanctimonious little weasel, Mr. Tuc?? You just spent lots of words saying nothing, while puffing yourself up like the frog in the fable. If you understand anything about socialism or fascism it was not displayed in your rambling, incorherent missive; just strings of words. And I'd love for you to describe what Capitalism without ethics looks like—you should recognize it if you weren't so blinded, because the results are all around us. Come down to earth, Mr. Tuc and behold the portion of society, of which you have no knowledge; the folks whose healthcare tab you are paying and will continue to pay. Perhaps what you need is a guided tour of American society today. But you are a hater Mr. Tuc, pure and simple. And you are a dangerous hater, Mr. Tuc. You are the kind who lead witch hunts, or guarded prisoners in Nazi death camps.

And I would like for you to look up “King Phillips War” in an essay of atleast 500 words or more, by Monday. Hint: It's all about your direct descendents, our blessed Puritans; perhaps the most vicious, cruel people who ever came over in search of religious freedom. You will be able to identify with them completely, since hatred was also their “muse”.

I can't believe that anyone would allow their children to be around you.

The “sanctimonious little weasel” is the poster using the nickname “james38″ (see above).

Are you trying to qualify for the same honorific, jackie?

That the difference between freedom – political and economic – and the various forms of tyranny and dirigisme respectively is nothing you apparently can appreciate doesn't surprise much.

Capitalism – the free market, to get away from the Marxists' pet pejorative – cannot ESCAPE from “ethics.” If someone acting in a free market does not conduct himself ethically, no one will deal with him. It is only the unethical intruder in the marketplace who needs armed force (and they do like to make it look “official” by bringing in government goons) to compel the taking of other people's goods and services without consent.

Don't you recognize this, jacke? Or are you “blinded”?

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_Philips_War , jackie.

Betcha didn't know that the whaling ship in Melville's Moby Dick was named (with a bit of misspelling) after one of the tribes participating in that conflict.

And my antecedents were in Sicily at that time. We didn't “come over from the old country” until 1900.

I'm not going to disagree with you about the Puritans, though. My wife is part Irish, and the word “Drogheda” is not lightly voiced in my household.

And you say that you understand history, my friend?? There is no way unless your “notions” took place in an alternate universe. Abe Lincoln was too busy saving the nation to be caring about “protectionism”, or “arm-twisting” and the only one that I can define as being “dipped” in goonery is you. You must not have a clue as to the history of the south or the Civil War or tariffs, if you think for one minute that the Morrill Tariffs caused the south to secede–you have just defined yourself as being a real, certified moron. I am a professional educator of American history at the high school level–with a Masters degree. You distort history; you read into history what you wish, even things that never existed in the time period that you clack about. You are so concerned with socialism, and being an atheist that you “color” every issue you attempt to address. I think that time has passed you by; you sound like a cranky old guy. That you can actually speak of Lincoln in such a disrespectful way. You should be ashamed of yourself, really.

Well, it gets a little noisy, and my wife's had chronic migraine cephalgia since before we first met, and I try to keep the uproar down….

Well, don't look now Tuc, because “ethics” just escaped while your back was turned. “No one will deal with someone in a free market who does not conduct himself ethically”? Give me a break sir! Some of your unethical “intruders” are now sitting in prison, and the government “goons” arrested them in the nick of time, before they took more of the people's “goods and services”. I must be “blinded” because I did not notice any “armed forces” used by the government while bringing to justice those who have lived and prospered on the “honor system”.

I believe that the boat was called The Pequod.

Well, perhaps, deep inside there is a warm heart, but you could never tell by the mean and disrespectful things you say

Hm. I expect I know more of it than you do, jackie. But that's not saying much. On the matter of Lincoln as “an old Clay Whig” and his adherence to the principles of the Hamilton/Clay “American System,” haven't you seen John Ford's Young Mr. Lincoln (1939)?

In one scene, Henry Fonda (playing Lincoln) gives a political stump speech that summarizes the American System perfectly.

