"How far you can go without destroying from within what you are trying to defend from without?"
~Dwight David Eisenhower
I haven't taken a commercial flight in approximately forever, but even I know there's quite a flap at airports these days due to the installation of new "body scanner" machines that reveal boarding passengers in varying degrees of nudity, depending on the sensitivity of the scanner. And apparently, passengers who are apprehensive about undergoing such a revealing procedure (and the accompanying X-rays) haven't been thrilled by the Transportation Safety Administration's alternative: a pat-down by a same-sex TSA employee that outdoes many first dates for physical intimacy. Not long ago, one such aggrieved passenger summed up the opposition to the new rules for boarding an aircraft with his now-famous rallying cry, "Don't touch my junk."
Hence the protests, the "opt-out" movements and the resulting arguments playing out on blogs and newspapers' opinion pages everywhere. Criticisms of the scanners and pat-downs have largely boiled down to two main strands: that the high-tech imaging still doesn't prevent would-be terrorists from bringing dangerous substances onto airplanes; and/or, that the new security measures are invasive of personal privacy and in violation of the Constitution.
I'm sympathetic to both arguments, particularly the latter (which was recently laid out quite articulately by George Washington U. Professor Jeffrey Rosen). But I'm also sympathetic to the more nuanced observation, made by the New York Times' Ross Douthat, that opposition to new security measures often depends on one's support for or opposition to whichever political party is currently setting the agenda on national security. After all, good policy is good policy, whoever occupies the White House.
But I posit that there is a much simpler, much more elemental way to view the whole controversy, one that doesn't depend on upholding constitutional principles or staying loyal to your narrow political affiliation. The scanners and pat-downs are a mistake, for the simple reason that they seek to reinforce the idea that the government can do something that is patently impossible: methodically eliminating every conceivable method of committing violence. The longer that fallacy is official TSA policy, the more severe will be the public consternation when the next terrorist strikes.
Airport security in America is an utterly reactive enterprise. The hijackers on the 9/11 flights used simple box cutters to take over their airplanes; so now the TSA throws a fit if you happen to have a nail clipper in your carry-on bag. A few months later, a would-be terrorist tried to smuggle a bomb onto a flight in his shoe; so ever since, passengers must remove their shoes and send them through X-ray scanners. A few years later, a group of terrorists almost succeeded in smuggling explosive chemicals onto multiple flights and blowing them up mid-air; so now all liquids are treated as contraband and severely restricted (as I learned first-hand when Scottish security at Glasgow airport wouldn't let me bring half a bottle of blue Gatorade on my flight home three summers ago).
And now, because a Nigerian terrorist tried to blow up a plane last Christmas with a bomb sewn into his underwear, the TSA wants to see (or feel) what's inside your underwear. Is this starting to feel like the old arcade game Whack-a-Mole to anyone else yet?
When a pattern emerges, there are only two possibilities: the pattern will continue, or it won't. Either the TSA will continue trying to ban whatever method of attack the last terrorist used, with ever-greater intrusions into the privacy of air passengers, or they will be forced to draw the line somewhere, and admit they can't stop every form of attack.
Or in other words, either body imaging scanners will give way to body cavity searches after some enterprising jihadist inserts a bomb in some private bodily orifice; or the government's dedicated travel safety agency will have to admit there are some lines it cannot cross, some forms of attack it cannot prevent, and that there are no absolute guarantees of safety it can make. Neither is a particularly appealing prospect, but in the long run, those are the only plausible outcomes.
If today's security lines and procedures make travelers irritable and cranky, just wait until the day when a terrorist uses a previously unheard of method to blow up an airplane that TSA cannot or will not defend against. Irritation will quickly turn to widespread fear if the agency has to concede that the government security blanket has holes that can't be patched.
Not that I favor some sort of laissez-faire approach that abandons airport security entirely. While there are limits to the scrutiny the government can or should apply to passengers as they board airplanes, I see no reason to make the terrorists' lives easier by removing metal detectors or other sensible, unobtrusive measures. But we as a society ought to be able to distinguish between metal detectors that might reveal a harmless belt buckle or wedding ring in the process of screening for guns and knives, versus X-ray machines that reveal (and potentially, save, and disseminate) low-grade centerfolds of law-abiding travelers who already have enough reasons to resent the experience of flying in coach.
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Someone Buy This Man a Shovel
The most important thing I learned in 10th grade honors U.S. history wasn't the Marbury v. Madison Supreme Court ruling or the causes of the Civil War. It was the importance of always carrying a reliable bullshit shovel.
I will never forget the image of my teacher, the laconic, popular Mr. Chemerka, stopping the girl who would go on to become my graduating class's valedictorian in the middle of a long, vague, rambling attempt to answer a question that had caught her flat-footed. "Hold on a second," Mr. C interjected, "let me just get my bullshit shovel out." And, to much good-natured laughter (including from the future valedictorian), he pantomimed digging a hole with an imaginary spade.
