And in regards to health care, so does every other first world in the country. They also pay less per capita for health care, and enjoy both greater life expectancies and lower infant death rates.
I see health care as a human right..particularly in a country with the kind of wealth we have. In all honesty...and I know this might be offensive, particularly to you and your faith background...I find this to be absolutely frightening. When I look at how God judges those who turn their backs on the least....and I consider how people will sell anyone else out for a tax cut...that's what the fear of God looks like to me. Think of the Lazarus parable...walking by the poor every day. Consider the judgment of Sodom...Ezekiel 16:49 "Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy." I simply can not fathom asking for a tax cut when human beings go without health coverage...and my children have never wanted for a thing. I recognize how strange this conversation might look to those who don't share our hope and our faith.........but I think the GOP has this backwards version that God is on America's side and has stopped asking whether America is on God's side. Please understand I'm not condemning your view of this...this is just my view, and i may be out of my mind!!! (my wife would support that notion!!) It's just how I read the Bible and how I understand God. I'm fearful we worship at the altar of the free market and trickle down economics at the expense of the things God seems to really care about. God's economics don't seem TO ME to match what this empire seems to be fighting for.
You have yet to show how Obama's plan has anything to do with socialized medicine. OF course it doesn't, so that would be difficult for you to do. You also don't seem to understand Obama's ideas regarding Social Security since they don't have anything with buying up people's 401K's and repaying them vis SS. Again you're wrong here at least partially. It may mean more taxes for you if you make more than a quarter million dollars a year. It won't mean more for most Americans though.
A good many nations in the world with socialized medicine enjoy better overall health care. 27 nations also have a lower infant mortality rate. None of that has to do with Obama's health care plan though because his isn't socialized medicine.
Honestly, this is one of the saddest things I've ever read here. It's clear you're not talking about any kind of success but the material kind... I guess this is what happens when a second rate mind spends his teenage years falling in love with the writings of a third rate mind and tries to live by the scripture of Ayn Rand. Ugh. I find it interesting that in your Wiki cite, you neglected to mention the origin of the term by Historian James Truslow Adams, even though it takes up a good portion of the page: Nothing there that comes close to what you're suggesting passes for the American Dream. Please show me any writing by Washington, Adams, Jefferson, Madison, Franklin, Hamilton, Jackson, or Lincoln that supports your view. I'm not talking about Poor Richard's quips about working hard... I'm talking about anything that could be remotely interpreted as saying that the accumulation of wealth is the highest calling of Americans. Here's John's cousin Sam... What he's saying is that people who thought like you do were the Tories. There is a much greater cause than an individual amassing material goods and personal luxuries. Tom understood the selfish and the egotistical all too well... There is a place in society for people who think and behave your way, but it has nothing to do with the primary purpose for America and it is surely not the American Dream.
