By Bob Klaus
Father's Day almost interdicted, but I could not let Hank have the last word (A Dose of Reality, Comment, 15 June).
Mr. Gorfein continues to ignore the meat of my arguments, and instead clutter up the conversation with liberal talking points. We are still the world's #1 immigration destination. The U.S. is down to 18th in "quality of life" because of the 50-year War on Poverty, which now has over ½ of US households receiving Federal means-tested benefits, and less than ½ paying ANY income taxes; exacerbated by President Obama's war on energy. You can thank the welfare system for 75% of black babies being born out of wedlock, with the national figure near 50%. When you destroy the family by substituting a "village" for a father, prosperity is not enhanced.
When healthcare is a "collective endeavor", you lose that incentive to exercise, watch your diet, get off drugs, not drive like an idiot. So Big Brother must step in and take from those who have and give to those who won't be bothered to provide for themselves. Until there are no "haves" remaining (except political elites): every socialist government ever attempted ultimately fails. Mr. Gorfein doesn't like my recurrent allusions to Venezuela, a nearby, dramatic example: fine, look at North Korea instead. Or, if he insists on Europe, how about Greece for a mature example of a socialist economy?
Legions of medical professionals are leaving their practices because of Mr. Gorfein's argument that Medicare/Medicaid patients are becoming all that is left. Who would work their *** off getting through medical school, to then be told how much they can charge to pay off their school loans, spending much of their effort on paperwork? Those "great predators", the pharmaceutical companies, provide most of the recipes for medications around the world. The reason they charge what they do is first because the FDA forces Pharma to invest billions and half of the patent life into research before releasing new drugs, which are then pirated. I do not like crony capitalists any more than I like socialists, but if you take a moment with almost any of our problems, you will find a bureaucrat behind the difficulty.
There is no benefit to my soul to watch the government take my money for others; charity occurs only when I volunteer it. If you don't think the government takes money by force, tell the IRS you have paid your share; the first person at your door may not have a gun, but the next one will. Also, the bureaucratic overhead runs at best 30% and usually many times worse than that. Few of the charities in the Combined Federal Campaign roster have efficiencies of 50%, and you can bet that HUD takes lots of $10 from lots of pockets to pay a dollar for a subsidized apartment.
And then finally, Mr. Gorfein returns to our Constitution, but only after presuming welfare benefits and universal healthcare into citizen "rights". Not one signer in the 1787 Continental Congress would agree with those definitions. Government is to "secure" all of our "inalienable [God-given] rights", not every specious claim from one citizen against another's "pursuit of happiness". Socialist programs, especially including healthcare, exist only to take from one and give to another, with the government taking its cut as it forces the transfers. They only work temporarily, until they have destroyed the economy they are parasitizing. I prefer the culture I was blessed to inherit, and will try my best to pass it on to the next generation.
Originally published on RappNet, Rappahannock News
Robert "Bob" Klaus (Amissville) is a true patriot, freedom lover and an honest, just Conservative
Posts
