RealClearMarkets - Lest We've Forgotten, Health Care Is Not a Right

RealClearMarkets - Lest We've Forgotten, Health Care Is Not a Right: "The advocates of socialized medicine have insisted for decades that health care is a right. They now feel emboldened enough to proffer the absurdity that health insurance is a right, and they do not bother to make a distinction between the two. 'Health care is a right, not a privilege,' proclaims Sen. Bernie Sanders in a Huffington Post op-ed calling for the nationalization of medicine. Medicine has become 'a business' instead of a higher calling of selfless service, President Obama ruefully tells the American Medical Association.

A right is a political principle defining and sanctioning freedom of action in a social context. It imposes a negative obligation-the obligation to refrain from violating the rights of others-not a positive entitlement. Since government produces nothing, for the government to provide goods and services to some, it must first take them by force from others, which is a violation of their rights."