A New Threat to Civil Liberties

Consider for a moment if, as the leftists want, we socialize health care. 

What will this lead to? Obviously, the state would be playing a larger role in the health care industry, possibly even running the whole thing itself.  But the important thing is who picks up the tab.  As long as the individual, not the state, is paying his own bills, it is fine to say he should be able to take whatever risky decisions he wants to with his body, since he is paying his own bills for the possible results of said risky decisions. 

In a socialized health system, where health care is 'free', and no individual is paying his own bill individually, there is a present and great incentive for the people to vote for infringements of civil liberties - to ban certain activities that, in a capitalistic health care system would be entirely acceptable due to the fact that the individual is picking up his own bill.

If you are a civil liberties advocate who cares little about economic freedom, you should consider this before you join the ranks of the socialized medicine supporters.  Once socialized health care gets passed, you will find yourself fighting an uphill battle to protect a great many non-economic freedoms.

For a quick example.  If health care is socialized, there will be an increasing incentive for the state to ban smoking or drinking because it is very unhealthy. 

In a socialist system, the state must pay the bills of the people who drinks or smokes, not the individual.  The result? In a universal health care system, the public has an interest in somehow forcing you to act the way they want you to - an incentive they would not have in a capitalistic system.

This line of thinking, when combined with a socialized universal health care system would, without a doubt, lead to more infringements of personal freedom and choice down the road.  Freedoms that you take for granted now to do all manner of unhealthy things from smoking to drinking to eating ice cream or  engaging in any other unhealthy activity if you want are suddenly more likely to be in the crosshairs of public debate in the future, if socialized health care is implimented. 

Any personal freedom that is unhealthy will be up in the air as long as it is arguable that it is likely to result in the state paying some form of bill or other, rather than the individual taking the risk.  Socialist health care will invariably lead to a reduction of personal freedom and choice in our society, if implimented. 

Can you say "slippery slope"?

>>2

If I said it every time I saw one, I'd be getting plenty of practice.

Yes, the state is definitely going to ban tobacco, alcohol, and ice cream.

and 4chan

>>1
Never thought of it that way, it would kind of be like a huge giant insurance company taking over the government.

>>1

Good point.

Yes, but its easy to say that when you're wealthy enough to afford healthcare. Being born into a poor family who cannot afford it is another matter.

Anyone who thinks a national healthcare system is a dreamlike utopian vision is an idiot, but so is anyone who thinks it's pure evil. There are massive problems, and anyone who's seen UK policies on public health will find that what no. 1 says is undoubtedly true. The question is whether you believe it is the lesser of two evils, and in my view, it probably is.

State healthcare ftw. California is implementing statewide healthcare, I think it is brilliant, probably one of the best things Schwartzenegger has done.

I think health should be a human right. For poor Americans, a medical bill can completely cripple them. On Morgon Spurlock's show 30 Days, he and his fiance spend 30 Days living on minimum wage, and what finally does them in is medical bills, which would've taken months or years to pay off.

>>9
Yeah, so since health care is expensive, the solution is clearly to stick a gun in someone elses' face and force them to pay for it for you, right?

Then, the same dumb leftist cunt is going to go to an anti-war rally to protest violence & war.  Gotta love hypocrisy.

>>8
"Anyone who thinks a national healthcare system is a dreamlike utopian vision is an idiot, but so is anyone who thinks it's pure evil."

I never said it is pure evil.  I am merely pointing out that it does indeed pose a grave threat to civil & personal freedoms in the future - as you seem to agree it does. 

Anyway, there are other solutions than to simply let the state handle it.  You could always try rolling back a lot of the unnecessary regulations that raise the cost of health care, rather than just nationalizing the whole thing.  There are many costly and quite simply unnecessary regulations that significantly raise the cost of health care that none of the health care reformers are even discussing, which I think would be far better solutions than to simply let the state handle it.  The point is, we have ridiculous amounts of regulatory measures, many of which are nearly pointless that raise the cost of health care.  Rather than increasing our efficiency by rolling back unnecessary regulations and cutting costs, the socialists just want to push the bill on to someone else. 

"There are massive problems, and anyone who's seen UK policies on public health will find that what no. 1 says is undoubtedly true. The question is whether you believe it is the lesser of two evils, and in my view, it probably is."

Good.  I agree.  Can you cite the UK policies on public health for me?

I live in australia, which does have socialised medicine. We have lost no freedoms, we just have free (well we pay taxes) medical care. Old or young, rich or poor, if we are sick, we go to the doctor. I know, that sounds horrible! Maybe we should live in America and have the government pass the Patriot Act instead (i can only assume that the original statement was from a sadly uninformed American....seems to be the norm),that is your biggest threat to free speech and civil liberties. I mean really.....health care for all....the unseen evil? LOL!!! PS i am a former US military member (vet Gulf War) who has been living in OZ for 12 years now, and have seen the light about the rest of the world and the idiocy of the US gov't. So there.