“My politics are short and sweet, like the old woman's dance. I'm in favor of a National Bank, I'm in favor of internal improvement system and a high protective tariff. These are my sentiments and political principles.”

In other words, the issue of counterfeit currency (“a National Bank”), “bridge to nowhere” pork projects (“internal improvement system”), and protectionism aimed at bleeding the agricultural states – especially the southern states – into peonage (“a high protective tariff”).

What, you're not only ignorant of history but of the movies, too?

Well, try http://www.mises.org/story/952 on, eh?

Both LewRockwell and the Mises Institute maintain archives of DiLorenzo's work, including much he has written on Lincoln, and which I've no doubt you would like kept far from your high school students' attention.

And, yeah, I guess I qualify as “a cranky old guy.” Getting old isn't that hard. You just have to be determined enough to piddle on the graves of your enemies, and the incentive seems to enhance your will to live.

No, I'm afraid that “ethics” went out the window when government stepped in.

The purpose of civil government is to protect the individual from violation of his rights to life, to liberty, and to property, by force or fraud. From a perspective of practicability, we see that government interference in the markets – undertaken ostensibly to provide that protection – simply creates a regulatory environment in which a number of unintended (but nonetheless easily anticipatable and well-anticipated) consequences have resulted, and will continue to result in one way or another.

The first consequence – perhaps even to be considered a cause of the government's intrusion – is regulatory capture. Another is the diminished levels of suspicion and scrutiny applied by the bunco artists' victims to the “too good to be true” propositions by which they are ensnared (“Oh, the SEC is looking out for us; what could happen?”).

That a physician is licensed by your state government to practice medicine, jackie, is no assurance that he is competent to diagnose and treat you. You must “trust, but verify,” and take such steps as are reasonable to assure that what you are receiving from that physician achieves standard of care – or better, if possible.

What might give an investor (for example) reason to ignore the old saying that “If it looks too good to be true, it almost certainly isn't” except the assurances of politicians and bureaucrats intent upon achieving some sort of dirigiste outcomes?

In the free market, there are neither illusions of some sort of Big Brother watching over you (look up the “Knowledge Problem with regard to government meddling in the economy, jackie) nor government favoritism to protect the swindlers, the incompetent, and the corrupt from the wrath of their customers or their investors.

This is the negative feedback mechanism of a properly functioning division-of-labor economy, and which government intervention can only derange and degrade.

Good! The Pequod was named after the Pequot tribe. As I'd said, a bit of a misspelling.

Warm? Well, there's a helluva lot of atherosclerosis in there, and marked cardiomegaly, but no infarctive or myopathic changes as yet.

You should've seen the vexed look on that cardiologist's face a couple of years ago when my stress test proved that (despite the physique of a dumpling) I had not suffered the MI he'd been trying to diagnose.

Oh, my. You didn’t bother to follow those links and read anything of DiLorenzo at all, did you, jackie?

The “protective tariff” of which you speak so approvingly was one of the things (the other was chattel slavery) that de Toqueville remarked would eventually tear the American union apart. It was certainly “beneficial” to the northern manufacturing interests which held Lincoln and the other Whig politicians in their thrall. Again, I enjoin you to read that particular article of di Lorenzo’s to which I had directed you above, entitled “Lincoln’s Tariff War.” It’s not lengthy.

See http://www.mises.org/story/952

If “a good history teacher never stops reading, studying and researching the subject,” then you’re hardly behaving like “a good history teacher” right now.

In my own area of professional concentration, I would never presume to rest on such laurels as might be conferred by “exit tests” or even board certification examinations.

There’s always something for me to learn. There’s too damned much out there I don’t know for me ever to say “I’ve learned enough.”

And inasmuch as you “bless” the memory of Lincoln, perhaps you should also read this:

“The American Lenin” by L. Neil Smith

I can debate you on the issue of “states’ rights” if only on the notion that these lesser (and more readily controlled, accessible) state governments tend to be more proximally responsive to the needs, the scrutiny, and the commands of their constituencies, and therefore their role in federalism is to counterbalance what the Founders knew would become a quasi-imperial central government were not some system of checks and balances wrought to prevent this.