And ever since, I've tried to apply the bullshit shovel test to every argument and opinion I run across, as a quick gauge of soundness and simple factual accuracy. Most of the time it works remarkably well, alerting me to certain statements and ideas that don't stand up to even cursory scrutiny. But when I read Tom Friedman's latest New York Times column today, I had a sea-captain-from-Jaws moment: "I think I'm going to need a bigger bullshit shovel."
In case you need a reminder, Tom Friedman writes a twice-weekly column for the Times lamenting the fact that he's not in charge of everything. He is obsessed with "green" technology, and he wishes the United States could be more like his idol, the People's Republic of China, so the federal government could impose his environmental vision on the country without little details like democratic governance getting in the way. When Obama was bailing out GM and Chrysler last year, Friedman wanted the money to come with strings, including a mandate that the companies converted all their models to hybrids, pronto. In 2008, he nearly wet himself when the Chinese put on a glamorous opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics, without bothering to wonder why the Chinese have such a hard time staging simple elections. (I had words for him on that occasion.)
(If you're starting to wonder why I even read the man's work, you have a fair point. It's sort of a ritualistic self-flagellation exercise, and probably indicative of some deep-seated sense of guilt I'm trying to exorcise. Maybe my friends and family need to stage an intervention.)
Today's column might just plumb a new low for Tom, something I would have considered physically impossible since whenever I last read him. Concerned that a bipartisan Senate plan to impose prices on carbon-based forms of energy could fall apart because Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid would rather pass a bill pandering to Hispanic voters in his home state of Nevada, Friedman frets that America will lose out to China in the race to claim "the next great global industry ... energy technology."
If you're confused, here's the CliffsNotes explanation:
China already builds a lot of renewable energy equipment, such as solar panels, wind turbines and electric motors for hybrid cars: stuff that's in high demand in places like Europe, where renewable energy production is mandated by government and encouraged through heavy subsidies. Friedman wants American companies to build all that cool stuff, but right now they generally don't, because the U.S. government doesn't punish conventional sources of energy like oil and coal and because renewable energy isn't cost-effective without some sort of carbon tax or cap-and-trade system to make fossil fuels more expensive. No climate bill in the Senate means no shiny new "green industry" in Detroit or Pittsburgh.
Now here's where the bullshit shovel is so desperately needed. Observe that Friedman first declares that renewable energy technology is "the next great global industry." And then observe that he says America needs to handicap conventional, carbon-based energy in order "to start really shifting the economy to clean-power innovations." In other words, wind and solar are the next big money-making business proposition, the trend that's going to revitalize American industry and create American jobs, so we're missing out if we don't get on board. But first we need to make renewables the next big money-making business proposition.
This is setting the proverbial cart so far in front of the horse it's not even funny. Here's a little nugget from all those economics classes Tom Friedman apparently never took: if there's a big, money-making opportunity out there, capitalists will pounce on it, in all their greedy, self-interested glory. They don't wait around for a green light from the government. But that only works if the business opportunity in question makes sense and adheres to the laws of physics. Creating artificial demand for wind turbines by suppressing cheaper alternatives like coal is akin to creating more jobs in the ditch-digging business by outlawing bulldozers, or boosting the glass industry by throwing rocks through windows.
None of which is to say that some form of carbon-limiting scheme doesn't make sense. I have some major reservations about the current state of climate change science, but if in fact global warming is a serious threat, I'm all in favor of reducing greenhouse gas emissions through some sort of government-imposed system. That will almost certainly include switching from cheap, economical fuels to expensive power generated by wind and solar.
But to hear the Tom Friedmans of the world proclaim that making this costly transition will actually make money is laughable, or it would be if it wasn't so intellectually insulting. Chinese solar panel factories aren't booming because the Chinese economy is "going green." On the contrary, China is now the world's largest emitter of carbon dioxide, and 80 percent of the electricity powering China's industrial revolution comes from ... coal. (The U.S. generates about 45 percent of its power from coal, if you were wondering.)
China builds lots of wind turbines and solar panels because the cost of production in Chinese factories is much lower than in the U.S. or Europe. China builds lots of batteries for hybrid cars because it has a near monopoly on the "rare earth" elements needed to build them, and is willing to permit the tremendous environmental devastation involved in rare-earth mining (devastation that has shuttered almost all U.S. rare-earth mines). China recently surpassed the U.S. as the largest auto market in the world, and it's the fastest-growing market for big, gas-guzzling luxury cars from companies like BMW. In short, China is "green" in the same sense that Ben Affleck is a perennial Oscar contender.
