Monday, March 26, 2012

Obama: Counter-Revolutionary

The founders of our nation bequeathed us a Republic, if we could keep it, to paraphrase Benjamin Franklin. The duty of the government of the Republic was to protect the rights of its citizens. To quote the Declaration:
That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,
The founders didn't promise us ever increasing wealth, freedom from want or poverty; only the opportunity to take control of our own lives to pursue those ends we thought best.

But Obama, like other progressives before him, actively seeks to subvert the meaning of the revolution by pressing government into service to supply our every need. Such a government becomes our master, not the servant it was meant to be. In this way, Obama is a counter-revolutionary. He seeks to return the U.S. to the condition of Europe in which the greatness of the state and what it accomplishes, not the greatness of the people, is the measure by which the nation is judged. This is part of the underlying meaning of his so called health insurance reform, and why I so strenuously oppose every bit of that legislation.

In fact, the nation has always delivered first rate insurance and health care, but certainly not equally to all people. But that is not the promise of our nation. We will all be better off we let free people figure out how to best buy their health insurance amid freedom of choice among providers and plans. We will be better off if providers, doctors and hospitals are free to innovate not only with the technology of health care but with innovative business models for delivery. Look at the abundance of food delivered at low cost in a relatively free market. Health care will be as plentiful and filled with variety when we introduce free market reform.

Ultimately, this President, who promised to fundamentally transform America, is not the revolutionary, but a counter-revolutionary, reversing the promise of our founding, a limited government that protects the rights of its citizens.

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