Good heavens, why do you think the Rhode Islanders refused even to send a delegation to Hamilton’s star chamber proceedings in Philadelphia, and fought tenaciously to refuse ratification of his starkly illegal abrogation of the Articles of Confederation?

You may have read The Federalist Papers, jackie; but have you so much as thumbed through The Antifederalist Papers collected and published by various editors? There was a concerted effort to resist Hamilton’s “blessing” (by which I also mean a national debt, which is the only purpose for which a National Bank could possibly exist), undertaken by Founding Fathers credentialed no less impeccably than those participating in the secret proceedings of the Philadelphia convention.

If it is possible to appeal to your better nature and your sense of professionalism, jackie, I am making such an appeal now.

My wife may not like to hear him quoted, but Cromwell – yet another stopped clock in history – gave us a useful phrase when he abjured the general assembly of the Church of Scotland:

“I beseech you, in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken.“

Down below and edging off the page, jackiebell had written (I italicize):

“Mr. Tuc–I have been a history teacher for over 23 years. During that time, I have become quite well acquainted with socialism and why socialists systems eventually turn into dictatorships,etc. It was Churchill who noted that England could never embrace such a system, because a socialistic society would eventually need a Gestapo to enforce it–which is exactly what happened in Hitler's Germany. Why you obsess over socialism confounds me!! As an educator I just don't look definitions up for the kids to absorb; we learn about how systems work in different societies and cultures; and this is exactly what your 'missives' lack, because socialism takes different forms at different times and places. 'Socialism' is very hard to pin down, because of the nature of the beast. Oh-you have plenty of definitions to hand around, but you can't supply any knowledge of the history of a country or the people. We teach critical thinking skills these days. The things you write make little sense because you don't understand how to apply them to living societies. Your taunts and foul language would discredit any individual involved in the business of showing students how to 'apply' history; how to relate men and events through time. You totally prejudice your case by dismissing the views and values of others. Anyone can look up definitions of which you have a large supply. History does not unfold in a vaccum, Mr. Tuk. You are too old not to have learned these things through life experiences. And stop putting your country down, for god's sake; and quit making fun of people. Remember, that socialists are not the only enemy of mankind. I believe it was Pogo who said: 'We have met the enemy, and they are US!'”

I am the first to admit what prejudices and predispositions I hold, just as I am cognizant of the reasons why I have developed them. These are not primarily or even proximally emotional, but the result of reasoned examination of the subjects upon which they pertain. I will not say they are dispassionate, but they're sure as hell thoughtful. Were I not convinced of their validity, I would abandon them for prejudices and predispositions of more robust character, and I do not hesitate to put them to the test whenever and wherever possible.

I suppose it comes of having been educated primarily in the sciences. Nothing in the sciences is sacrosanct. We seek out our own ignorances, looking for lacunae in the general fund of knowledge, the better to tease out the tissue of reality and make the unknown known.

You're an educationalist, it seems, with a Master's in history. That's nice, but such an educational background does not dispose the individual so inculcated with the sort of mental flexibility required to address situations in which hard-held beliefs – and what you know of Lincoln and of socialism, to pick just two examples, is more a matter of faith predicated upon carefully selected information and outright myths neither your preceptors nor you yourself have ever wished to challenge or even to examine with proper skepticism – lead you into egregious error.

That you should write: “'Socialism' is very hard to pin down, because of the nature of the beast” is a manifest of your refusal to make the effort to “pin down” a definition of socialism. This is remarkably indicative of your desire not to know. The literature examining socialism – from the perspectives of both socialists and anti-socialists (defenders of the free market) – is wonderfully rich. Indeed, I'd directed your attention to one of the seminal works on the subject, von Mises' Socialism, which was originally published in 1922, which has never gone out of print.

Dr. von Mises' assessment of this political economic “system,” despite its age, is one which European socialists have taken quite seriously, and which they have struggled to confront – without success – for nearly a century. American socialists – “Liberals” – have tried simply to ignore it to death.

