Do you want government controlled health care? If you do, ask yourself these questions. Do you think leaving all your personal health issues in the hands of government employees will make everything easier, better, and wonderful? Do you think doing that will make you healthier? Do you trust the government to do the right thing for you and your family's health? Do you trust the government with your life? Are you more comfortable with the government making life and death decisions for you than if you, your family and your doctor made them yourselves?
These are important questions, folks. Better think them through carefully before you throw in with the socialized medicine gang because once the seeds are sown, once the government health care bill is passed, it will be a done deal for all time. There will be no going back. No reversals. Once government has its hands on something it keeps it.
The first thing you should do is consider what kind of a job big government does when it controls ANYTHING. Think of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Think of the Department of Motor Vehicles. Think of the US Postal Service. Think of the Internal Revenue Service. Think of Communist Russia, of Communist China, of Nazi Germany. These were all nations totally controlled by the government. Do you think they did a fine job for their people? Did those governments make things "better"?
Personally I don't put much trust in any group or organization private or public that becomes too big. When a group gets so big that it takes over completely, things tend to get worse, not better. When Federated Department Stores (Macy's) got bigger by buying up all the other department stores in the country, consumers suddenly had less choices of merchandise and fewer places to shop. In a relatively short period of time, just in California alone, we lost Robinsons, Bullocks, Bullock's Wilshire, The Broadway, The May Co., I. Magnum, Buffum's, and Orbach's.
Big government is no better than big business. As a matter of fact it's worse because it has at its disposal police forces, national guards, and armies that can enforce its will on the public. You might not be happy with Blue Shield but they won't send troops into your home to force you to buy their insurance. And you can take Blue Shield to court, but you'll have a tougher go winning a case against the United States of America. In the words of Thomas Jefferson, "A government big enough to give you everything you want, is strong enough to take everything you have."
There are other Jefferson quotes which are worth remembering, such as:
"A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government."
"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty."
"All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent."
"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."
The government itself doesn't make anything. It passes laws, it regulates, it redistributes wealth, but it does not invent, it does not create. Individuals create and make things. The government decides what to do with the things people make. Sometimes the government decides to take something that someone has made and give it to someone else. Is this fair? There is a famous quote by Dr. Adrian Rogers which addresses this.
"You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the industrious out of it. You don't multiply wealth by dividing it. Government cannot give anything to anybody that it doesn't first take from somebody else. Whenever somebody receives something without working for it, somebody else has to work for it without receiving. The worst thing that can happen to a nation is for half of the people to get the idea they don't have to work because somebody else will work for them, and the other half to get the idea that it does no good to work because they don't get to enjoy the fruit of their labor."
This in a nutshell describes the socialist philosophy. Taking from the producers of society and giving to the non-producers of society. Socialized medicine, or universal healthcare as it is now being called, is another step in the socialist direction. Big government growing bigger. If passed, it will be another nail in the coffen of American liberty as we know it. It scares me, because it brings to mind another Thomas Jefferson quote: "The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground."
It's not too late. We can still hold back this "natural progression" or at least slow it down. If you don't want to see a total government takeover of health care, contact your senators and congressmen right away and tell them. Do it now.
