Morality101.net

I am always in favor of helping anyone who needs help.  I am in favor of supporting them until they can get on their feet.  I would prefer this were done privately whereby it would be voluntary giving out of love rather than by force of law.  But even I, a person who opposes big government, have no problem with the NEEDY receiving the help they need, from whatever source until they are able to make it on their own.  And they must be allowed to try to make it on their own.

I have been accused of being cold-hearted, mean-spirited, selfish, self-centered, spiteful, heartless because I call for the government to clean itself up and fly right.  The issue in question last time I was accused related to the welfare programs, the feel good programs.
I find myself hard-pressed to explain a concept that is so natural for me to someone who has never thought along the same lines, but I do it anyway, albeit rather poorly.

Our government has been explanding, probably since time for it began, but has exploded in scope in the last 50 years to the extent it bears little resemblence to my younger days.  Some of that expansion may have been good, but I perceive most of it as bad.

I contend that many people who initially get on welfare do so illegally – I’ve had social workers say they’ve had mothers borrow children from a neighbor to show how many kids she had, I’ve known some who have scammed the system, and I know it is done regularly.  I have no reason to think government actually tries to get anyone off welfare because to do so loses a certain degree of control it will then have over that person.  Welfare is a two headed monster.  It serves both the recipient and the politician.  The victim will, if he votes at all, definitely vote and defend the politician who promised him the moon, especially if he delivers on the promise.  The politician will always promise the moon in order to get the votes.   I’ve heard others tell about when bird food is made available, the birds flock around, and once the bird food is gone, the birds leave too.  As long as it’s there, the birds will stay and eat rather than look for more.
There are people who milk the system, and some believe that is rare.  I don’t. I think  it is horribly abused – and I correctly translate that into abuse of the taxpayer who provides the money to take care of those people.  It isn’t just the “welfare system” – it is all the other “feel good” programs designed to create dependency on government, such as subsidized transit, meals on wheels, senior citizen discounts, Medicare, Medicaid, free clinics, etc.

One example.  I once was director for the senior citizen centers, meals on wheels, and transit for my county.  One woman had been having meals delivered to her home at taxpayer expense for months and one day ran into the center to tell me not to have that day’s meal delivered because she was “going shopping with the girls”.  She ran up the 5 steps to the front door rather than take the ramp.  I stopped her delivered meals that same day as she was obviously not qualified to receive home delivered meals.   She was scamming the system, and everyone who knew it was helping her scam the system.  She is one example of many, many I could list.  If the government could bring itself to actually clean house and straighten out things once in a while I would not be so antagonistic, but that has never been done and will never be done.  Someone somewhere must draw the line – otherwise the scammers and cheaters will destroy the system and people who champiion these government handouts will be sorely upset.

I have to ask myself, as possibly you do, how needy is a person who walks around with ipods and cell phones?  How needy is a person who swills booze all day?  How needy is a person who always seems to have cigarettes?  How needy is a person who drives an expensive car?  How needy is a person who goes to the shop for manicures?  How needy is a person who takes illegal drugs?  How needy is a person who uses the money to have her ears (and other parts) pierced, to have fake nails put on, etc?  How needy is a person who has 3 TVs in their home?  How needy is a person who is so important that they wear a pager?  How needy is a person who wears designer jeans?  How needy is a person who gets free medical care, but ignores the medical advice?

I don’t blame the poor person nearly as much as I blame the government.  Maybe not all citizens, but certainly legislators should understand that tax dollars are finite.  What is so hard to understand about one family going without something so that the their taxes will pay for the exact same thing for some other family?  Do people not understand that when a person works and earns a day’s pay, that pay is HIS, NOT the government’s, and not anyone else’s.  If it is HIS money, how does government have the legal right to FORCE him to give whatever percentage of it the government deems necessary?  This constitutes neither caring nor compassion – this constitutes force to steal from one to give to another, primarily for votes.