In your case, jackie, that tactic seems to have worked. Unless you open your eyes and get into it, as a good historian presented with previously unknown and pertinent source material ought to be eager to do.

Please quit quoting Pogo as if that were witty. There are genuine works of scholarship you are ignoring – perhaps deliberately? – to a purpose that does not become you.

Sir:
 
The Morrill Tariff was introduced to Congress after the Panic of 1857.  As you know, these were years leading up to the Civil War, and there was plenty of sectional warfare  taking place in Congress.  The north and south had already begun down the long road to sectionalism.  Although the Panic was later blamed on other issues than those that produced the idea of the protective tariff, the interests in protecting the industrial north trumpet southern interests.  Lincoln believed that a high protective tariff was in the Nations best interest–emphesis on Nation here.  Lincoln was wise enough not to completely trust our European friends.  Plus, during the war the tariff supplied the United States with needed revenue to supply factories which produced war materials.  Naturally, this angered England who was a cotton client, and England sided with the Confederacy.
 
That the tariff “helped” to erode the south is only, as I said before, part of what the south had already done to herself.  This tariff effected wealthy southerners, who were a minority population in the south, and their interests in being able to maintain their lifestyles.  Remember, the one dreaded fear of wealthy land and slaves holders, was a revolt of slaves, which at the time of the war, greatly outnumbered their owners.  They simply could not have an “excess” of slaves running around; a fear that was well founded considering the number of slave revolts which occurred.  Poor whites, who were as wreched and illerate as the slaves, were never to overcome their lot in life until George Washington Carver helped them out by showing them (south) that they could produce other items besides cotton.
The south never could have won the war anyway, for many, many reasons.  But southern paranoia still exists today, and a morbid distrust of “government” and the dreaded fear that the feds might take away their blessed guns!!
 
Although perspectives differed then as now, we can be very sure of one thing.  President Lincoln preserved the Union. The industrial north prevailed and rounded up the Rebels by use of force and materials.  It is hard to imagine how things might be now, if Lincoln hadn’t held fast.  Lincoln’s body had not gotten cold before the Radical Republicans rushed in to completely revise Lincoln’s plans for the Reconstruction.  Radical Reconstruction, in my opinion did much more damage in continuing the hatred which arose during the fighting than any single other factor.  We are living with all of it today.  If you want to talk about the horror of government abuses and intrusion–here is an example. And like today, we are faced with politians who would push their agendas to “law”.

Oh well, I fogot to edit my last email!!

Sir:
 
I must respectfully disagree with you, regarding what the lack of oversight or government regulations has done to effect this economy as it has thus far.  Ronald R. put this “free market” idea of his to work during his first administration. The idea of a “free market” should be a critical aspect of a capitalistic society. Unfortunately, the “free market”, Reagen style, with the “trickle down” idea, began to faulter the minute it hit the ground; but of course, it took years to morph into a Frankenstein monster, and with the help of politicians, etc.
 
The 1980s recession should have been the first clue, but no one really seemed to bother about wondering if, perhaps, something was going wrong within lending institutions.  Instead, we rocked along until Enron fell.  I remember being horrified at how little intervention the government made, which, naturally would have been too late anyway.  That Bush knew that Enron was in trouble and did nothing about it, has been a recent revaluation,the details of which I have not yet researched.  The Retired Teacher's Association had invested in Enron.  Naturally, retirees haven't had a raise since then.
 
“Ethics” hit the road and died along the way, when companies began to operate on the “honor system” which deregulation of government over sight actually promotes, then the very worst in people  takes the place of integrity.  The shrill cry of “big government” from the Republicans, and the insistence that a small government is best, is really great on paper but discounts the growth along with the ensuing complexities of society.
No, I don't want a large and intrusive government ruling my life. However,  ultra conservatives, trying to destroy a woman's right to privacy, by legally dissolving Roe vs Wade, is a perfect example of BIG GOVERNMENT intruding in people's private lives; led by religious fanatics of the Rep. Party. Yet, talk of gun regulation or gun laws, they all jump up and say that the government is taking away their weapons!!!  I can't think of  better examples.
 