I will never forget the image of my teacher, the laconic, popular Mr. Chemerka, stopping the girl who would go on to become my graduating class's valedictorian in the middle of a long, vague, rambling attempt to answer a question that had caught her flat-footed. "Hold on a second," Mr. C interjected, "let me just get my bullshit shovel out." And, to much good-natured laughter (including from the future valedictorian), he pantomimed digging a hole with an imaginary spade.
And ever since, I've tried to apply the bullshit shovel test to every argument and opinion I run across, as a quick gauge of soundness and simple factual accuracy. Most of the time it works remarkably well, alerting me to certain statements and ideas that don't stand up to even cursory scrutiny. But when I read Tom Friedman's latest New York Times column today, I had a sea-captain-from-Jaws moment: "I think I'm going to need a bigger bullshit shovel."
In case you need a reminder, Tom Friedman writes a twice-weekly column for the Times lamenting the fact that he's not in charge of everything. He is obsessed with "green" technology, and he wishes the United States could be more like his idol, the People's Republic of China, so the federal government could impose his environmental vision on the country without little details like democratic governance getting in the way. When Obama was bailing out GM and Chrysler last year, Friedman wanted the money to come with strings, including a mandate that the companies converted all their models to hybrids, pronto. In 2008, he nearly wet himself when the Chinese put on a glamorous opening ceremony for the Beijing Olympics, without bothering to wonder why the Chinese have such a hard time staging simple elections. (I had words for him on that occasion.)
(If you're starting to wonder why I even read the man's work, you have a fair point. It's sort of a ritualistic self-flagellation exercise, and probably indicative of some deep-seated sense of guilt I'm trying to exorcise. Maybe my friends and family need to stage an intervention.)
Today's column might just plumb a new low for Tom, something I would have considered physically impossible since whenever I last read him. Concerned that a bipartisan Senate plan to impose prices on carbon-based forms of energy could fall apart because Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid would rather pass a bill pandering to Hispanic voters in his home state of Nevada, Friedman frets that America will lose out to China in the race to claim "the next great global industry ... energy technology."
If you're confused, here's the CliffsNotes explanation:
China already builds a lot of renewable energy equipment, such as solar panels, wind turbines and electric motors for hybrid cars: stuff that's in high demand in places like Europe, where renewable energy production is mandated by government and encouraged through heavy subsidies. Friedman wants American companies to build all that cool stuff, but right now they generally don't, because the U.S. government doesn't punish conventional sources of energy like oil and coal and because renewable energy isn't cost-effective without some sort of carbon tax or cap-and-trade system to make fossil fuels more expensive. No climate bill in the Senate means no shiny new "green industry" in Detroit or Pittsburgh.
Now here's where the bullshit shovel is so desperately needed. Observe that Friedman first declares that renewable energy technology is "the next great global industry." And then observe that he says America needs to handicap conventional, carbon-based energy in order "to start really shifting the economy to clean-power innovations." In other words, wind and solar are the next big money-making business proposition, the trend that's going to revitalize American industry and create American jobs, so we're missing out if we don't get on board. But first we need to make renewables the next big money-making business proposition.
This is setting the proverbial cart so far in front of the horse it's not even funny. Here's a little nugget from all those economics classes Tom Friedman apparently never took: if there's a big, money-making opportunity out there, capitalists will pounce on it, in all their greedy, self-interested glory. They don't wait around for a green light from the government. But that only works if the business opportunity in question makes sense and adheres to the laws of physics. Creating artificial demand for wind turbines by suppressing cheaper alternatives like coal is akin to creating more jobs in the ditch-digging business by outlawing bulldozers, or boosting the glass industry by throwing rocks through windows.
None of which is to say that some form of carbon-limiting scheme doesn't make sense. I have some major reservations about the current state of climate change science, but if in fact global warming is a serious threat, I'm all in favor of reducing greenhouse gas emissions through some sort of government-imposed system. That will almost certainly include switching from cheap, economical fuels to expensive power generated by wind and solar.
But to hear the Tom Friedmans of the world proclaim that making this costly transition will actually make money is laughable, or it would be if it wasn't so intellectually insulting. Chinese solar panel factories aren't booming because the Chinese economy is "going green." On the contrary, China is now the world's largest emitter of carbon dioxide, and 80 percent of the electricity powering China's industrial revolution comes from ... coal. (The U.S. generates about 45 percent of its power from coal, if you were wondering.)
China builds lots of wind turbines and solar panels because the cost of production in Chinese factories is much lower than in the U.S. or Europe. China builds lots of batteries for hybrid cars because it has a near monopoly on the "rare earth" elements needed to build them, and is willing to permit the tremendous environmental devastation involved in rare-earth mining (devastation that has shuttered almost all U.S. rare-earth mines). China recently surpassed the U.S. as the largest auto market in the world, and it's the fastest-growing market for big, gas-guzzling luxury cars from companies like BMW. In short, China is "green" in the same sense that Ben Affleck is a perennial Oscar contender.
