Cannibal Care

From my latest at the Center for a Stateless Society:

ObamaCare in brief: Government feeds you to the insurance companies, while simultaneously feeding the insurance companies to you. The state takes home a doggie bag.

In which I work on math for Rachel Maddow

As I've mentioned before, when I watch "news" television I generally watch the preferred provider of the party in power. That lets me expose myself to the best arguments in favor of the current regime's policies, and forces me to come up with my own arguments against those policies rather than relying on others to do my thinking for me.

Through the Dark Years of Dubya, that meant watching a lot of Faux "News" (Hannity, O'Reilly, et. al.) These days, it means watching a lot of what I'm coming to think of as the (P)MSNBC "MOMs" (Maddow, Olbermann, Matthews).

So anyway, Maddow is on a high horse about numbers this week. Specifically, the numbers that it will take to pass health care "reform." Like this:



Let me help you solve this one, Rachel.

First, take a look through the US Constitution and see if you can find so much as a word indicating that the framers intended to delegate supervisory power over health care to the federal government.

Second, since you found that no, there isn't any enumerated power over health care in the Constitution, let me direct your attention to Article Five of that document:

The Congress, whenever two thirds of both Houses shall deem it necessary, shall propose Amendments to this Constitution, or, on the Application of the Legislatures of two thirds of the several States, shall call a Convention for proposing Amendments, which, in either Case, shall be valid to all Intents and Purposes, as Part of this Constitution, when ratified by the Legislatures of three fourths of the several States, or by Conventions in three fourths thereof, as the one or the other Mode of Ratification may be proposed by the Congress ...

So, there you have your real, actual numbers, Rachel: 67 in the US Senate, 291 in the US House, and ratifying majorities in either the legislatures or popular conventions of 38 states. Those numbers only apply, of course, if you're as interested in the real and true legalities of the situation as you claim to be.

I have to say I'm a little disappointed in Maddow lately. She was a pure joy to watch when her show debuted at the tail end of the Dark Years ... and for a little while there, it looked like she was going to retain an unusual (for the left end of the "mainstream" media) independence from the Obama regime as well. For example, she smacked down Obama big-time on his "indefinite detention" backtracking. Unfortunately, health care "reform" seems to be turning her into just another Democratic hack. Still better than O'Reilly by a damn sight, and that craven whiner Hannity isn't even in the same league, but not nearly as enjoyable to watch as she was even a couple of months ago.

"Reform," get your "reform" here!

Tonight, President Barack Obama will hold a prime-time press conference for the purpose of promoting and defending his health care "reform" plan. The solutions he will offer to high costs, lack of access, poor quality of care, etc., will amount to retention and expansion of every stump-stupid idea that has increased costs, impeded access and blocked advances in quality of care for more than a century.

If Obama is serious about real health care reform, he'll offer a very different plan than the one you know he's going to offer. Something along these lines would be a decent start:

- Repeal of the Controlled Substances Act, all of its amendments and subsidiary/complementary laws, and all of it enforcement agencies, effective immediately (pharmacies would, of course, remain free to require a doctor's prescription for a medication if they so choose).

- Abolition of the Food and Drug Administration, effective January 1, 2010 (the insurance industry will likely have an analog to Underwriters Laboratory up and running in short order to replace FDA's regulations with recommendations).

- Phased repeal of Medicare in reverse by part (i.e. from D to A) beginning on January 1, 2010 and proceeding in six-month phases to conclude December 31st, 2011.

- Repeal of federal Medicaid funding and oversight, effective January 1, 2010 (if the states want to keep their ends of that program running, well, the 10th Amendment says they're allowed to be stupid in areas of stupidity not delegated to the feds).

- Effective January 1, 2010, invocation of the federal government's power to regulate interstate commerce for the purpose of exempting from all licensing requirements any health care provider who offers treatment to patients from outside the state in which his or her primary practice is located.

Of course, we know that Obama isn't serious about real reform, so BOHICA.