My ex-husband is a doctor and a very competent one.  I went with him through his years of training, and you can believe me, there are regulatory agencies for doctors.  Now, this does not guarantee that you won't run into a bad one; but within “medical communities” and the AMA, the loss of license, lawsuits, and chance of winding up on the “bad list”is a determent. States do a pretty good job of regulating physicians.  Yes, any person looking for a doctor has the responsibility to check it out first.
 
That investors make foolish choices is one thing, but when the market supplies all the stupid reasons for investing in stupid things, and brokers all fall in line and everyone involved is making foolish choices, you have a Wall Street collapse; a repeat I might add of the first stock market Crash.  Do you recall, that after the Crash that the feds stepped in and put regulations in place so that another Crash could be avoided?
 
You are correct in that “free markets” eliminate Big Brother form looking over your shoulders.  And the Bush era is an example of how government can indeed protect swindlers when administrations turn secretive, blind and corrupt–look at the Nixon years.
 
And I can't see that all of this can possibly, in the long run, help labor?  When the “trickle down” theory turns into “trickle up”, jobs are shipped overseas as CEOs ET AL, see how much more profit can be made that way.  In my opinion, like in most things, an equal balance, or the proper use of government is the best answer.  After all, our Constitution was built on the idea of a balance of power within its structure.
bell

Hm? Have I taken you to task for typos or the like? These comments boxes are not exactly what anyone would call the optimal places for collecting one’s thoughts or putting together finished prose.

Hm? Have I taken you to task for typos or the like? These comments boxes are not exactly what anyone would call the optimal places for collecting one’s thoughts or putting together finished prose.

The question is, in a free market society, how can we boost earnings for our helpless insurance companies.I think I have the answer. Let's make group policies dependent on medical qualification. In other words, if you are in a group and you or a family member have a health problem or you're too old, you will not be able to get coverage. That way the insurance companies wouldn't have to pay out so many claims. True, they would lose some customers, but they could raise rates on everyone else to make up for it. This would be a truly free market plan. Don't forget to write your Republican congressman about this new and exciting idea.

Oh please, Sir Tuc==
In haste, I sent you a missive which I negleted to “check out” before I sent it.  You will, however, receive another missive in much better shape.
 
Many thinks for your kind reminders and for taking me to task–
Your Friend!
Jackie

Oh please, Sir Tuc==
In haste, I sent you a missive which I negleted to “check out” before I sent it.  You will, however, receive another missive in much better shape.
 
Many thinks for your kind reminders and for taking me to task–
Your Friend!
Jackie

Well, jackie, I’m not denying that I’m a nasty sonofabitch, but I don’t think I’m that nasty. I’ll keep an eye open, and thank you.

Dear Tuc–
 
Just remember to respect the views of others by not using awful curse words, for one thing.  Remember you are not the “last word”.  When you rant and rave, you begin to look  dumb, out of controll, and not at all sure of yourself.
You and I are probably close to the same age.  Lose the “socialism” deal–this present generation is not as familiar with it as we learned about it, so quite often, they get the whole thing wrong–meaning mixed up.
While working with young people, I have learned to keep a light heart.  Young folks will look up to you and respect you–if you don’t come across as an old “fart”.   I am not a follower of organized religion, but I believe with all my heart, in the guiding  hand of Providence. It is Providence which has given us great men and women who have turned the “tide” every time, just when things look the worst. Look for it–it’s there.
Sincerely,
Jackie

Madam, with all respect, I will speak and write as I goddam please.

And at all times light-heartedly, I assure you.

Thank you, but no, thank you.

