Monday, May 23, 2011 at 10:13PM Kudos to Cato for fighting the good fight. The Supreme Court will have to rule the mandate unconstitutional -- if not, this expansion of power will put government over the top, so that nothing or no one can stop it. This court case will determine if the Constitution still has any meaning at all.
Cato, Obamacare, supreme court Wednesday, June 30, 2010 at 06:45PM Enough is known about human beings to establish the claim for natural rights. There's no way to absolutely settle the issue, but we know enough to recognize that the basic rights of life, liberty, property and pursuit of happiness are rights every individual possesses upon birth, and that they are vital to human flourishing. A person can throw these rights away by violating the rights of others, thereby creating a situation in civil society where the person is punished and certain rights are suspended -- because no one has the right to violate the rights of others. So basically, justice rests on the foundation of basic rights and the protection of these rights from violators.
The State is currently guilty of violating rights, regardless of the fact that these violations are written in law. Laws which violate basic rights are subordinate to the rights themselves. Our rights are not issued by the State -- our rights are natural and exist prior to the establishment of the State. The State, through government, should exist only to protect these rights.
As a people, we have the ability to stop the State's violation of rights. In America we have a representative government, and if enough people elect representatives who will stop rights violations, then this is the proper means of resolution. We have to be concerned with the President we elect, and the congress we elect, because these two branches control the other parts of government which can affect our lives.
You hear the phrase -- "Elections have consequences" -- very often among the political class, and this is true, but not necessarily in a good way. The problem in America is only half of the qalified voters vote, so if a President wins with a little over half of those votes, this means that 25% of the qualified voters are determining the consequences of elections. This sad state of affairs has given us a government which is over-stepping its bounds and violating individual rights. Our government is spending money on things that don't make our lives better, and the government is intervening in the economy in ways which have caused high unemployment and stagnation. The government is violating the rights of property, liberty and the pursuit of happiness through it's heavy interference. Government used its powers to increase home-ownership and set up a financial collapse of the banks, and now it's still bleedng money through Fannie and Freddie, the two culprits in the crisis who are now completely controlled by government and own 90% of the mortgages in America.
Government is also violating our right to privacy through anti-terrorist laws which sacrifice freedom to security, with no establishment of imminent threat sufficient enough to justify the rights violations. National security threats have to rise to the level of unquestionable immediacy before the power of the government to institute emergency measures kicks in, and this is not the case in America. Even in cases of imminent threats, there should be caution that rights are not violated more egregiously than is necessary, and never permanently -- we're going on years now with the privacy violations, and I'm not sure anyone knows the full extent -- now Lieberman wats to give the President the power to shut down the internet -- congress is also voting on giving itself the power to seize banks thought to be vulnerable. Government is out of control -- and all intellectually honest men and women know it.
Government set up a regulatory system which allowed the catastrophe in the gulf and missed the financial crisis -- not only missed, but was instrumental in hiding signs of the crisis -- see Barney Frank and his contributions to the scam. Government has passed a healthcare bill which will force individuals to buy insurance policies, and which coercively interferes in the healthcare industry in unprecedented ways.
Approximately 25% of the qualified voters voted for Obama, and now Obama has nominated Elena Kagan, a dyed-in-the-wool progressive with minimal respect for the Constitution, to the Supreme Court, a position with much influence on the protection or destruction of our Constitution. Elections have consequences? You're damned right they do, and not voting can ensure the consequences will be dire.
I didn't provide links to the claims, but they're easy to find -- just Google -- it's an interesting venture.
