Know Yo' Roll

The recent grassroots anger at President Obama's health-care plan is quite illuminating. Firstly, it's interesting, and extrememly disappointing, that President Obama does not even have a health care plan. He has vague proposals that he submitted to the Senate.

If I submitted to the Senate a man in need of a foot massage, the Senate would return to me a man with his arms cut off. Obama has laid out a very vague set of "principles" to be considered by the Senate, but principles in the Senate are worth as much as an overcoat in a whorehouse.

But more than anything else, the anger at Obama's "plan"indicates a fundamental misunderstanding of the role of the federal government in America. To be concise, Americans rail against proactive government while simultaneously benefit ting greatly from reactive government.

So, it would be a socialist sin for the federal government to insure a young person, but it is taken as an article of faith that the very same government must insure every old person through Medicare.

So, it would be a socialist sin for the federal government to take over a car company, but it is taken as an article of faith that the very same government must build every road in the country. If private companies had to built roads, two things would happen: there would be fewer roads and cars would be way more expensive.

So, it would be a socialist sin for the federal government to tax soda, but it is taken as an article of faith that the very same government must assure the safety and supply and purity of water, which is the sine qua non of every beverage, including......soda.

So, it would be a socialist sin for the government to pay for the birth of a child, but it is taken as an article of faith that the very same government must pay to keep brain-dead people on life-support.

Socialism is here. It's been here. The Russian Revolution quickened it, as nearly-pure (and ultra-chaotic) capitalism gave ground to the grey area of a mixed economy in every civilized nation on Earth. Yet even before the Russian Revolution, we had a navy, a common currency, a post office, et cetera.

Every nation now is a mix of socialism and capitalism. The US has a higher relative degree of capitalism than any other nation. And in general, that's a good thing. But it's not the only thing.

Sex is the ultimate imperative of life. And profit is the ultimate imperative of economics. But there are certain types of relationships, in fact nearly all relationships, in which sex is entirely inappropriate.

It would serve us well to apply this lesson to profit vis a vis health care. Sex is not evil. And neither is profit. But to insist on making either of those things the ultimate goal of every Earthly endeavor? That is evil.