Our government is becoming increasingly socialist, to the point that some even ask what is so bad about socialism.  Our government schools aren’t doing such a hot job with education if civics and real history are no longer being taught.  Maybe they are still being taught, but slow students get a passing grade so as to not be made to feel badly.

To those who question conservative’s compassion and caring, I tell them the truth about what I do – hours and hours of volunteering at nursing homes and churches for senior citizens, fund raising for Child Protective Services, financially support 4-H, the high school band, food baskets for Christmas, donations to local charities, churches, and schools.  Perhaps this doesn’t impress the critics, but it isn’t meant to.  Do they assume if there was no government help and I found a family in need that I would cheerfully watch it starve to death?  What goes on in these people’s minds?  Anything?

Am I perfect?  Goodness, NO, I am NOT.  Is the critic perfect?  NO, he is not.

I feel I am compassionate.  Stupid, I am NOT.  Wasteful, I am NOT.  Naive, I am NOT.
I will do anything, go to almost any limit to help someone help himself, but when he expects me to do it all for him, I assume I am being scammed.

Principled Perspectives.

A is A, and Socialism by any Other Name…

that Obamacare isn’t socialism ignores socialism’s essential nature. Technical definitions aside, socialism is a form of collectivism, the doctrine that holds that the standard of value is the group, to which the individual is subordinate and can be sacrificed on any group whim, as represented by the state. Communism, Nazism, welfare statism, fascism, democracy, and socialism are all manifestations of collectivism. The sacrifice of individual rights under a statist regime is the political essence of collectivism, and that is exactly the nature of Obama’s health care plan.

But to advocate socialism openly and honestly is and always has been a loser in America. After the tyranny, wars, and unprecedented mass murder wrought by the socialist regimes of Soviet Russia, Nazi Germany, Red China, and the many smaller variants of the 20th century, socialism is dead as an intellectual force. That is why the champions of socialized medicine run from the socialist label as from the plague.

As the great Aristotle said; A is A. And socialism is socialism. We are headed toward totalitarian socialism in America, and have been for the past century. Under Obama, the trend is accelerating. But he is an empty suit, simply cashing in on the trend…the collectivists preferred method of American socialization…the back door of fascism. Step by step, through programs such as the Veterans Administration, Medicare, a myriad of government controls and taxes, etc., total government control of medicine (and, in fact, the entire economy) is and has been advancing in America…long before Bush-Obama socialism appeared on the American scene.

The fascist method was explained by a former leader of a major Western nation some time ago:

“The party is all-embracing…” said Adolf Hitler upon taking power, “Each activity and each need of the individual will thereby be regulated by the party as the representative of the general good…This is Socialism- not such trifles as the private possession of the means of production. Of what importance is that if I range men firmly within a discipline they cannot escape. Let them own land or factories as much as they please. The decisive factor is that the State, through the party, is supreme over all, regardless of whether they are owners or workers…Our Socialism goes far deeper…[the people] have entered a new relation…What are ownership and income to that? Why need we trouble to socialize banks and factories? We socialize human beings.” (From Herman Rauschning’s The Voice of Destruction, as quoted in The Ominous Parallels, by Leonard Peikoff, page 231-232.)

We will maintain our illusion of privacy, while the state, through the medical bureaucracy, exercises total control over the medical and business decisions of patients, insurers, and providers alike. Doctors won’t be technical employees of the state (the communist brand of collectivism), at least not initially. But, fascism is socialism…and so is Obamacare…whether Mr. Schwalb, President Obama, or Bill O’Reilly want to call it that or not. Obamacare will “range men firmly within a [health care] discipline they cannot escape.” The medical bureaucracy will be “all-embracing”, and the people will be socialized…sooner (if the democrats have their way) or later (if the current GOP has its way).