Down below and working its way off the right side of the page, jackiebell had written (I italicize in HTML; those reading in email will probably not see the markup, and URL references are added):

“The Morrill Tariff [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morrill_Tariff and http://mises.org/story/952 ] was introduced to Congress after the Panic of 1857 [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Panic_of_1857 and for much more discriminate perspective, http://mises.org/pdf/asc/2002/asc8-trask.pdf ] . As you know, these were years leading up to the Civil War, and there was plenty of sectional warfare taking place in Congress. The north and south had already begun down the long road to sectionalism. Although the Panic was later blamed on other issues than those that produced the idea of the protective tariff, the interests in protecting the industrial north trumpet southern interests. Lincoln believed that a high protective tariff was in the Nations best interest–emphesis on Nation here. Lincoln was wise enough not to completely trust our European friends. Plus, during the war the tariff supplied the United States with needed revenue to supply factories which produced war materials. Naturally, this angered England who was a cotton client, and England sided with the Confederacy.

“Although perspectives differed then as now, we can be very sure of one thing. President Lincoln preserved the Union. The industrial north prevailed and rounded up the Rebels by use of force and materials. It is hard to imagine how things might be now, if Lincoln hadn't held fast. Lincoln's body had not gotten cold before the Radical Republicans rushed in to completely revise Lincoln's plans for the Reconstruction. Radical Reconstruction, in my opinion did much more damage in continuing the hatred which arose during the fighting than any single other factor. We are living with all of it today. If you want to talk about the horror of government abuses and intrusion–here is an example. And like today, we are faced with politians who would push their agendas to 'law'.“

The “long road to sectionalism” antedates the Panic of 1857 by a long shot, jackie. Dig into Jefferson's Kentucky and Virginia Resolutions (1798 and 1799), for example. And that Panic of 1857 was much milder and shorter-lived than the two preceding it. Trask (cited above), for example, notes that:

“By contrast, the Panic of 1857 was followed by only a six-month recession; and the banks were in suspension for only a few months. Having suspended in October, the New York banks resumed paying specie in December.“

So using the Panic of 1857 as an explanation for the Morrill Tariffs won't work, jackie.

Lincoln campaigned and won in 1860 on the critical platform plank of serving the interests of the populous northern industrial states at the expense – a murderous and blatantly divisive predatory attack upon – the southern agricultural states.

I can't blame you for not going into the details of the Republican Party's national convention in Chicago's Wig-Wam (called perhaps “the dirtiest political convention in the history of the United States” by one author I'd read decades ago), but ho the hell have you avoided reading Lincoln's first inaugural address? He spelled out his plan to plunder the south – and to hell with the Darkies – right then, right there.

Yes, Lincoln wanted to “preserve the Union.” Had he failed to invade and conquer the seceding southern states, New Orleans and Charleston and Savannah would've served as essentially duty-free ports through which could flow the commerce that Lincoln's mercantilist backers wanted to crush out (so that they could maintain their own artificially high “screw the consumers” profit margins).

Lincoln and his fellow Whigs (masquerading as “Republicans”) needed to slam those doors and nail them shut. When the southerners refused to stand still and get raped by Lincoln's tax collectors, violent aggression was the only means by which your beloved “Emancipator” could pull off his thievery.

Look at the sequence of secessions (and at the slave states which did not secede, including Maryland, Delaware, and New Jersey) and you'll get a better idea of why secession took place. What “Liberals” and other modern socialists erroneously call “the Civil War” (it was no such thing) was not kindled by slavery –

(( though during the course of his criminal aggression Lincoln reluctantly rung in an Emancipation Proclamation that freed the slaves ONLY in those territories not under the control of his government; note the exempted portions of the southern states at that time under federal military occupation ))

- so much as by the predatory exactions of the Morrill Tariff.

Beyond this factual consideration – and your persistent denial thereof, jackie – discussion of the Radical Republicans' military occupation of the conquered southern states is of no consequence.

Save, perhaps, to remark upon Robert E. Lee's later, bitter observation that if he'd known what “those people” were going to do to the populace of the southern states, he would've never surrendered at Appomattox Court House, and would have taken his men off into the hinterlands to fight la guerilla against these enemies until his dying day.

Maybe if the Republicans stall enough the people having health issues that preclue coverage in the regular market (since it is not just financial problems that prevent coverage), these people will be dead and the cost of coverage for the few healthy (young) will be cheaper.