>>12
The government is monopolising and abusing your healthcare system. The doctors are only accountable to you through a long queue of bureaucrats and populisticians, prefer mainstream ineffective drugs because they are harmless and they are less likely to get sued for malpractice, you have no choice which doctor or surgery you go to and they are not accountable if the illness is prolonged unnecessarily. There is also no incentive for people to live healthier lifestyles, you are forking out extra tax so people can self-destructively gluttonise and directly breathe in smoke.

>>12
"I live in australia, which does have socialised medicine. We have lost no freedoms,"

Australia has lost no freedoms? Really? Hmm, what's this?

http://www.newsmax.com/articles/?a=2000/6/26/12629
http://www.gunowners.org/hlr-au.htm
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0601/S00228.htm
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/jul2003/asio-j01.shtml
http://www.worldpress.org/Asia/2177.cfm
http://www.computerworld.com/securitytopics/security/story/0,10801,105427,00.html

"we just have free (well we pay taxes) medical care."

Yeah, so its free (well, you have to pay for it), medical care.  Spectacular!

"Old or young, rich or poor, if we are sick, we go to the doctor. I know, that sounds horrible!"

I can't speak for everyone else, but I have no problem paying my medical bills here in the USA.  If you work hard here, you can get ahead... and that leads to..guess what.. the ability to pay your bills and live comfortably! *SURPRISE!*

"Maybe we should live in America and have the government pass the Patriot Act instead (i can only assume that the original statement was from a sadly uninformed American....seems to be the norm)"

Or maybe we should live in Australia so we can loose all our civil liberties, have legislation comparable to the patriot act passed while we apparently aren't even aware of it, then hop on the internet and critisize the supposedly misinformed americans like myself. 

"PS i am a former US military member (vet Gulf War) who has been living in OZ for 12 years now, and have seen the light about the rest of the world and the idiocy of the US gov't. So there."

Whoa, I'm not saying our government doesn't do a lot of stupid shit.  I am perfectly ready to recognize that a lot of government programs (much like the ones you have in australia, and alike many we have here) are completely full of shit and should be rolled back.  This is one of the many reasons I am happy to call myself a libertarian, rather than a misinformed australian government suck up like yourself.

13 Name: Anonymous @ 2007-01-10 08:13

    >>12
    The government is monopolising and abusing your healthcare system. The doctors are only accountable to you through a long queue of bureaucrats and populisticians, prefer mainstream ineffective drugs because they are harmless and they are less likely to get sued for malpractice, you have no choice which doctor or surgery you go to and they are not accountable if the illness is prolonged unnecessarily. There is also no incentive for people to live healthier lifestyles, you are forking out extra tax so people can self-destructively gluttonise and directly breathe in smoke.


you ser, seem to be misinformed.

simply because the doctor is hired by the government, he is still as resposnsible as he'd be if he was hired by a private company.

In general we assume doctors want to do their job, which is, healing people, this is done by giving them the correct drugs, diagnosing people correctly and giving them the right things is the job of doctors, but ho! no no no, doctors who are paid by the GOVERNMENT! will not give you drugs that work, because they might be wrong! geez, that sure is logical.

Care to explain why you have no choice of which doctor you want to go to? i happen to live in a country with free healthcare and  i can go to whatever doctor i wish, of course the doctor has to have room for me in his/her schedule, and i can't bribe him/her to take me before other people, but that's only fair, isn't it?

isn't there an incentive for people to life a healthier lifestyle? sure there is! it's simply a collective incentive rather than an individual incentive. If i lead an unhealthy life, i'm goign to have to pay more taxes. as well as "if other people lead unhealthy lives, i have to pay more money, so they shouldn't", thus you create an over-all consensus that the best thing for everybody is that everybody lives healthily.

Of course what i jsut said is flawed in some parts and can be argued against, but generally if a hospital service is malfunctioning it's because of lack of regulation/rules/management/resources not because people either have to pay themselves or the government does it. 

>>14

They killed Crocodile!

I never thought an entire Nation of rednecks would give up their guns so readily.

Holy shit, an intelligent post along with people who care about the issue and haven't yet dropped the N-bomb.

>>11
I think your analysis of the root problems facing any health care system is right on.  Nationalization would not solve these problems, but would merely push them around or transform them into similar problems.  There has not been nearly enough public discussion about the real costs and benefits of socialized health care. >>1 has raised perhaps some of the most important costs of socialization.