The only antipode to collectivism/socialism is individualism/free market capitalism…the system based upon America’s founding principles of unalienable individual rights and textconstitution republican government…long absent from American health care.

continue reading…

Republished from Source: Original Article by J D Longstreet Socialized Medicine in the United States! : WesternFront America May 27th, 2009

So the big push has begun! The big push for socialized medicine in the United States. Altho, there is little funny about this boondoggle, it is sorta funny to watch the socialists in the US government, including the Obama Administration, tie themselves into knots to avoid using the words “socialized” and “medicine” in the same paragraph, let alone the same sentence. Nevertheless, that is exactly what they are proposing… socialized medicine. And again, I expect ignorance to overcome logic and sound reasoning as the government shoves socialized medicine down the throats of American citizens and, in so doing, bring about the collapse of the best healthcare system in the world.

If you are one of those who actually think they are doing this because they care about you, you really need to see a shrink about your mental health, I mean your “delusions.”

America is about to experience something we have never had before in our history. Rationing of healthcare. There is simply no escaping it. Costs of healthcare will have to be brought to heel by the Obama administration and there is only one way to do that… and that is to ration it. In other words you will be placed on a waiting list and your ailment will be treated whenever they get to you, in a couple of weeks, a couple of months, or a couple of years, or maybe never. If you don’t get the care you require and you die, so much the better. That is the other way of bringing healthcare costs down.”

My wife had surgery a few days ago. The surgery was performed by a robot. Yep! A well-qualified doctor was supervising the robot, of course, but the robot did the work. The machine, we were told, costs 2 million bucks per copy. I pleaded with my wife, in the few minutes we had before she was whisked away to the operating room, to take extreme care, and for goodness sake, do not damage or break that 2 million dollar robot.

The machine is so complicated it sometimes takes hours to set it up between procedures and, as a result, it can only perform two surgeries a day.

It took only a few days, less than a week, to have the paperwork, blood work, radiological workup, and the surgery performed and return home, in my wife’s case. I was left sitting in one of those uncomfortable chairs in an ultra-modern waiting room, surrounded with huge TVs with drive-in movie size screens and stereo sound, plus a progress board, all lit up, and hanging on a wall, showing the progress of your patient in the surgical process as the hours dragged by. Those of us waiting had the option of relaxing in an area of the “pavilion” where hot coffee and snacks were offered. We were given a “beeper and every hour or so, the beeper would go off and someone from the surgical team would come out and bring us up to date on where, exactly, our patient was in the process and how, generally, the patient was tolerating the supreme invasion of a knife, even a knife wielded by a robot.

The kind of “express’ healthcare we experienced and described above, will be a thing of the past if Obama and the Democratic Socialist Party gets their way and they create and install a government run healthcare system. Of course, they are going to deny that and tell you that folks like me, who actually tell you the truth about such things, are “full of it” and don’t know what we are talking about. The sad thing about all of this is that by the time you find out that those of us warning against a government system are, in fact, telling you the truth, it will be too late and healthcare in the US will be scraping the bottom of the barrel like so many other socialized medicine programs around the globe. In other words it will be too cussed late to do anything about it!

One other thing: Do not feel secure, if, like me, you have your own private health Insurance, Why? Because the government run plan will run the private plans out of business. The private plans will not be government subsidized. The government plan(s) will. How can the private plans even be expected to compete against the government plans when the deck is so stacked against them? The simple answer is… they can’t. Soon you and I, with our private health care plans, will eventually wind up on the government health dole — whether we want to or not — and that’s the ultimate plan!

In an article titled: “Obama’s ‘Public’ Health Plan Will Bankrupt the Nation” Lawrence Kudlow says: “And does anybody believe Obama’s new “public” health-insurance plan isn’t really a bridge to single-payer government-run health care? And does anyone think this plan won’t produce a government gatekeeper that will allocate health services and control prices and therefore crowd-out the private-insurance doctor-hospital system?

Federal boards are going to decide what’s good for you and me. And what’s not good for you and me. These boards will drive a wedge between doctors and patients.” Kudlow goes on to say:”…. the Obama Democrats are determined to force through a state-run system that will bankrupt the country.” Read the entire article HERE.

