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October 07, 2008

Healthcare is a RIGHT?

No. HELL, no.

NO ONE has a "right" to something that necessitates the enslavement of others to provide that "right."

No one is entitled to healthcare as a "right" any more than they are entitled to food as a "right" or a house as a "right".

Red Barry can surely go fuck himself.

Posted by Darleen at October 7, 2008 08:22 PM

Comments

I heard that too, on the radio as I was on my way home from class.

Healthcare is not in the Bill of Rights.

I also don't like the "Prevention" that Obama kept talking about. What does that mean? No more hamburgers, Sugar, Alcohol or Tobacco? All of those things are "bad" for you.

The Libertarian in me doesn't like where this is going.

Posted by: baxtrice at October 7, 2008 08:36 PM

Um, Red Barry, i.e. "That One", is going to beat your angry little asses come election day. And you know why? Because the MAJORITY of your fellow Americans want to see him as our President. Deal with it, Darleen. You're officially becoming an anachronism.

Posted by: leah at October 8, 2008 03:18 AM

Answer the question, Leah. Where is this "right" that Barry talks about?

Unlike Barry, I AM a descendent of slaves. Barry just announced that my daughter, the RN, has no right to her own labor, she belongs to the state.

McCain/Palin has not been able to run against just Barry/Joe, they also run again the MSM. A MSM that refuses to investigate nor criticize The Dear Leader.

Just because a cult leader might be elected, doesn't mean the MAJORITY of citizens are behind him...especially when the leader is already cheating at the polls (see Ohio).

Posted by: Darleen at October 8, 2008 06:26 AM

Hey Darleen,

Will dissent still be patriotic when Obama is elected, or will we be told to shut up and "deal with it"?

I still have the right to disagree with Barry whether or not my fellow Americans want to see him as President or not. He doesn't represent me.

Posted by: baxtrice at October 8, 2008 07:29 AM

Told to shut up? No, he's a bit more subtle about silencing the opposition.

Posted by: Stephen R at October 8, 2008 12:29 PM

...says the government worker. You have a child's understanding of moral philosophy.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 03:13 PM

I think the right doesn't understand that sharing the public microphone with others is not the same thing as being made to shut up. It makes me laugh how they're so frightened of a "fairness doctrine" that would enable alternative voices, those not funded by the wealthy power elite, to be heard. They really strike me as the whiniest of bullies, who only want to play when they're guaranteed a constant win.

Darleen sounds almost unbalanced today, equating universal health care with slavery! My cousin is a nurse in Ireland, where medicine is truly socialized, and she lives quite well and owns a lovely cottage that I wish I could afford the airfare to visit. Does Darleen think her daughter would have to work for no pay if more Americans had affordable health care? Does she think she would be forced to work as a nurse? More to the point, does she understand the meaning of the word "slavery"?

I'm becoming convinced that this kind of rabid extremist conservatism speaks more to a personal pathology that needs to see the world in black/white us/them terms. It really has little to nothing to do with this great country. After all, how do you love a country when you hate almost all the people who live in it?

Posted by: Leah at October 8, 2008 04:46 PM

Leah

The "Fairness Doctrine" isn't. Period. Why you want to control what people listen to is clear...you can't stand any ideology but your own. Stop pretending otherwise.

And nice for you cousin, a lot of slaves where well kept too.

Don't you understand that a comfortable cage is still a cage? And the definition of slavery is someone who doesn't own his/her own labor any more. My daughter CHOSE her profession. She can shop her skills on the open market. Obama has declared that her choice and her skills no longer belong to her. Oh, she could quit or find other work ... at least for now. But tell me, Leah, just what would happen if doctors and nurses all said "fuck that shit" and quit? Or maybe you should understand that when nationalizing medicine in England and Canada their best and brightest doctors fled to America ... because they understood the difference between a professional and a slave.

You do NOT have a right to health care. You have the opportunity to negotiate to obtain it...and that means EXCHANGE in a voluntary manner. Another else is a form of thuggery.

Something that Obama is clearly familiar with.

Posted by: Darleen at October 8, 2008 06:09 PM

Your argument is so stupid Darleen. Police officers own their labor, and yet we require them to protect our property rights and compensate them for it with state money. There's no reason it needs to be any different just because someone is a nurse rather than a police officer or firefighter. Get off this ridiculous high horse about your daughter. It has nothing to do with enslavement. That's just idiotic. It has to do with what aspects of life are deemed so fundamental that a decent society is willing to ensure them. If healthcare is a right then society should pay health care workers to provide it, just as it pays the police to protect people's well-being. Maybe you should tell the next cop you see that he's a slave and see what reaction you get.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 06:32 PM

Darleen, my cousin no more lives in a cage than I do. She has far more disposable income, owns her home as personal property the same way I do, CHOSE her career and ENJOYS it. I have a lot of Irish family and they all are satisfied with their health care, have undergone many of the same procedures (heart stent, breast cancer treatment, hip replacement) as my family members in America have - with the same good results. There's no shortage of great doctors and nurses there. They're no more slaves than is the average American who struggles at some job they hate to try and maintain an increasingly uncomfortable cage.