Friday, April 2, 2010
Does Anyone Know Jimmy Carter's E-mail Address?
Because I have an article I'd really like to send him.
Last summer, when "tea party" protests of Obama's recently enacted health care legislation were still an emerging new phenomenon, the ex-president famously wrote off the protesters as crypto-racists unable to accept the fact of a black president. "I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African-American," Carter intoned.
And since then, the liberal thought-police at The New York Times, the Washington Post and elsewhere have largely echoed that sentiment, comparing Capitol Hill protesters demonstrating on the night of the health bill's final passage to Nazi storm troopers or angry, Jim Crow segregationists threatening to lynch southern blacks in the face of Civil Rights legislation in the 1960s.
It's gotten to the point where even I, despite never participating in a "tea party" rally, and despite my utter indifference to Obama's race, started questioning myself. "Maybe I just think I object to the health care bill because it's unconstitutional, because it will make health care worse, because it smacks of heavy-handed government and economic illiteracy. Maybe I really object to it because deep down, I'm a huge racist, Nazi skinhead and just didn't know it..."
But then I read this article by Reason Magazine's Michael Moynihan, and I snapped back to reality. "Phew," I said. "Never mind. It really is just a horrible, ugly, misguided piece of legislation after all."
Last summer, when "tea party" protests of Obama's recently enacted health care legislation were still an emerging new phenomenon, the ex-president famously wrote off the protesters as crypto-racists unable to accept the fact of a black president. "I think an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African-American," Carter intoned.
And since then, the liberal thought-police at The New York Times, the Washington Post and elsewhere have largely echoed that sentiment, comparing Capitol Hill protesters demonstrating on the night of the health bill's final passage to Nazi storm troopers or angry, Jim Crow segregationists threatening to lynch southern blacks in the face of Civil Rights legislation in the 1960s.
It's gotten to the point where even I, despite never participating in a "tea party" rally, and despite my utter indifference to Obama's race, started questioning myself. "Maybe I just think I object to the health care bill because it's unconstitutional, because it will make health care worse, because it smacks of heavy-handed government and economic illiteracy. Maybe I really object to it because deep down, I'm a huge racist, Nazi skinhead and just didn't know it..."
But then I read this article by Reason Magazine's Michael Moynihan, and I snapped back to reality. "Phew," I said. "Never mind. It really is just a horrible, ugly, misguided piece of legislation after all."
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
ObamaCare and My Cognitive Dissonance Moment
Liberals, rejoice; conservatives, despair: After what felt like an interminable, mind-numbing debate, Barack Obama's signature health reform bill is the law of the land. And sadly, we as a country are probably in for months and years of continuing debate, not to mention lawsuits challenging the law's constitutionality and entire political campaigns devoted to upholding or repealing the most significant piece of social engineering legislation of our time. What a dreary prospect.
It's been an exhausting national debate, not least because the various bills, the final law and the underlying issues are so complex and detailed. I've opposed the basic plan all along, on constitutional, philosophical and economic grounds. But now that it's passed, I'm not here to rehash those arguments yet again. Because, having followed the news coverage of congressional Democrats celebrating their legislative victory, I realized I have a much more basic problem with ObamaCare: It makes my head explode.
To elaborate on that a bit, I cannot reconcile the things I hear liberals say about this legislation with other things I hear liberals say about this legislation. For months now, I've been listening to Barack Obama, or Nancy Pelosi, or another Washington Democrat make certain claims about health care and health reform. I hear those claims, and I say "Uh huh...," and then Obama, or Pelosi, or Senator Whoever immediately goes on to conclude something that makes me go "Huh?" It's gotten to the point where no amount of aspirin can cure the headache this causes me.
And so, rather than delving into the minutia of the law, I humbly submit the following list of basic claims about health care reform that I, personally, cannot hold in my mind simultaneously without suffering severe cognitive dissonance. Or a massive stroke.
1) "The present health insurance system is dysfunctional (uh huh...). We need to make sure everyone in this country has health insurance! (huh?)
So health insurance is outrageously expensive, maddening to access and bad at actually doing the things it's supposed to do? And this is a reason to expand it to an additional 30 million people? This isn't evidence that it's a bad system that we should have gotten rid of years ago? This doesn't cause Democrats to pause and ask, "Hey, maybe the reasons the current system sucks for the people who have health insurance are related to the reasons other people don't have insurance at all"?
2) "Our country is facing a serious fiscal crisis due to the unfunded liabilities created by government entitlement programs. (uh huh...). So we need to create a new, bigger entitlement program! (huh?)
I know, it sounds crazy, but I didn't say it. Obama said it: "Make no mistake: health care reform is entitlement reform."
