Affordable Health Care Act

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You and Yours

President Obama’s proposal for universal pre-school education appeared to have consensus support at the State of the Union Address. After all, one of the most conservative states, Oklahoma, boasted the most comprehensive pre-school education program. And no research on educational programs has shown more promise for success at school than pre-school education.

So I was shocked to learn in Gail Collins’ column this morning that this same proposal had been defeated by Presidential veto in 1971 and then persistently opposed by Congress in the 1970’s.  Apparently this proposal threatened the integrity of the family and, worse yet, foreshadowed a socialist society. Such rumors seldom lose their  force in households and the halls of government, once they are in circulation.

Bur “socialism” is a code word for sharing with others the benefits we already enjoy.  The subtext for “socialism” is that, once we’ve got ours, we won’t pay for yours. This was the message that undermined the Affordable Health Care Act. Except for a pang of conscience from Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, that act would already be nullified.

When Congressional representatives declare that we can’t afford universal health care, what are they saying? We won’t pay for universal health care. We won’t pay for what “me and mine” already have, because that would mean paying for someone else– socialism!

The same argument is likely to emerge with pre-school education, because most comfortable families already provide pre-school education for their children from 2 to 4.  It will be no surprise when these children soar past their peers in grade school and get into the best colleges, because they have a”head start.”

But will we pay for other children to have the same head start?  Not if the relentless drumbeat of “socialism” begins to sound. The comfortable citizens will protest the empowerment of the vulnerable citizens, because they will be given what we had to earn.  We “earned” ours, now you can do the same.

I won’t even go into how arrogant this sounds. I’ll just invoke the Declaration of Independence, which Abraham Lincoln quoted when he composed the Emancipation Proclamation, and which just celebrated its 150th anniversary.

[T]hey are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights and that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Lincoln avowed that the black slaves had these same rights, despite their status and value as property 150 years ago.  The economic consequences of freeing human beings once regarded as property were prodigious. It would cost the comfortable households, both in the South and the North, their most valuable assets for the sake of “the pursuit of happiness” of people not commonly regarded as human. According to Doris Kearns Goodwin, the Proclamation stirred discontent across the Union and nearly caused mutiny in the Union army (Team of Rivals).

History ultimately vindicated Lincoln, and the comfortable class yielded its property for the sake of human rights. De facto slavery is no longer acceptable in this country, but inequality is.

If the drumbeat of “socialism” stirs over the proposal of universal pre-school education, let’s call it what it is. It is not a wasteful federal program and something we can’t afford. It is extending opportunities to children who will then compete with our children in school and in life.  It is granting other families what we already enjoy for our own.  It is paying for “the pursuit of happiness,” when we are already pursuing it very well, thank you.

If this is socialism, then democracy belongs only to “me and mine.” You and yours can get your own.

 

 

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Broccoli Ad Absurdum

The claim that if government can require the purchase of health insurance it can therefore require the consumption of broccoli is one of those so-called “slippery slopes” that judges are always scrambling around.  Courts, politicians and lobbyists have found our legal system utterly eroded by slippery slopes, endangering us with every change in the law. If they identify a law that rankles, they will immediately excavate a slippery slope and then point to it with mounting panic.

Oh yes, health insurance today, but tomorrow . . . broccoli!

In the world of logic, this move is called “reductio ad absurdum” or “a reduction to an absurdity; the refutation of a proposition by demonstrating the inevitably absurd conclusion to which it would logically lead.”  Although logic has a strong reputation in our legal system, the “ad absurdum” part of this strategy should not be overlooked.

A delightful parody of the “reductio ad absurdum” is the current run of Directv commercials, such as “See what happens when you make bad decisions. Don’t wake up in a roadside ditch!” (http://bit.ly/ymT7PP).  In this instance, a cable television user becomes angry at being on hold with his cable provider, leading to several hazards, resulting in getting an eye-patch and finally getting mugged and left in a roadside ditch. Directv has run several commercials on the same silly premise, but no one is buying satellite television service because they are worried about ending up in a roadside ditch.  They laugh at the ridiculous outcome of a simple behavior, such as getting angry on the phone while being on hold.

However, when “reductio ad absurdum” is introduced into the courts or on the floor of the legislature, no one is laughing.  We are all sobered by the possibility we may be forced to eat broccoli in the future.  Why do we take these arguments seriously?

The National Rifle Association is a past master of “reductio ad absurdum.” Every restriction on the licensing of guns appears to them a violation of their right to bear arms.  Most recently they mounted a furious attack on the new technology, which would imprint an identification number on shell casings, so that police gathering them at the scene of a crime could trace them to their users– the criminals.   But if we can identify criminals, we can also identify innocent users of guns, and we wouldn’t want that– would we?  Why should we be allowed to know who fired a weapon and when they did it?  Won’t this mean that the government will come to our houses and seize our weapons without recourse? Ad absurdum!

Judicial decisions are particularly hazardous, because they are used as precedents, so there really is a slippery slope out there, not an imagined one.  The federal government has used its Constitutional power to regulate “interstate commerce” to intrude into affairs many would see best regulated by the state, such as education or care of the indigent. The Supreme Court is the ultimate arbiter of the degree of federal control, so it should take these cases of federal power seriously.

But the judges of the high court should be more wary of the “ad absurdum” arguments or they may find themselves with a satellite dish on the roofs of their houses.  Seeing broccoli as the outcome of universal health care really stretches the legal imagination. Health insurance is a lot more like Social Security and Medicare than it is like broccoli. Is the Constitutionality of Social Security at stake here? Should citizens be required to save money for retirement or for hospitalization? You can spot slippery slopes running off to the right as well as to the left.

We have a compelling social interest in citizens having funds for retirement, in having access to catastrophic health care, and ultimately to the high level of medical care this country offers. In no way does broccoli rank among these interests, and I will defend every citizen’s right to leave it alone. Regardless of the outcome of the Affordable Health Care decision, I am confident that the Supreme Court will protect my sacred right to eschew broccoli.

And I mean no offense to the broccoli growers and producers of America.