The GOP Stands on Valid Principle on Obamacare

The Republicans in the House of Representatives have voted for, what, the 42nd time, to defund the 'Affordable Care Act', which is popularly known as Obamacare. Only this time, they've tied the vote into a demand that would cause the government to default on its loan obligations unless the defunding is sustained. There are a lot of people out there who call this stupid.

We prefer to call it principled.

Isn't this what we want from our leaders, to stand on and fight for principles? Is it not regularly lamented throughout the land that what we need are leaders who lead, who believe in certain things and work towards them, yet we do not get such leaders? Well, the House GOP has elected to stand on principle and has the support of an awful lot of Americans behind them to boot. That strikes us as the ideal confluence of political will and popular support. What's not to like?

Granted the President and Nancy Pelosi don't like it. But you will notice that they don't like it for very partisan reasons: it threatens to gore their ox. All the while they too will assert they are standing on principle. If they are, well, then, wouldn't we have two groups dedicated to principle? If fighting for what you believe in is a principle worth defense, then we have it on both sides now. Isn't that good?

Not particularly. What we have here is yet another in that series of shallow words and shallow thought. People believe we ought to stand on principle. Unfortunately this isn't any different than being for education, peace, or freedom. Without asking all the corollary questions, what principles, why, how do we enforce them, and so on and so forth, we are asking for we don't know what. And all that that will get us is we don't know what.

Naturally, we support the GOP here because their principles are more sound. The federal government should not be in the health care business, the Supreme Court be damned. Yet it is interesting to see how President Obama and former Speaker Pelosi react when they don't like when folks stand on principles contrary to theirs.

The President and Adolf Hitler

A group of South Dakota legislators have proposed that every one in that fair state over the age of 21 own a gun. The most immediate response is to jeer, and dismiss the move as a typically conservative reaction in protection of the Second Amendment.

But that would be wrong. What they are doing is showing the downright stupidity of certain government mandates on a level which even the most stouthearted liberal could understand. South Dakota State Representative Hal Wicks explains it best: "Do I or the other co-sponsors believe that the state of South Dakota can require citizens to buy firearms? Of course not. But at the same time, we do not believe the federal government can order every citizen to buy health insurance."

The action illustrates the inanity, indeed the total threat to personal freedom, which is essentially behind the Affordable Care Act. If the government can order the individual to get health insurance, what else might the government order them to do? Eat right? Exercise? Because, of course, eating right and exercise would help curtail health care costs and would be good for you. And isn't it about what's good for you?

But therein lies the trouble: it quickly becomes not about what's right for you but what's right for the general society. Not that the individual should not have a proper general concern for society (for a stable society best makes it possible for him to enjoy proper freedoms) but that, ultimately, the person must, under reasonable circumstances, have the final say on his or her daily choices. Otherwise, we may as well become the Borg, and allow ourselves to simply be plugged in where everyone else thinks best. We may as well become the robots of the state.

That is what liberals, in the end, want. They want to tell us where to live and what type of transportation to use and what to eat and what to do with our lives. For to the left, it's all about the state. Your freedom ends where their desires begin. And they want it all.

That's why the Affordable Care Act is totalitarian, plain and simple. If the government can tell us to buy a certain something, a certain anything, it lays the groundwork for the government to control us all the way down. At the risk of feeding the vitriol which has so many folks distraught these days, that's why it's okay to portray President Obama as Hitler. The jewel of his Presidency is simply dictatorial.

Of Course the Health Care Reform Bill is Unconstitutional

A federal judge in Florida has ruled the Affordable Care Act of 2010 unconstitutional. This brings the score to a two/two tie" two judges have said it's constitutional under the Commerce Clause, and two have said no. The case will surely go the US Supreme Court.

Yet no matter what the Supreme Court may rule, and at this point a ruling that it is against the Constitution is likely, the fact is that the Commerce Clause was never intended to go right down to the individual. Indeed, in most areas where the federal establishment has reached all the way down to the single person, it has only been after constitutional amendments such as the 16th, which allowed a so-called 'head' tax (income tax) to be levied directly against the individual.

The point is made clear by constitutional scholar Randy E. Barnett of Georgetown. "Never before in American history has the commerce clause been used to impose a mandate on all Americans to enter into a commercial relationship with a private company," Barnett has asserted. "Up until today, all previous exercises of the commerce power had been to regulate activity or to prohibit certain activity."

The entire health care debate is simply another manner in which the liberals are trying to paint the Constitution in their favor. They do not believe in the rule of law. They believe in what they believe and want what they want, and will do whatever they can to achieve it. Even if that means a lobotomy for the US Constitution.