NY Times: Antitrust Chief Hits Resistance in Crackdown
The only oneIt's one of several letters printed today from people opposed to Obama's health care plan.
I’ve heard a lot lately that health care is a right. I thought about that and reflected on the rights that the Founders determined needed to be clearly defined, in the Bill of Rights. Obviously, health care wasn’t mentioned, but there was something that struck me about the rights enshrined. When you think of the more commonly defined rights — speech, religion, assembly, bearing arms — think of this: While all these are protected from the government, none can be compelled upon you. You can’t be forced to speak, read or write a paper, join a religious group, participate in a rally or carry a weapon.
Apparently, though, this "right” of health care is so vital that the federal government must mandate and require, under penalty of law, that you participate.
Steve Curry, Oklahoma City
FOOD FOR THOUGHTI didn't come up with the title "Food for thought", the editors at the Gazette did. But it strikes me that it conveys one of the main points of my letter perfectly: thought is required to create food, and thought is the 'coin' which pays for the food - the thought required to choose the specific physical efforts which will result in the production of the food. In a very real sense, one does trade thought, itself, for food.
While I find much to agree with in Brett Thomasson's letter ("'Free' advice") in the July 15, 2009 Oklahoma Gazette, I do take exception with his assertion that Matt Zitterkob is more dependent on capitalism "as a parasite than as the low-level worker he was before, since he now contributes nothing to society."
A person's capacity to support himself has nothing to do with his "contributions to society". Such an idea fosters the impression that your value is somehow tied to or ultimately determined by society, leading to the notion that "society owes me" - which leads to such ideas as "freeganism" and "urban foraging" in the first place.
Supporting yourself by productive work, on the other hand, is an expression of your capacity to uphold your own value - which is bestowed upon you, not by society, but by your own judgement. While capitalism recognizes that a free society makes it possible for people to trade their efforts for the values they need to sustain their lives - and to determine for themselves the terms of that trade, including price - productive work to create those values would be required to survive even if you were alone on a deserted island. For if your food could not be "foraged" in such a place, then it would have to hunted or grown before you could eat it.
That is, it would have to be created by your own effort. And not merely physical effort, but thought as well.
Rob Abiera
Oklahoma City
"The government can create coalitions of private companies, . . . "Now, it occured to me that when private companies form private coalitions, that's a trust and it has to be busted. Hence, the antitrust laws. It would also be considered anti-competitive, as well. As such, it would attract the attention of the Antitrust Division of the Justice Department, as well as the SEC, the FTC, and who knows what other agencies - including various and sundry Congressional committees, who would consider such a thing an unmitigated evil (which it is not, of course).
Still Not An OptionIBD's evidence looks pretty damning to me.
EXCERPTS: "Not fully trusting our own interpretation, we asked for confirmation from the House Ways and Means Committee. Sources there agreed: The bill would indeed shut down the individual private health care insurance market.
Our impression was further confirmed Monday when Rep. Dave Camp, the ranking member on Ways and Means, told us that "any existing plan will not be able to enroll members." There will be "a prohibition," the Michigan Republican said, "on enrolling individuals in private health plans" after the bill becomes law in 2013.
It was also confirmed by Ways and Means staff director Cybele Bjorklund, who, in response to questions from Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin during a committee markup session, admitted last week that insurance providers "cannot create new policies outside of that window outside of the exchange.""
. . .
"In trying to prove the exchange will be a private market, the bill's own supporters actually prove our point. Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., complains in a letter on the next page that last week's editorial is "factually incorrect and highly misleading" yet admits three paragraphs later that outside the exchange, providers "can't continue to market" existing "policies to new customers."
Waxman, who chairs the House Energy and Commerce Committee, also claims the legislation "will create a transparent insurance marketplace," apparently unaware that government cannot create a market. The government can create coalitions of private companies, which are eventually co-opted by the state. And it has given itself the power to seize private companies, as with General Motors.
But it cannot fabricate a market. Anyone who thinks it can, does not know how markets work."
"The government can create coalitions of private companies, . . . "Isn't that what fascist states do?
. . . Apollo 11 enacted the story of an audacious purpose, its execution, its triumph, and the means that achieved it—the story and the demonstration of man’s highest potential.A recording of her lecture, "Apollo and Dionysus" is also online at the Institute's site.
Inductive Quest(via Objectivist Round Up!)
'FREE' ADVICEGood, that is, except for the part about 'contributing to society'.