I do not trust the Red Party to do anything effective about the health care “insurance” problem. Do you, mac? Not that the National Socialists have got a handle on anything except a complete horror.

There are a couple of things that could be done immediately and very easily to bring down the costs of health care.

First, change the standard by which the FDA's Office of New Drugs (OND) permits the marketing of novel pharmaceuticals to require only proof of safety and do away with the proofs of efficacy requirement that came in when 21 CFR was radically amended back in the thalidomide scare days.

This would massively reduce the duration of the drug development time, and even more massively reduce the costs associated therewith. Right now, it takes about a billion (yeah, with a “B”) dollars to get one new chemical entity (NCE) through the FDA's approval process. Hell, no wonder the on-patent drugs cost so damned much. The manufacturers not only have to make back that billion, but pay for all the NCE's that don't make it to the “approved-for-market”:status.

Second, let's follow Milton Friedman's recommendation and do away with professional licensing. All of it. Your doctor's (or nurse's, or radiation tech's) state license matters not a goddam bit as an assurance that you will receive anything approaching standard of care in your encounter with that person. Occupational licensure of every kind has never been anything more than a means by which people in a protected job category can screw their customers.

That's the way it's always been. Want to find a good doctor? Check on his board certification(s). Professional specialty boards have a helluvan incentive to keep their standards up; quality is the only thing they've got to “sell.”

State licensing means a bunch of politicians are supposedly looking out for your welfare.

You believe this, and I've got this bridge in Brooklyn I want to sell you.

Third, allow health “insurance” to go back to being real insurance, instead of a pre-paid “all you can eat” ticket to a big buffet of services. Give consumers an incentive to consume wisely by making them pay out of pocket for routine health care. Without licensing, a lot of those expenses will go down like one of Bubba's White House interns.

Fourth, make all personal health-related expenditures – even that 81 mg “micro” dose of Aspirin every cardiologist wants every adult to take every day – “first-dollar” deductable on federal and state “income” tax returns. As it stands now, damned few Americans ever sustain more medical expenses per year than rises above the ridiculous threshold established by IRS regulations.

If health care is so goddam important, then ever damned dollar spent on it must be credited to the individual American as a completely deductable expense.

Those are simply the easiest ways in which your “public servants” can begin chewing away at what's causing so much of our GDP to go into health care. Wonder why they don't do this kind of stuff?

I sure as hell do.

I am waiving aside my first thought upon reading your response – that you sound like my paranoid schizophrenic who called anyone in office a Nazi. I do not label peoples opinions with putdowns that is the first ploy learned in political science classes. You do put forward some issues that raise some agreements. If the AMA could really control their membership with true punishments and reporting of problems87, we could do away with state by state licensing. In reality if a medical doctor is blackballed in one state, he can go to another (say Texas, as we are very lax) and relicense and continue to damage his patients.

Medicine needs to be regulated, there is no question of that need. The question should be does the department have enough people to test & police new products. Certainly you do not wish to go back to the '50 thalidomide “scare days” to have a child with no arms or legs as a result of medicine, nor I assume would you wish a woman to find that she cannot have children as a result of medicine given to her mother to prevent spontanious natural abortion as some of my generation found.

Where can I get a pre-paid “all you can eat” ticket… big buffet of services”. I want that. So far this year I have spend $3,500 for out of pocket medical tests (mammogram, and a colonoscopy) which I thought would satisfy my insurer for the same amount towards my $5,000 deductible. Oh no, they consider only $1,200 to be medically necessary and that is only the amount that will be used to reduce the deductible. I think only Congress and what is left of big business upper managment get the buffet. Since money is tight, I will be delaying the rest of my normal GYN tests till later.

Having insurance pay for results not tests sounds interesting. The premises of ordering a battery of tests to prevent lawsuits was use here to get tort refom pasted 2 years ago, which would supposedly reduce insurance costs. Haven't seen that yet.

Aw, c'mon, mac. You wouldn't know a “paranoid schizophrenic” from a schizotypal personality disorder case with perseverative features. Jeez, why do people think they can soak up a little Psychiatry For Dummies crap and sling those terms around as if they mean something?