Read a history book. Shoot, read a recent article or two on Argentina and a plan getting feet in our own Democrat congressional circles that gleans inspiration from the same ideas, ignoring the problems Argentina has faced. Then get back to me. We've gone from viable "privatization" plans to complete government absorption policy being thrown around... and accepted! BTW- Max, No... I am out of my mind. Let me explian my views on "health care" for a moment. If health care is a human right, show me where it has EVER been so. Before you turn me off here... read my entire post. Health care has never been a "right" - but always a "responsibility." Each parent is responsible to take care of their children. Each person is responsible to take of their own body in order to prevent sickness (East your veggies... drink your OJ, etc.). The care of elders is a family responsibility that has also been sadly institutionalized. No PHYSICIAN, save the "Great Physician" has ever offered "health care" as a "right." And even the one I refer to offers "health" and "healing" - not treatment of symptoms. Not even Hippocrates thought that way... even he got something for his knowledge. And his oath has been ignored by "modern" medicine. "Rights" are never free... but they are inherent. You're not born with, and you do not naturally come into "health care" outside of common sense and good nutrition, and most of that is the responsibility of the parent. That is "health" and the ability to heal. So then "health care" is a ruse. It is simply baby sitting of symptoms. Science, for that matter, sees anything short of perfect health in nature as weakness, and, in the case of natural selection and evolution, it is paramount to the basic premise that "the strong survive." Yet when it comes to a commodity, science plays the other side of the coin and suddenly becomes compassionate. But is is squarely because of money that science turns the corner. If we have a right to "health care" it would be 100% free of cost. But that's bad for business. FWIW - that has ZERO to do with my Faith. I am not looking through any of this through the lens of "faith." That further clouds the issues of actuality. Don't take my meaning wrong, I fully believe in my God, but I also see what man has done to pervert basic health rights. "Health care" has been a commodity so far as the world's economies have been, since day one... but therein lies the rub. When "health care" becomes the "job" of someone outside the individual (other than a parent, or relative), you have crossed into aiding and abetting the lazy and irresponsible. You have actually made "health care" a perverted term meaning actually "treatment." Treatment of symptoms is not health. It is a bailout plan. It usually doesn't aim at the cause of the symptoms. Good health takes on the responsibilities of eating right, prevention of illness through common sense (don't skydive = no splat, don't drink and drive = no one gets killed in a wreck, don't ingest foods with transfats = reduced chance of HBP) - we used to eat better... people lived longer pre-fast food, etc. Other societies around the world only saw certain disease after their food chains were westernized. We used to be responsible for ourselves... but government got bigger, and society became more an more dependent... The biggest case that proves this is "health care." Or as I've said, the "big business" of "treatment." If anything at all, so far as "faith" is concerned, faith originated groups (Red Cross, etc.) have done more to advance the basic "rights" of humanity concerning health around the world... in America most of all "health care" groups were formed by churches... look at the names of most of the hospitals in any major city... "Methodist" or "Presbyterian" or "Baptist" or "Saint" something or other... the "faith" community have always led the way in the basic right to HEAL. Every person has a right to a pursuit of GOOD HEALTH and to HEAL. By and large, most are born ready to live, and in good health... The human body has even been proven capable of healing if given the chance through nutrition... That is not "health care" but rather being healthy. "Heath care" is a perversion of the real rights we have. A lack of understanding of the differences (in the current systems in place and what all people have had as basic rights since the dawn of time) is the key issue. If anything, the current state of "health care" when viewing through a lens of faith, one could conclude that faith-based missions around the world have done more good outside of the USA strictly because our government regulation here is not concerned with healing and good health, but has been corrupted through a love of money... a love of revenues that are taxable... and seeking to garner more of that revenue, internalizing it in large part would make the most sense to the greedy in government. If we're wanting to go there, and look through eyes of "faith" - 'The love of money is the root of all evil' -then lets' see our current state of "health care" for what it is. BIG BUSINESS that creates TAXABLE revenue. If US "health care" was any more about "healing" and solving the riddles of incurable disease than oil companies are about truly promoting viable energy alternatives, then they would BOTH find ways to work themselves out of business. The "health care" of this nation is a big business. Nothing more. I don't have a right to "big business." I do have a right to a healthy life. I do have a right to heal when needed. Having personally experienced loss in my family... while