Currently, there are four plans under consideration. One would simply expand Medicare. It would be a fully government run program and would not have to remain solvent to remain in business. The second would be set-up by the government and be required to remain solvent while establishing their own networks and payment schemes. Then there is the plan to have each state create it’s own state insurance following government guidelines. And the one with the least chance of making it out of committee is to have no government plan at all — and instead — clean up the current private insurance programs and police them better than they have in the past.

If all this sounds like a mess, believe me when I tell you that it IS a mess!

Look, you get nothing for free. Everything has a price, a cost. The cost may be hidden, but, believe me, it is there. The price of socialized medicine in America will be so unbelievably high if will be impossible to hide. The government will have to choose between continuing to raise taxes to pay for it, or reduce the amount of healthcare available to the patients.

There is always the threat of a tax revolt in America if the government continues to raise taxes. Many believe the tax revolt has already begun with the American Tea Parties. The first round if those tea parties saw an estimated one million Americans meeting, all across America, to protest taxes already levied by the government on her citizens. Another wave of Tea Parties are expected on July Fourth, the birthday of the nation, and many in the Republican Party now suspect the American Tea Parties are simply the birth of a third political party in America.

The GOP is between a rock and a hard place here. If they do not put up an extremely good fight against Socialized Medicine in America, there is good reason to believe there will be a mass migration of conservatives from the GOP and into other conservative political parties. The American Tea Party will be perfectly positioned to welcome those migrants into their conservative party.

The Democrat Socialist Party would be well advised to tread lightly on socialized medicine. It could be the straw that breaks the camel’s back for them.

**************************

J. D. Longstreet blogs daily at INSIGHT on Freedom … … http://csadispatch.blogspot.com/

To All My Valued Employees,

There have been some rumblings around the office about the future of
this company and, more specifically, your job. As you know, the economy
has changed  for the worse and presents many challenges. However, the
good news is this: The economy doesn’t pose a threat to your job. What
does threaten your job however, is the changing political landscape in
this country.

However, let me tell you some little tidbits of fact which might help
you decide what is in your best interest.

First, while it is easy to spew rhetoric that casts employers against
employees, you have to understand that, for every business owner, there
is a Back Story. This back story is often neglected and overshadowed by
what you see and hear. Sure, you see me park my Mercedes outside. You’ve
seen my big home at last year’s Christmas party. I’m sure; all these
flashy icons of luxury conjure up some idealized thoughts about my life.
However, what you don’t see is the BACK STORY:

I started this company 28 years ago. At that time, I lived in a 300
square foot studio apartment for 3 years. My entire living apartment was
converted into an office so I could put forth 100% effort into building
a company, which by the way, would eventually employ you.

My diet consisted of Ramen Pride noodles because every dollar I saved
went  back into this company. I drove a rusty Toyota Corolla with a
defective transmission. I didn’t have time to date. Often times, I
stayed home on weekends, while my friends went out drinking and
partying. In fact, I was married to my business — hard work,
discipline, and sacrifice.

Meanwhile, my friends got jobs. They worked 40 hours a week and made a
modest $50K a year and spent every dime they earned. They drove flashy
cars and lived in expensive homes and wore fancy designer clothes.
Instead of hitting the Nordstrom’s for the latest hot fashion item, I
was trolling through the discount store extracting any clothing item
that didn’t look like it was birthed in the 70’s. My friends refinanced
their mortgages and lived a life of luxury.  I, however, did not. I put
my time, my money, and my life into a business with a vision that
eventually, some day, I too, will be able to afford these luxuries my
friends supposedly had.

So, while you physically arrive at the  office at 9am, mentally check in
at about noon, and then leave at 5pm, I don’t. There is no “off” button
for me. When you leave the office, you are done and you have a weekend
all to yourself. I  unfortunately do not have the freedom. I eat, and
breathe this  company every minute of the day. There is no rest. There
is no weekend. There is no happy hour. Every day this business is
attached to my hip like a 1 year old special-needs child. You, of
course, only see the fruits of that garden — the nice house, the
Mercedes, the vacations… you never realize the Back Story and the
sacrifices I’ve made.