Oh, and you're all jew-niggers.

>>18
"Oh, and you're all jew-niggers."
No one dropped the N bomb so you had to?

So fapping could be deemed an unhealthy practice?  Don't be surprised if a new anti-fapping bill is passed.

>>20
why in the world would fapping be deemed an uhealthy practice? it is medically healthy if you're not able to get regular sex. the only government that would deem fappin an unhealthy practice would be some sort of crazy theocrazy (lol usa)

Monetary loss from banning alcohol + tobacco >>> monetary loss from accidents and diseases involving alcohol + tobacco

Really >>22?

Oh, I'd so love to see supporting evidence for this.

>>23

I'd love to see supporting evidence of the opposite.

The point is you made a baseless assumption and I refuted it with another one. See how that works?

You are all deluded. Thanks to the National Health Service the average person in the UK has healthcare that the pharoahs and kings of the ancient world could only dream of. This is the Miracle of Socialism. The NHS is the largest employer in Europe and one of the largest corporations on Earth, all run not for the benefit of greedy shareholders but for the benefit of the People. The NHS is the Jewel in the Crown of Socialism. That fucking treasonable maggot Blair has been trying to privatise the NHS by stealth using PFI. Politicians wouldn't dare admit to wanting to privatise our health service, even though the fucking rich want their fucking lower taxes, it is useless to appease them, taxes will never be low enough for them.

It is funny you Yanks consider socialized medicine theft, because in Britain private healthcare is considered theft as it steals doctors and nurses from the People's NHS, private education is considered theft because it steals teachers from the People's schools, I personally consider anyone who uses or works for private health or education to be an enemy of the People.

Also those that say socialized healthcare makes people unhealthy should realize how unhealthy American's are both mentally and physically. I am 5'9" 130 pounds hardly ever drink, smoke weed or fap, the last time I needed to use the NHS I fell down the stairs whilst drunk and broke my toe and I was treated by African and Chinese doctors, because we have doctors and nurses from around the world who work together for the People.

The American healthcare system invents diseases just to provide a cure for a profit, like completly unnessacary circumcisions which is viewed as a barbaric mutilation in Europe and the capitalist system needs to make people ill in order to sell them drugs. In a truly communist system drugs, tobacco and alcohol would not even exist as companies would not exist to grow them and their would be no demand, people would be happy all the time so wouldn't need drugs to escape the capitalist hell of individualism and competition, but people would haves loads of free time to go picking wild cannabis and wild magic mushrooms if they want.

What we need though is for the government to build many new NHS mental hospitals so we can treat those mentally ill people who think that capitalism is the solution to all lifes problems, who think communism doesn't work when it clearly does or who are infected with this American born again evangelic KKKristian Zionist shit we get poisoning our cable and sattellite TV channels. Please USA join the civilized world and stop being savage beasts.

>>11
First of all, I never said you said it was pure evil. They're just the yin/yang of the argument. That said, there are many things which you no doubt support because they are good for the country which do in fact erode personal freedoms; a national healthcare system simply influences the perception of 'public health'; it does not create it.

As for problems, well, I wouldn't know where to begin. The NHS has consistently been one of the biggest issues in British politics since its inception. It costs billions every year, and its existence has led or contributed to to some of the things you say (such as higher taxes on alcohol and tobacco for health reasons, though frankly I support this), and whilst the vast majority of the British public support its existence, they are very critical of the inability of governments to sort it out.

On the other hand, the poor of the United Kingdom don't have to worry about having no healthcare or being financially ruined by sickness; certainly not to the same extent as in the US; that is an undoubted triumph of the system.

>>25

If this is satire, you win an internet.

>>24
Really? Excellent! Let's both satisfy each other and get evidence to support or contradict the claim.

Or do you believe a claim by itself is sufficient? The moon is made of blue cheese.

>>28

You said that socializing medicine would cause certain unhealthy things to be banned because of monetary reasons. However, there is a cost to banning things as well. Prove first that banning those things under socialized healthcare will actually be more profitable than not, as there is, in actuality, a huge market for the things you listed.

>>29
If you tax something enough that people will not be able to choose to use it anymore, or tax it enough to make it a significant enough burden for someone to use, you have effectively banned it, and eliminated personal choice from the matter.  I guess rich people won't mind this, since they have plenty of money and can afford to pay the taxes anyway. 

>>25
"You are all deluded. Thanks to the National Health Service the average person in the UK has healthcare that the pharoahs and kings of the ancient world could only dream of."

By stealing/extorting the resources to provide it from someone else. 

"This is the Miracle of Socialism."

Without some degree of capitalism, your government programs would be non-existant for lack of funding.  Miracle of socialism? More like miracle of looting. 