Previous entitlement programs, mostly Social Security and Medicare, are threatening to bankrupt our government, so we need to cut them and put the money into a new entitlement program that's available to more people? Once again, the first part of the statement sounds reasonable: the federal government's current unfunded liabilities (that is, the value of the future benefits it has promised to pay but won't have the funds to afford) is $43 trillion. Toss in the national debt of $12.5 trillion, projected future deficits and some other liabilities, and our country is in a $62.3 trillion hole.
Yet somehow, the solution to entitlement spending is ... entitlement spending? Despite a proven track record of previous entitlement programs growing far beyond our capacity to pay for them? I can just hear the earnest, liberal policy wonk going: "But this time it'll work...!"
(And in case you were wondering just how much money $62.3 trillion is, the total value of everything produced by our entire economy in 2009 was $14.2 trillion. In individualized terms, that would be equivalent to a worker earning $50,000 with debts of $219,366.)
3) This one might be my favorite: "We're going to force insurers to cover people with expensive health problems at the same cost as everyone else (uh huh...), and health insurance is going to become more affordable." (huh?!?)
This, in essence, is what Obama's plan boils down to: Somehow we're going to make sure that the people who need medical care the most are going to get it, while still making sure that insurers stop ripping off the rest of us by keeping costs under control. Both halves of that goal are perfectly noble in and of themselves, but they are what logicians call "mutually exclusive." You can have one, or the other, but not both together. Say, did somebody mention something about baking a cake, eating the cake, and then still having the cake?
I think there might be a 4) and a 5) somewhere on this list, but for the sake of my own (mental) health, I should probably stop there. Besides, I've got a cake to bake.
It's been an exhausting national debate, not least because the various bills, the final law and the underlying issues are so complex and detailed. I've opposed the basic plan all along, on constitutional, philosophical and economic grounds. But now that it's passed, I'm not here to rehash those arguments yet again. Because, having followed the news coverage of congressional Democrats celebrating their legislative victory, I realized I have a much more basic problem with ObamaCare: It makes my head explode.
To elaborate on that a bit, I cannot reconcile the things I hear liberals say about this legislation with other things I hear liberals say about this legislation. For months now, I've been listening to Barack Obama, or Nancy Pelosi, or another Washington Democrat make certain claims about health care and health reform. I hear those claims, and I say "Uh huh...," and then Obama, or Pelosi, or Senator Whoever immediately goes on to conclude something that makes me go "Huh?" It's gotten to the point where no amount of aspirin can cure the headache this causes me.
And so, rather than delving into the minutia of the law, I humbly submit the following list of basic claims about health care reform that I, personally, cannot hold in my mind simultaneously without suffering severe cognitive dissonance. Or a massive stroke.
1) "The present health insurance system is dysfunctional (uh huh...). We need to make sure everyone in this country has health insurance! (huh?)
So health insurance is outrageously expensive, maddening to access and bad at actually doing the things it's supposed to do? And this is a reason to expand it to an additional 30 million people? This isn't evidence that it's a bad system that we should have gotten rid of years ago? This doesn't cause Democrats to pause and ask, "Hey, maybe the reasons the current system sucks for the people who have health insurance are related to the reasons other people don't have insurance at all"?
2) "Our country is facing a serious fiscal crisis due to the unfunded liabilities created by government entitlement programs. (uh huh...). So we need to create a new, bigger entitlement program! (huh?)
I know, it sounds crazy, but I didn't say it. Obama said it: "Make no mistake: health care reform is entitlement reform."
Previous entitlement programs, mostly Social Security and Medicare, are threatening to bankrupt our government, so we need to cut them and put the money into a new entitlement program that's available to more people? Once again, the first part of the statement sounds reasonable: the federal government's current unfunded liabilities (that is, the value of the future benefits it has promised to pay but won't have the funds to afford) is $43 trillion. Toss in the national debt of $12.5 trillion, projected future deficits and some other liabilities, and our country is in a $62.3 trillion hole.
Yet somehow, the solution to entitlement spending is ... entitlement spending? Despite a proven track record of previous entitlement programs growing far beyond our capacity to pay for them? I can just hear the earnest, liberal policy wonk going: "But this time it'll work...!"
(And in case you were wondering just how much money $62.3 trillion is, the total value of everything produced by our entire economy in 2009 was $14.2 trillion. In individualized terms, that would be equivalent to a worker earning $50,000 with debts of $219,366.)
3) This one might be my favorite: "We're going to force insurers to cover people with expensive health problems at the same cost as everyone else (uh huh...), and health insurance is going to become more affordable." (huh?!?)
This, in essence, is what Obama's plan boils down to: Somehow we're going to make sure that the people who need medical care the most are going to get it, while still making sure that insurers stop ripping off the rest of us by keeping costs under control. Both halves of that goal are perfectly noble in and of themselves, but they are what logicians call "mutually exclusive." You can have one, or the other, but not both together. Say, did somebody mention something about baking a cake, eating the cake, and then still having the cake?