depending on "health care" I can tell you that perhaps the quickest way to lose any amount of health you have is to plug yourself in and get dependent on the "heath care" system. It is not the intention of this big business machine to heal and make people independent of them. It is fully the intention of this big business machine to string individuals along on new meds, new treatments, new tests, and establish new research for the purpose of new business ventures. We all have basic rights. But I want no part of a right to a system of death. If fully believe in the points you raise concerning America, and the American church... I do not advocate leaving out the poor, etc... concerning treatment. I just cannot sit by and accept that a government answer -hybrid in principle as it may be on paper -is anything more than another money grab, and eventual socialism. Government wants to help? Fine, regulate the food industry. Make food healthy. We should be arguing this point in our country. Don't we have a human right to healthy food? /rant
From the Redistribution of Wealth thread, post #96 To Supermac34 and wakkoman: You both ignored a critical factor in my argument. Did you know that, in the 1950s, a man could work at a gas station and support a family, buy a house, without his wife working? Yeah, that really happened. The point I'm making is that the typical wage, adjusted for changes in inflation, is MUCH lower than it was in the past - people from a couple generations back had a much, much, much better chance of moving up the ladder than people who were born in the last twenty-thirty years. I noted that the ideal of social mobility may have been true in the past (though it was never as pervasive as many claim), it is rapidly disappearing from the realm of possibility. It's fairly well established that a college education is the single biggest predictor of upward social mobility. But that's becoming a problem as well since, for the last 20 years, the cost of college tuition has been rising at double the rate of inflation: And from a more recent article at CNNMoney ... ----------------------------------------------------------------- So, maybe I can bring this up here since the free-marketeers ignored it in the other thread. If the American Dream was a person, then it is now a person in a nursing home w/advanced health problems and not much time left. And since the 'S' word has made an appearance in this thread: I'm not in favor of Socialism because I believe it's already an out-dated system. I also believe Capitalism is an out-dated system in the sense that it made sense in the eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries because there was still room for competition and there were very few global conglomerates. It doesn't make sense any more in the modern world. But, again, it should be noted that China, the USSR, East Germany, and the Bloc states were not actual communist nations. For communism to come into being, per the system developed by Marx, there must be an incipient stage of capitalism. You'll note from the 'communist' countries I listed above that not a single one of them had anything resembling a capitalist system prior to becoming 'communist.' It's this fact that convinces me that most people who throw out the word 'socialist' as a epithet against any redistribution of wealth actually have no idea how 'socialism' is defined. In short, the communist nations had just as adulterated a system of 'communism' as we, starting in the twentieth-century, have of 'capitalism' - it's convenient shorthand, but neither term makes sense any more. What we have now is closer to a oligarchy where authority springs from access to great quantities of capital, and in that sense, we've passed well beyond the 'competitive' stage. But anyway .... about the 'American Dream': It's on its deathbed, and our culture is already suffering for it.
I think what you're ignoring is that people today don't have needs, they have 'wants'. At that time our lifestyles did not include cell phones, computers, varieties of food, air conditioning, granite countertops etc. Peopel today also have this idea that they deserve healthcare and any treatment possible. Food has virtually deflated in the last 20 years due to technology. A big mac is virtually the same price as it was 20 years ago, which if adjusted for inflation has actually come down in real dollars. If one is willing to live without all the tangible goods and entitlements, they could live well on a meager income better than most in the 1950's. To state that we have not become wealthier as a nation and that there are significantly more opportunities are just false. I think with the global markets and scalablity of the financial markets, a very small percentage of people are able to become extremely wealthy in the 100 millions and billions and these people skew all the other figures about economic mobility.
You are now living in a global economy, its absurd to assume you should be able to support a family, own a house just on one income from working at a gas station, JUST because you were born in United States. Those days are never coming back, not when a Chinese/Indian engineer/doctor is working for 20k a year. You can still move up the ladder, but not by doing the same job billions of other people can also do.
and do you know what would happen to our economy if all these people who don't deserve all these shiny new televisions and ipods stopped buying. I am not arguing that people shouldn't live within our means, but do you know what happens when we do?