Regarding the Heide Brandes story "Foragers and 'freegans'" in the July 8, 2009 Oklahoma Gazette:
Matt Zitterkob overlooks several important points in his analysis of his lifestyle. He is, of course, still dependent upon the capitalism he disdains, since the free food he scrounges was produced, processed, packaged, shipped and so on by persons who are part of that system. He is perhaps more dependent on it as a parasite than as the low-level worker he was before, since he now contributes nothing to society - unlike all of those involved in the production of the thrown-out food he eats - and earns nothing with which to navigate within it.
The entire "freegan" movement is based on the idea of, "You work, I don't, and you can feed the both of us whether you want to or not." I suspect that many people in Third World nations who forage for food because no other option exists would marvel at a society where such actions are unnecessary but which produces people who choose to do them anyway.
After they got done laughing at them, that is.
- Brett Thomasson
Newcastle
The Demanding AltruistIt's always good to remind people that
It is the egoist, not the altruist, who values other people.
The New Tea Parties: An Overture to Reclaiming Our Lost FreedomSally Kern and her cohorts are wrong when they claim that the United States of America was founded on Christianity. Where in the Bible does it say that every human being has the absolute right to pursue his or her own happiness in this life on this earth? Every time they assert that this country was meant to be governed by the Christian morality of selflessness and sacrifice they are aiding and abetting the enemy.
EXCERPT: "It is time for Americans to understand that it is not merely a political fight they have on their hands, but a moral one. They must reject the moral code that asks them to live for the sake of other men -- what else could TARP, or the takeover of General Motors, or of the tobacco industry, or of the energy industry, of the insurance industry, or of the health care business mean, but for you to sacrifice your right to your life and your money and property for the sake of others -- and proudly, loudly proclaim the selfish virtue of individual rights, which has been the source of all the wealth and prosperity that we enjoy but which Obama and Congress seek to destroy through socialist redistribution."
(Emphasis mine.)
FACT CHECK:
John Adams
"It is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand.”
• The quotation says nothing about the powers of the federal government to influence religion
• Furthermore, the U.S. Senate ratified, and John Adams signed the Treaty of Tripoli, in which Art. 11 states: As the Government of the United States of America is not, in any sense, founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Mussulmen; and, as the said States never entered into any war, or act of hostility against any Mahometan nation, it is declared by the parties, that no pretext arising from religious opinions, shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries.
James Madison
"We have staked the whole of all our political institutions upon the capacity of mankind for self-government, upon the capacity of each and all of us to govern ourselves, to control ourselves, to sustain ourselves according to the Ten Commandments of God."
• This statement appears nowhere in the writings or recorded utterances of James Madison and is completely contradictory to his character as a strong proponent of the separation of church and state. (http://web.archive.org/web/20030620063744/http://www.au.org/press/pr4401.htm) (http://web.archive.org/web/20020215050032/http://www.au.org/churchstate/cs3014.htm)
Benjamin Franklin
"Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God.”
• Franklin was never as outspoken on this issue and Jefferson or Madison, but he did leave behind a quote that lets us in on what he thought: Writing to his friend Richard Price on Oct. 9, 1780, Franklin expressed his dismay with government-imposed religion. Observed Franklin, “When a Religion is good, I conceive that it will support itself; and, when it cannot support itself, and God does not take care to support, so that its Professors are obliged to call for the help of the Civil Power, ‘tis a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one.”
• Long known as a deist and a champion of the European enlightenment, Franklin was also famous for his religious tolerance and his desire to see all faiths live together in peace. “I have ever let others enjoy their religious sentiments without reflecting on them for those who appeared to me unsupportable and even absurd,” he wrote at age 84. (http://blog.au.org/2006/01/17/happy_birthday_/)
Thomas Jefferson
"God who gave us life gave us liberty and can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are of the Gift of God.”
• The quotation says nothing about the powers of the federal government to influence religion. The quotation is taken out of context. Yes, Jefferson said this, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with the issue of separation. This quotation is taken from a famous letter in which he argues against slavery; Jefferson believed that slavery violated a person's God-given freedom. This does not imply that Jefferson thought that the state had the power to aid religion.
Joseph Story
"Whether any free government can be permanent, where the public worship of God, and the support of Religion, constitute no part of the policy or duty of the state.”
• The quotation says nothing about the powers of the federal government to influence religion and is taken completely out of context. Story did believe in support of religion on the state level, but he rejected federal power over religion; this quote leaves the opposite impression.
Patrick Henry
"This great nation was founded, not by religionists, but by Christians"
• Another spurious quotation. These words appear nowhere in the writings or recorded utterances of Patrick Henry.
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