I think there might be a 4) and a 5) somewhere on this list, but for the sake of my own (mental) health, I should probably stop there. Besides, I've got a cake to bake.
Tuesday, March 23, 2010
I Never Thought I'd Say This...
...but for once in my life, I agree with Joe Biden.
After giving a little speech today at the White House signing ceremony for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the vice president turned to his boss, and said, into a live microphone, "Mr. President, this is a big fucking deal."
Chalk it up as yet another of Joe Biden's seemingly endless string of public gaffes (though it still doesn't top my all-time favorite).
Still, this one is worth noting, because today the veep got it right. When you enact a law that dramatically restructures 16 percent of the American economy, on a strict partisan vote, over the objections of public opinion polls everywhere, under the veil of a massive accounting gimmick and completely unrealistic policy assumptions, relying on a series of special deals for individual lawmakers, and you cement in place the worst aspects of a seriously dysfunctional health care system, and create the legal precedent that health care is an entitlement regardless of your ability to pay for it, it's a really big fucking deal.
You hit the nail on the head, Joe.
After giving a little speech today at the White House signing ceremony for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, the vice president turned to his boss, and said, into a live microphone, "Mr. President, this is a big fucking deal."
Chalk it up as yet another of Joe Biden's seemingly endless string of public gaffes (though it still doesn't top my all-time favorite).
Still, this one is worth noting, because today the veep got it right. When you enact a law that dramatically restructures 16 percent of the American economy, on a strict partisan vote, over the objections of public opinion polls everywhere, under the veil of a massive accounting gimmick and completely unrealistic policy assumptions, relying on a series of special deals for individual lawmakers, and you cement in place the worst aspects of a seriously dysfunctional health care system, and create the legal precedent that health care is an entitlement regardless of your ability to pay for it, it's a really big fucking deal.
You hit the nail on the head, Joe.
Wednesday, March 10, 2010
Bam!
Just in case anyone was in need of a refresher on why Obamacare is a horrendous idea that will only exacerbate the problems with the American medical system rather than solving them, here it is.
Apparently it takes Democrats in Congress 2,000 pages to further undermine our health care system, but a columnist at humble little Reason Magazine can debunk their plan in about 600 words. I don't know whether that's comforting or terrifying.
Apparently it takes Democrats in Congress 2,000 pages to further undermine our health care system, but a columnist at humble little Reason Magazine can debunk their plan in about 600 words. I don't know whether that's comforting or terrifying.
Saturday, February 6, 2010
Suggested Reading
Last week, in need of some reading material to pass the relative tedium of riding a stationary bike in my local gym, I spied a back issue of The Atlantic, a magazine I never read. Plastered across the cover was the headline, "What Washington Doesn't Get About Health Care," above a photo of a pensive (or even confused-looking) Barack Obama. On a whim, I picked it up.
And never has a chance encounter with a piece of nonfiction writing paid greater dividends than did columnist David Goldhill's comprehensive, illustrative discourse on everything that is fundamentally wrong with our country's health care system, and how the so-called "reforms" being pushed by Democrats in Washington would effectively double-down on a bad bet by expanding the current system.
Goldhill asks the basic questions that never got answered when Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and other liberals in Congress started writing their thousand-page bills to revamp health insurance. "How often have you heard a politician say that millions of Americans 'have no health care,' when he or she meant they have no health insurance?" Goldhill inquires.
From that simple observation, he proceeds to demonstrate why modern health insurance is the problem, not the solution, to the hyper-expensive, often shoddy treatment Americans pay for every day. Liberals harp endlessly on the 40-million Americans without health insurance, and they constantly blame "the insurance industry" for the high costs and poor service experienced by the hundreds of millions who do have insurance.
But they never bother asking why no one likes their insurance. Goldhill does, and more importantly, he provides answers that go beyond facile charges of corporate greed. That someone can so coherently apply some basic Economics 101 to the multi-trillion dollar boondoggle that is American medicine, and explain the problems in plain language, is incredibly encouraging to someone such as myself, who's been arguing all along that paying for health care with health insurance makes utterly no sense.
And in case you're wondering, David Goldhill isn't some weird, right-wing fringe anarchist who blames government for every social problem. In fact, he is a self-declared Democrat with an obvious concern for our country's poorest citizens. But unlike Democrats in Congress, he brings a businessman's eye for rational, conceptual analysis, backed up with the data to make his case.
So, if you have 45 minutes and want a real explanation of the single largest problem facing this country, I implore you to give him a try. You won't regret it.