"even though the fucking rich want their fucking lower taxes"

What? Those greedy bastards think they should have a right to keep what they earn? What an absurd notion.

"It is funny you Yanks consider socialized medicine theft, because in Britain private healthcare is considered theft as it steals doctors and nurses from the People's NHS,"

Yes, because the doctors are clearly the property of the state.    Their bodies, the achievements, and the things they produce are the property of the state to be used as the state sees fit.  Greedy individualist bastards.

"private education is considered theft because it steals teachers from the People's schools, I personally consider anyone who uses or works for private health or education to be an enemy of the People."

Yes, because the teachers are clearly the property of the state.    Their bodies, the achievements, and the things they produce are the property of the state to be used as the state sees fit.  Greedy individualist bastards.

"Also those that say socialized healthcare makes people unhealthy should realize how unhealthy American's are both mentally and physically. I am 5'9" 130 pounds hardly ever drink, smoke weed or fap, the last time I needed to use the NHS I fell down the stairs whilst drunk and broke my toe and I was treated by African and Chinese doctors, because we have doctors and nurses from around the world who work together for the People."

I'm 5"10, 140 lbs, have never used a recreational drug in my life, and am generally in perfect health.  Saying "americans" are unhealthy imposes collective judgement on americans generally, when there are plenty of individual americans who are quite healthy indeed.  Also, the simple fact that one society has more individuals like myself who are in good health does not mean that that society has a better medical system - it could simply mean that that society's individuals choose to make more healthy decisions.. (such as eating more vegetables, less ice cream, or whatever).

"The American healthcare system invents diseases just to provide a cure for a profit,"

Give an example.  Your circumcision example was not a disease, and thus does not fit your description and is not a proper example.

"like completly unnessacary circumcisions which is viewed as a barbaric mutilation in Europe"

Good for them.  I view it as unnecessary and barbaric too.  Being a capitalist doesn't mean I am pro-genital mutilation (SURPRISE!).  There are also other americans (as well as some of those evil greedy capitalist doctors you despise so much) who oppose the practice.

"In a truly communist system drugs, tobacco and alcohol would not even exist as companies would not exist to grow them and their would be no demand,"

LOL! How would you get rid of demand? Utterly destroying all individuality and raising the public in an Orwellian police state under constant 24 hour-a-day surveillance & loading them up with bullshit propaganda about how their bodies are the property of the collective and that by using drugs they are damaging state property?

"people would be happy all the time so wouldn't need drugs to escape the capitalist hell of individualism and competition,"

I'm living in the USA right now, and I can't complain.  I'd rather live here than in fucking europe or canada, or worse, China or the former Soviet Union.


I sure as fuck hope >>25 was a troll post. 

>>30
I choose to own a yacht, but I don't have enough money YACHT COMPANIES ARE INFRINGING ON MY PERSONAL CHOICE

>>29
Hello, I am Anonymous. You can't tell me from any other.

FYI, >>23 was my first post in this thread.

And I'm still waiting for support for that claim in >>22. Bonus points if they don't suffer from the broken window fallacy.

>>33

i know what you mean, i'm anonymous too, and i'm still waiting for  a reply to my original post which was #15 :/

>>32
There is a difference between an artificial price set by the government, and the market price.  If the price of a pack beer costs 5$ on the free-market, and you can afford that, but the government taxes the price up to 2000$/pack, and you can't afford that, your freedom of choice has been taken away by the government, effectively. 

The yacht companies in your example have a right to charge what they want for their product, since it is their product, and they own it until it has been purchased by someone.  Again, it is their property, and they can choose not to part with it unless they are offered a price that is acceptable to them (the seller).  This is entirely within their rights as property owners.  Anything less would be an infringement of their freedom of choice. 

This is entirely different from a scenario in which the government arbitrarily denies the freedom of choice to the consumer in the free-market.  In the given situation, the government is denying the consumer his rights to purchase the product from the seller at a price agreeable to the two of them.  This transaction between buyer and seller is a basic human right - the right to property, and the right to do with that property what you please (such as trade it away), as long as you aren't infringing upon the rights of others in the process.

By setting an artificial price, the government is interfering with a private and peaceful interaction between people and denying them basic liberties.

>>35  Good points.

>>35
Which is exactly why we need to lower taxes in areas that are what I'd refer to as lifestyle choices, such as alcohol and cigarettes (should be entirely your choice, and nobody should have a say at all but you).

>>37
That doesn't make any sense. All sales tax can be defined as a lifestyle choice.

>>38
A general sales tax would be different than taxes on specific goods which are typically used as a means to restrict the people's freedom of choice in the marketplace.

Hey, you know what also imposes on human rights? Dying.