I think your problem is that you're so wedded to this ideology that you don't realize how idiotic you sound. Not all people have the ability to negotiate or exchange for health care. Do you propose they die like dogs in the street? What kind of civilization to you propose we have here in the greatest nation on earth?

Josh makes an excellent point. If we have a RIGHT to be safe in our homes, does that mean those who freely choose law enforcement as a career are slaves?

The one thing I enjoyed more than the rightwing whining about the Fairness Doctrine was them simultaneously whining about the liberal media. Especially when Obama went to Europe and the free market champions on the right just couldn't stop bawling that nobody cared when McCain went overseas. LOL. The only thing the rightwing does better than whiny bullying, it's blatant hypocrisy.

Posted by: leah at October 8, 2008 06:55 PM

Josh and Leah --

Here's a good post about why Healthcare is not a right. Take a minute to read it if you want. Or don't.

Posted by: baxtrice at October 8, 2008 07:27 PM

Darleen has been whining about the "angry Left" for several years now and how they hate Bush and blame him for everything under the sun. Looks to me like she's got plenty of boiling hatred for Obama and nothing at all to say in defense of the last eight years (or the 12 years --until 2006, of Republican rule of Congress), and most revealing, nothing in support of her candidate's proposals. Classic case of blame the other guy for everything. Ayn Rand's vitriolic pseudo-philosophy ignores most evidence of the benefits taxation and regulation have brought in the past century; would you rather live like a banana republic and have a society with two classes, very rich and the very poor? Bush and the Right have us on that road, spiralling down fast. You can't blame Barry for any of it, but keep spouting your bitter bile because it's confirmed what you're really about.

Posted by: brad at October 8, 2008 07:40 PM

Baxtrice, that post isn't good. It just regurgitates the oft-asserted (but never demonstrated) distinction between positive and negative rights. Not persuasive to anyone who's had a basic education in Western moral/legal thought.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 07:51 PM

More specifically, baxtrice, this does all the work in that post:

"People have only a right to freedom and to be left alone. The government involvement that best protects the rights of its citizens is to not get involved at all. When people make the argument that we have a fundamental “right” to health care, they forget about certain other people’s rights. Doctors, nurses, hospital administrators, and of course taxpayers."

If you saw my point about police above, you'd realize where this fails. Protection of any right requires government environment. You could re-write that quote as "Property rights have to be protected by the police. When libertarians insist on property rights, they forget about certain other people's rights. Policemen. Judges. District attorneys, and of course taxpayers."

The distinction libertarians try to draw is specious.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 07:57 PM

Ayn Rand?! You're going to trash Ayn Rand, when the Democrats were running Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac -- The Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that caused the Housing Bubble? And Barry was the 2nd most contributed to Senator by Fannie Mae??
Linky Linky
Bahahahahahahaha!!

OMG that's so funny. Wow. But seriously. Trash "W" to your hearts content, he's gone in 3 months. But leave Ayn Rand out of this.

Also, Class Warfare? Holy Shit man, I'm so fucking tired of class warfare, Hillary, Biden, Barry..all the Dems have been pounding that pony since the primaries. Shit, man. Give it a rest.

-signed bitter and clingy baxtrice (*wink wink*)

Posted by: baxtrice at October 8, 2008 08:04 PM

Josh,

It could be my CRAZY simple-mindedness, but Police officers are hired to enforce the law, not protect our rights. We call them when a crime (against the law!) has been committed. And in the state where I live, I can protect my own property. With my own guns too! :)

But hey, I've never been one for BIG Government. Me likey small government and less interference of the government in my life. If I had it my way, they would
1. deliver the mail
2. protect the borders/national security
3. enforce the laws.

That's all I need.

Posted by: baxtrice at October 8, 2008 08:13 PM

Enforcing the law is protecting your rights, baxtrice. You have a legal right not to have someone break into your home. That's one of your property rights. It's enshrined in law, and enforced by the police. Come on, this is kid stuff.