all good points, IROC...just thought you might be interested in my viewpoint, since it comes from the same source as yours...even if it goes in different directions, ultimately. as for health care being a human right...i did not mean it from a government/constitutional/"the world" sort of way.... i meant it mostly from a, "wow we sure have a lot...and wow i'm really uncomfortable when I see people being denied something that might save their lives or a family member's life when my kids won't simply because they were lucky enough to be born into my family." "to whom much is given, much is expected" haunts me as a Christian living in this country. truly haunts me. as i say, that's where I understand the context of the phrase, "the fear of God" more than anywhere. more than in anything else. because too often i fail to notice how comfortable i am...and how uncomfortable it is for others. for me....i can't separate out these political issues from my faith....i find myself serving 2 masters when i do that. one says pray for your enemies...the other says, "let's scour the earth to destroy them." one says take care of the poor and serve them...the other takes $.36 of every dollar they take from me and uses it for building weapons of war. one tells me to throw everything into profit so that i can live comfortably, because "i deserve it." the other says i should take up my own cross and be willing to give it all away. difficult to serve two masters. in all honesty, for all the patriotism i see in the church, we live in a culture that looks a helluva lot like the one that threw our forefathers to the lions. it's consumed the church in this country in so many ways. it calls itself the best hope of the world, language the Roman Empire used for itself...and its leaders on both sides of the aisle echo that. it's not the best hope of the world...but i don't need to tell you that!! i want this country/government to mimic jesus, even if it happens by accident. i want it to be humble...to seek peace...to look out for the poor. sometimes it does those things, and when it does it's a good thing. when it does other things, i find it to be less true and less good.
The stats are that around 65% of GDP is consumer spending while for the first time ever last year over 50% of profits from the S&P 500 came from outside of the country. Organic, natural consumption will lead to more consistent sustainable growth. Excess spending beyond natural means will lead to increased interest payments over time which cuts away from future spending and is a net negative. I'd rather have people spend within their means for longer term stability and growth versus short-term unsustainable pops in GDP that lead to bigger problems like what we're seeing today.
My above reasoning is also why we need to focus on global consumers and the growing consumer base in places like China, India and Latin America. As our consumption declines through the lack of credit, we'll need increase in consumption abroad to grow at reasonable rates. That is probably one of my biggest fears with Obama as he may become protectionist and this will limit our ability to leverage the foreign markets, specialization and trade policies. I think this could detract from future growth even more than tax policy.
obama's protectionist stance is one that requires global standards to equal ours. if china's workers don't have the same standards, they are cheaper labor, and therefore it won't matter because the jobs will go over there.
There are a number of countries now where healthcare is considered a right. This is a rather confused argument, but I'll just point out that there is no such thing as natural rights. Rights are always determined by people in power. For most of recorded history, the majority of people had no right to be represented in the will of their leaders. The point is - 'Rights' change over time with changing circumstances. There are no rights accrued to us by 'nature'. Should we be an "only the strong survive" culture? If we truly were, then there are plenty of middle-class (and above) people who certainly haven't demonstrated the physical and mental fitness required to survive in a tough environment - an environment, for example, like poverty - but who still manage to get adequate healthcare because they can afford it. That hardly seems like an "only the strong survive" situation to me. Maybe "only the people with adequate economic resources, no matter how they obtained them, survive" would be a better maxim? I think, more likely, 'survival' is no longer an adequate measure of social well-being. Most of us could live in a box behind the Circle K and still manage to survive. Our environment is not nature, and natural selection no longer occurs. I think this is what you meant to get at all along, right? There are plenty of people who are lazy and irresponsible and who have adequate healthcare. There are plenty of people who are neither lazy nor irresponsible who do not have adequate healthcare. Why is that? Yes, Big Business does all these things because it wants to turn a profit, and as much profit as possible. So ... what if we have a healthcare system that only needs to break even? What if we have a healthcare system where most of the money going into the system actually stays in the system instead of going into the pockets of Big Business? It is statements like this that reaffirm my belief that the morality of Christianity and the tenets of capitalism are not simply in disagreement on a few points, but are in fact diametrically opposed to one another on the majority of issues. I find it baffling when one tries to maintain a worldview that privileges both genuine compassion and absolute profit-seeking - and, judging from the arguments I've seen advanced to justify the pairing, it seems to baffle its adherents just as much as it baffles its critics. But we seem to acknowledge there's a problem. I don't trust the government, but I don't see an alternative in solving the massive healthcare problems in this country. Do you have a better suggestion (I don't mean this facetiously)?
Great post. Thadeus for the wins. The only point you left out here is the obvious deduction: Most "christians" don't have a clue what "christian morality" is or should be.