And never has a chance encounter with a piece of nonfiction writing paid greater dividends than did columnist David Goldhill's comprehensive, illustrative discourse on everything that is fundamentally wrong with our country's health care system, and how the so-called "reforms" being pushed by Democrats in Washington would effectively double-down on a bad bet by expanding the current system.
Goldhill asks the basic questions that never got answered when Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi and other liberals in Congress started writing their thousand-page bills to revamp health insurance. "How often have you heard a politician say that millions of Americans 'have no health care,' when he or she meant they have no health insurance?" Goldhill inquires.
From that simple observation, he proceeds to demonstrate why modern health insurance is the problem, not the solution, to the hyper-expensive, often shoddy treatment Americans pay for every day. Liberals harp endlessly on the 40-million Americans without health insurance, and they constantly blame "the insurance industry" for the high costs and poor service experienced by the hundreds of millions who do have insurance.
But they never bother asking why no one likes their insurance. Goldhill does, and more importantly, he provides answers that go beyond facile charges of corporate greed. That someone can so coherently apply some basic Economics 101 to the multi-trillion dollar boondoggle that is American medicine, and explain the problems in plain language, is incredibly encouraging to someone such as myself, who's been arguing all along that paying for health care with health insurance makes utterly no sense.
And in case you're wondering, David Goldhill isn't some weird, right-wing fringe anarchist who blames government for every social problem. In fact, he is a self-declared Democrat with an obvious concern for our country's poorest citizens. But unlike Democrats in Congress, he brings a businessman's eye for rational, conceptual analysis, backed up with the data to make his case.
So, if you have 45 minutes and want a real explanation of the single largest problem facing this country, I implore you to give him a try. You won't regret it.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
ObamaCare: An Offer You Can't Refuse
I happened to catch the president today on CNN, telling a townhall meeting of New Hampshire voters that the health care plan everybody loves to hate really isn't that controversial. New "exchanges" will allow the uninsured to buy health insurance, and new rules will bar insurance companies from denying coverage to those new customers, even if they have preexisting medical problems.
Sounds reasonable enough. And in return, the president assures us the government is simply going to "ask that everybody get health insurance." What a nice guy! How could we angry voters say no to a deal like that?
Except apparently, Obama's definition of "asking" differs from mine, because both health reform bills currently stuck in Congress require virtually everyone to buy health insurance, or face steadily escalating fines in coming years.
If this little nugget of coercion sounds familiar, you might be remembering it from the 2008 presidential campaign, when a candidate named Barack Obama criticized his chief Democratic rivals for supporting an "individual mandate" that would force all Americans to buy health insurance. According to candidate Obama, "A mandate means that in some fashion, everybody will be forced to buy health insurance. ... But I believe the problem is not that folks are trying to avoid getting health care. The problem is they can't afford it. And that's why my plan emphasizes lowering costs."
Flash forward a year, and President Obama has apparently had a change of heart, telling CBS news that "during the campaign I was opposed to this idea ... [but] I am now in favor of some sort of individual mandate as long as there's a hardship exemption."
I think it's fair to say that the term "flip-flop" will die with John Kerry, but still, that's quite a turnaround on an important issue. But hardly a surprise, since anyone remotely acquainted with basic economics can tell you that "universal" health insurance breaks down if you don't force healthy people to buy it and pay the insurance premiums that underwrite the medical costs of insuring the sick. Nobody right, left or center argues that simple fact.
Of course, quite a few conservatives and libertarians on the right argue that government has no business, or constitutional authority, to tell citizens to buy a stick of gum, let alone health insurance. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi neatly summed up the left's response to this objection recently when a reporter asked her if she believed the Constitution gives Congress the power to mandate health insurance, responding: "Are you serious? Are you serious?" Good comeback, Nance.
Since I'm already on record as opposing the mandate to buy insurance on constitutional grounds, and since Nancy Pelosi doesn't care what I think, I won't belabor the point further. However, the Obama-Pelosi mandate does entail one rather bizarre consequence that gets too little attention.
Health care, the president and his backers declare, should be a right for every American, and universal health insurance is the mechanism for upholding that right. But universal health insurance doesn't work without a universal mandate, so our participation in this plan will not be optional.
Ponder that for a moment. Because the rights enumerated in the Constitution -- the right to speak and worship freely, assemble peacefully, vote, etc. -- share an important similarity: in each case, the Constitution protects these rights by prohibiting the government from interfering with them. The Constitution says you can speak as you please, own a gun, and go to whatever church you want; but it makes no provision forcing you to do any of those things.
The newfound right to health insurance, if enacted, would become a first in our history: a right that cannot be refused. What you choose to do with every human right enshrined in the Constitution is your business; when it comes to Democratic health reform, you have the right to do what you're told.
Sounds reasonable enough. And in return, the president assures us the government is simply going to "ask that everybody get health insurance." What a nice guy! How could we angry voters say no to a deal like that?