Now, the economy is falling apart and I, the guy that made all the right
decisions and saved his money, have to bail-out all the people who
didn’t. The people who overspent their paychecks suddenly feel entitled
to the same luxuries that I earned and sacrificed more than a decade of
my life for.

Yes, business ownership has is benefits but the price I’ve paid is steep
and not without wounds.

Unfortunately, the cost of running this business, and employing you, is
starting to eclipse the threshold of marginal benefit and let me tell
you why:

I am being taxed to death and the government thinks I don’t pay enough.
I have state taxes. Federal taxes. Property taxes. Sales and use taxes.
Payroll taxes. Workers compensation taxes. Unemployment taxes. Taxes on
taxes. I have to hire a tax man to manage all these taxes and then guess
what? I have to pay taxes for employing him. Government mandates and
regulations and all the accounting that goes with it, now occupy most of
my time.  On Oct 15th, I wrote a check to the US  Treasury for $288,000
for quarterly taxes. You know what my “stimulus” check was? Zero.. Nada.
Zilch.

The question I have is this: Who is stimulating the economy? Me, the guy
who has provided 14 people good paying jobs and serves over 2,200,000
people per year with a flourishing business? Or the single mother,
sitting at home pregnant with her fourth child waiting for her next
welfare check? Obviously, government feels the latter is the real
economic stimulus of this country.

The fact is, if I deducted (Read: Stole) 50% of your paycheck you’d quit
and you wouldn’t work here. I mean, why should you? That’s nuts. Who
wants to get rewarded only 50% of their hard work? Well, I agree, which
is why your job is in jeopardy.

Here is what many of you don’t understand … to stimulate the economy
you need to stimulate what runs the economy. Had suddenly, the
government mandated  to me that I didn’t need to pay taxes, guess what?
Instead of  depositing that $288,000 into the Washington black-hole, I
would have spent it, hired more employees, and generated substantial
economic growth. My employees would have enjoyed the wealth of that tax
cut in the form of promotions and better salaries. But – you can forget
it now.

When you have a comatose man on the verge of death, you don’t
defibrillate and shock his thumb, thinking that will bring him back to
life, do you? Or, do you defibrillate his heart? Business is at the
heart of America and always has  been. To restart it, you must stimulate
it, not kill it. Suddenly, the power brokers in Washington believe the
poor of America are the essential drivers of the American economic
engine. Nothing could be further from the truth; this is the type of
change YOU can keep.

So where am I going with all this?

It’s quite simple.

If any new taxes are levied on me, or my  company, my reaction will be
swift and simple.  I’ll fire you.  I’ll fire your co-workers. You can
then plead with the government to pay for your mortgage, your SUV, and
your child’s future. Frankly, it isn’t my problem any more.

Then, I  will close this company down, move to another country, and
retire. You see, I’m done. I’m done with a country that penalizes the
productive and gives to the unproductive.  My motivation to work, and to
provide jobs, will be destroyed and, with it, will be my citizenship.

So, if you lose your job, it won’t be at the hands of the economy; it
will be at the hands of a political hurricane that swept through this
country, steam-rolled the constitution, and will have changed its
landscape forever. If that happens, you can find me sitting on a beach,
retired, and with no employees to worry about….

Signed,  THE  BOSS

When you can’t dazzle them with brilliance, baffle them with *****. Idiot Harry Reid maintains that paying income tax is voluntary in the U.S.. Harry Reid is the Majority Leader in the U.S. Senate. He’s obviously not very bright. But then again… he is a politician. Interviewer Jan Helfeld does a great job of trying to nail him down but… w…

Ole Harry for once said a truth, but didn’t believe himself. Really a stumbling oaf.  But hey, if you like videos you’ll see for yourself.

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