And I “label” you Obamaphile dunces to see you jerk and twitch and blow boogers from your dilated nostrils, doofus. Like dynamiting fish in a cattle tank, I know, but as I get older, I gotta take my fun where I can find it.

Sure, “Medicine needs to be regulated.” Politicians and bureaucrats do an absolutely shitty job of it (how else?). They were rung in by outfits like the AMA to enforce an oligopoly (look it up, mac) designed to screw patients by denying them the options that a government-unrestricted market would provide.

World War II comes along with “health insurance” as a non-wage-and-price-controlled (gotta disguise the most obvious and immediate effects of all that wartime counterfeiting the government does to pay for their “war-is-the-health-of-the-state” armaments) part of the war contractors' employee compensation packages, and we got third-party payors making that oligopoly even more lucrative for the AMA guys.

What is it about this you don't get, mac? Never had a History of Medicine course?

Nope. Obviously. You don't know doo-dah about the “thalidomide scare days” at all, do you? That, you silly boob, was a safety issue. The socialists (and I can name some of 'em, if you like) used it as an excuse to screw in efficacy standards they'd been faunching for – without success – for almost a decade.

Safety proofs, dimwit, have very, very, very little to do with proofs of efficacy. Go to the FDA Web sites. Better yet, read through 21 CFR. Or just shut your festering gob and pay attention here.

The “big buffet” came with politically supported HMO programs rammed up the nation's butt back in the '70s and '80s. Were you around then? No? I was. You wouldn't believe how the Mangled Care guys were selling their “all you can eat” buffet to the cherry-picked populations they wanted to enroll.

Look, you try to learn something and get back to me later, when you've got something resembling a clue, mac.

Okay?

[...] opponents of healthcare reform legislation have openly stated their determination to derail Pres. Obama’s proposed reforms, aimed at bringing “quality, affordable care” within reach of all Americans. Yet they have [...]

I took a look at the Republican health care plan that they came out with last month…..
The democrats have a 1200 page plan.
The Republicans plan is 3.5 pages.
Apparently the Repubicans either think that there's not much that needs to be done to improve the current health care system…or else they haven't really thought much about heath care in the last 20 years.
Don't get me wrong. It's always good to be brief…but…gee. That's even shorter than the rental agreement asks my renters to sign ….and they only pay $1600 a month.

Can you really summarize a trillion dollar program in 3.5 pages?

My guess is that they may not really want to go into details for fear they will start to piss people off. Better to just talk in generalities.

I even did a search for “Republican Health Care Plan” on wikipedia. Nothing.

Norrishall asks, “Can you really summarize a trillion dollar program in 3.5 pages?” Of course not, but the Republican plan isn't a trillion dollar program! There are other republican proposals out there, S 1099 for one, but they can't get them out of the democratic-controlled finance committee. Which is not a surprise. Obama wants bipartisianship? If you believe that, I have a nice piece of ocean-front property in Arizona to sell you!

[...] GOP Health Care Plan: Stall « The Washington Independent [...]

I took a look at the Republican health care plan that they came out with last month…..
The democrats have a 1200 page plan.
The Republicans plan is 3.5 pages.

[...] 8.GOP Health Care Plan: Stall « The Washington Independent Jim DeMint’s (R-S.C.) launch of his own health care plan in June, some Republicans were echoing the message in his TV ads, that Congress needed to slow down the pace of health care reform. … I took a look at the Republican health care plan that they came out with last month….. The democrats have a 1200 page plan. http://washingtonindependent.com/51881/gop-health-care-plan-stall [...]

[...] profit hospitals have made their money from the private health care field, so the opposition to the public option seem to be purely self [...]

The goals and the rhetoric of both sides are remarkably similar: cover the uninsured, allow people to keep the coverage they have, provide more choices of affordable health insurance, and rein in health costs. 

The goals and the rhetoric of both sides are remarkably similar: cover
the uninsured, allow people to keep the coverage they have, provide more
choices of affordable health insurance, and rein in health costs. 

Health Insurance Plans