Who will make sure the roads are re-paved in your small government utopia? I didn't see that on your list of government functions. Also if you want to be a good libertarian you should get rid of the item about the mail - the libertarian position on that is that it should be left to private enterprise. Looks like you've still got some things to learn about small-government Randroid libertarianism. Better dust off that copy of Atlas Shrugged.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 09:18 PM

Law: the system of rules that a particular country or community recognizes as regulating the actions of its members and may enforce by the imposition of penalties

Right(s): A right is a legal or moral entitlement or permission.

Now that's what the dictionary says. We still have issues as a nation defining the some of those certain "rights" as this thread started out showing. But clearly there's a difference between Laws and Rights. But I will concede that yes, Police do "protect our rights" - sort of, but only after we've contacted them and written some kind of report. Most of the time, they are enforcing the public law, which protects the "Community's Rights" in whole. The military also protects our rights by standing ready to defend us if need be. Also, I don't see eye to eye with Ms. Rand and Libertarians on everything, Mr. "I'm So Much Smarter Than Thou".

Round and Round we go...

Posted by: baxtrice at October 8, 2008 10:58 PM

There is a difference between laws and rights. Laws protect rights.

Right(s): A right is a legal or moral entitlement or permission.

The police enforce those legal entitlement. Even before you've "written a report." Ever seen "Cops"? So we've established that your rights require the intervention of the government in the form of the police, and it is beyond dispute that that intervention must be supported by taxation. And thus we've established that there's no difference, in this sense, between a right to be secure in your property and a right to healthcare. Turns out it's tough to be libertarian if you actually think things through.

Posted by: Josh at October 8, 2008 11:05 PM

What town do you live in where cops only respond to reports? In my town, they cruise around in cars. They respond to suspicious looking situations. They stop cars that are driving too fast or have missing headlights. They attend crowded events and keep an eye on the people who attend. They do much more than just respond to reports. They protect the rights of property and safety of the governed. Ergo, according to Darleen, police officers are slaves.

I sometimes try to envision this Randian paradise you angry conservatives dream of. Homeless people starving in the streets. Sick people dying without medical care because they don't have the means to "negotiate" for it. And angry, unbalanced types like yourselves shooting off your beloved guns whenever you feel threatened....which seems to be all the time. It sounds like you'd all like to live in the Thunderdome.

Posted by: leah at October 9, 2008 03:03 AM

Josh

Police/military/judiciary are legitimate government functions... they protect citizens from having their life, liberty or property illegaly taken from. That is the basic compact made between citizens and government (provide Defense)... government protects citizens from each other, from outside forces and provides a neutral forum for the resolution of disputes.

It is NOT the legitimate function of government to infantalize a certain percentage of its citizens by providing for their every need by taking by force from another percentage of its citizens.

Making healthcare a "right" is not a legitimate function of government. You have no more "right" to demand the services of a doctor regardless of his/her desires than you have a "right" to walk into a vegetarian restaurant and demand a hamburger free of charge.

Posted by: Darleen at October 9, 2008 07:01 AM

Good to see you conceding that your "enslavement" rhetoric is nonsense, and there is no fundamental distinction between providing healthcare and protecting property rights. Now you're just relying on your personal opinion of what government's legitimate functions are. Your idiosyncratic views of government are not widely shared, so you don't have a leg to stand on.

Posted by: Josh at October 9, 2008 07:35 AM

Leah said: "If we have a RIGHT to be safe..."

You don't. Nor do you have the oft-cited (by Democrats) right to "feel safe".

You do, however, have the right to defend your own safety -- one of the purposes of the 2nd Amendment.

As to your repeated statement that police "have to" protect your rights, that is false as well. The job of police is to enforce the law, period. Courts have REPEATEDLY found that the police are NOT responsible for your protection.

There have been cases where someone called 911, and the police exhibited gross negligence in getting there in a reasonable time. When bad things happen to the caller as a result (in one case, the estranged boyfriend breaking into her house killed her before police showed up an hour later...) the police were NOT held responsible, because the police, legally speaking, are not responsible for that person's safety.

Posted by: Stephen R at October 17, 2008 08:06 AM

I think the point Darleen is arguing regarding doctors etc as slaves is that, in order to work in that profession, you will have no choice but to work for the state. The entire profession will belong to the government.

Police are run by government because nobody else really _can_ run the police force. That's a pretty good description of the proper limits of government, in my opinion. The government should do those things that _only_ government _can_ do.

Regarding the more practical aspects of socialized health care, I quite like this article:

Why Is There No Car Insurance Crisis?
http://capmag.com/article.asp?ID=3848

Posted by: Stephen R at October 17, 2008 10:25 AM