Obama, health care, and the new road to serfdom / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com

Obama, health care, and the new road to serfdom / The Christian Science Monitor - CSMonitor.com: "At the core of the Obama administration’s push for implementing a comprehensive national healthcare system and related programs is a radical ideological belief in political paternalism and the welfare state. Let’s examine the premises behind – and realities of – welfare statism.
Power and paternalism

First, the guiding idea behind political paternalism is that the individual cannot be trusted to be a free and responsible human being. Those who wish to socially engineer our lives consider us too ignorant, too irresponsible, and too narrow in our own planning to intelligently and reasonably take care of our own healthcare, retirement, family’s education, or spending and consumption choices.

These paternalists presume to know what is good for us, better than we know ourselves. They are determined to make the world over in their own ideological image – and, of course, all for our own good, whether we want it or not.

They are also willing to use force against their fellow human beings to attain their ends. They believe that it is morally right for the state to use its coercive powers to take the income and wealth of some to give to others.

Sound exaggerated? Well, imagine how the government would react if you inform the government that you are sending in a tax payment for your contribution to police, courts, and national defense, but you’re withholding any amount that would fund a national healthcare plan because you consider it unnecessary and immoral. You’d soon face jail time if you resist the confiscatory seizure of your property for unpaid taxes."