Except apparently, Obama's definition of "asking" differs from mine, because both health reform bills currently stuck in Congress require virtually everyone to buy health insurance, or face steadily escalating fines in coming years.
If this little nugget of coercion sounds familiar, you might be remembering it from the 2008 presidential campaign, when a candidate named Barack Obama criticized his chief Democratic rivals for supporting an "individual mandate" that would force all Americans to buy health insurance. According to candidate Obama, "A mandate means that in some fashion, everybody will be forced to buy health insurance. ... But I believe the problem is not that folks are trying to avoid getting health care. The problem is they can't afford it. And that's why my plan emphasizes lowering costs."
Flash forward a year, and President Obama has apparently had a change of heart, telling CBS news that "during the campaign I was opposed to this idea ... [but] I am now in favor of some sort of individual mandate as long as there's a hardship exemption."
I think it's fair to say that the term "flip-flop" will die with John Kerry, but still, that's quite a turnaround on an important issue. But hardly a surprise, since anyone remotely acquainted with basic economics can tell you that "universal" health insurance breaks down if you don't force healthy people to buy it and pay the insurance premiums that underwrite the medical costs of insuring the sick. Nobody right, left or center argues that simple fact.
Of course, quite a few conservatives and libertarians on the right argue that government has no business, or constitutional authority, to tell citizens to buy a stick of gum, let alone health insurance. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi neatly summed up the left's response to this objection recently when a reporter asked her if she believed the Constitution gives Congress the power to mandate health insurance, responding: "Are you serious? Are you serious?" Good comeback, Nance.
Since I'm already on record as opposing the mandate to buy insurance on constitutional grounds, and since Nancy Pelosi doesn't care what I think, I won't belabor the point further. However, the Obama-Pelosi mandate does entail one rather bizarre consequence that gets too little attention.
Health care, the president and his backers declare, should be a right for every American, and universal health insurance is the mechanism for upholding that right. But universal health insurance doesn't work without a universal mandate, so our participation in this plan will not be optional.
Ponder that for a moment. Because the rights enumerated in the Constitution -- the right to speak and worship freely, assemble peacefully, vote, etc. -- share an important similarity: in each case, the Constitution protects these rights by prohibiting the government from interfering with them. The Constitution says you can speak as you please, own a gun, and go to whatever church you want; but it makes no provision forcing you to do any of those things.
The newfound right to health insurance, if enacted, would become a first in our history: a right that cannot be refused. What you choose to do with every human right enshrined in the Constitution is your business; when it comes to Democratic health reform, you have the right to do what you're told.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Quick Hits
I'm sure I'll have more to say about the recent upset election in Massachusetts, but for now, I offer you a quick rundown of my favorite left-wing reactions to - and explanations for - the sudden threat to their plan for "reforming" health care.
From The New York Times' editorial writers: "To our minds, it is not remotely a verdict on Mr. Obama’s presidency, nor does it amount to a national referendum on health care reform..."
No argument here. I fail to see how a Senate election in which 49 states' voters were ineligible to take part could possibly constitute a "national referendum." Note to Times editors: It doesn't count if you win an argument that nobody's having.
From Times op-ed writer Timothy Egan: "In famously well-educated Massachusetts, it cannot be said that the voters were stupid."
You know, as opposed to all those stupid states whose votes shouldn't count.
From University of Maryland Political Communications Professor Trevor Parry-Giles: "Other things intrude, like the Christmas Day terror attack, Haiti, anxieties about the economy."
Yeah, sometimes when a natural disaster strikes in some foreign country and inflicts terrible loss of life, I suddenly change party affiliations right before a crucial Senate election. It's the darnedest thing.
From Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy, D-R.I.: "The problem isn't our message. It's the messaging of the message that's the problem."
Translation: I don't want to be in Congress either!
From The New York Times' editorial writers: "To our minds, it is not remotely a verdict on Mr. Obama’s presidency, nor does it amount to a national referendum on health care reform..."
No argument here. I fail to see how a Senate election in which 49 states' voters were ineligible to take part could possibly constitute a "national referendum." Note to Times editors: It doesn't count if you win an argument that nobody's having.
From Times op-ed writer Timothy Egan: "In famously well-educated Massachusetts, it cannot be said that the voters were stupid."
You know, as opposed to all those stupid states whose votes shouldn't count.
From University of Maryland Political Communications Professor Trevor Parry-Giles: "Other things intrude, like the Christmas Day terror attack, Haiti, anxieties about the economy."
Yeah, sometimes when a natural disaster strikes in some foreign country and inflicts terrible loss of life, I suddenly change party affiliations right before a crucial Senate election. It's the darnedest thing.
From Rep. Patrick J. Kennedy, D-R.I.: "The problem isn't our message. It's the messaging of the message that's the problem."
Translation: I don't want to be in Congress either!
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