Krauthammer on Obamacare

This article is by far the best analysis I've read on the health care debate.

[Obama] protest[s], with perfect disingenuousness, that "this isn't about me. This isn't about politics."
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This is not about politics? Then why is it, to take but the most egregious example, that in this grand health care debate we hear not a word about one of the worst sources of waste in American medicine: the insane cost and arbitrary rewards of our malpractice system?

When a neurosurgeon pays $200,000 a year for malpractice insurance before he even turns on the light in his office or hires his first nurse, who do you think pays? Patients, in higher doctor fees to cover the insurance.

And with jackpot justice that awards one claimant zillions while others get nothing -- and one-third of everything goes to the lawyers -- where do you think that money comes from? The insurance companies, who then pass it on to you in higher premiums.

But the greatest waste is the hidden cost of defensive medicine: tests and procedures that doctors order for no good reason other than to protect themselves from lawsuit. Every doctor knows, as I did when I practiced years ago, how much unnecessary medical cost is incurred with an eye not on medicine but on the law.

Tort reform would yield tens of billions in savings. Yet you cannot find it in the Democratic bills. And Obama breathed not a word about it in the full hour of his health care news conference. Why? No mystery. The Democrats are parasitically dependent on huge donations from trial lawyers.

Didn't Obama promise a new politics that puts people over special interests? Sure. And now he promises expanded, portable, secure, higher-quality medical care -- at lower cost! The only thing he hasn't promised is to extirpate evil from the human heart. That legislation will be introduced next week.

Coulter

Ann's article this week is a lot like mine below...except people read it.

A Modest Proposal

Why doesn't the government nationalize every insurance industry? If justice demands that society bear the consequences of an individual's misfortune, why stop at their health? Why does the same rationale not apply to their car? Their home? Their life?

If a man is hit by a bus at the age of 32, his wife and children - through no fault of their own - are deprived of his income for life. The burden of supporting them will likely fall on society. Couldn't this tragic and costly result be averted by simply mandating a national life insurance system? Not only is it a moral imperative, it would also reduce costs in the long run by keeping the insured's survivors off welfare.

True, the man in the above hypothetical probably had the option of purchasing life insurance for himself and decided against it - possibly to pay for additional schooling to expand his future earning capacity. But this was clearly a bad choice, and should never have been left to his (obviously flawed) judgment in the first place.

More importantly, many people can't afford to pay for life insurance. They're forced to go through life simply hoping that nothing bad happens! Isn't it our duty to insulate them from chance? To make them immune to the challenges and uncertainties of life? Of course it is.

So, we're agreed - life insurance coverage for all!

What? You don't agree? Well, you're cleary selfish and unconcerned for the well-being of others.

Religious Intolerance

I had to share this article from Ken Connor of Townhall.com. While I'm concerned about our government's recent turn toward disastrous economic policies, I think the greatest danger facing our nation is the ongoing campaign to smear, discredit and snuff-out religious devotion. The survival of civilized society depends on our ability as Christians to defend basic theological and moral truths.

* * *
Science: Theists Need Not Apply
Ken Connor
Sunday, July 19, 2009

Religious bigotry is alive and well in the scientific community, as evidenced by its response to President Obama's decision to appoint Dr. Francis Collins as the head of the National Institutes of Health. Though renowned for leading the team of scientists that successfully mapped the human genome, Dr. Collins is making headlines for something else: his faith. In spite of his professional qualifications and accomplishments, many in the scientific community are less than enthusiastic about the President's decision to appoint a self-described evangelical Christian to lead the world's leading organization for scientific research.

This skepticism results from a prejudice against a theistic worldview that has become entrenched in the scientific community—an irrational attitude born of historical ignorance and intellectual myopathy that is increasingly dismissive of moral questions and ethical concerns.

The idea that a tension exists between science and theism is relatively new. The most brilliant philosophical minds of the western intellectual tradition—dating all the way back to the time of Plato and Aristotle—operated on the assumption that our existence came into being through the actions of a divine creator, described as the First Cause or Unmoved Mover. For centuries after, theology reigned as queen of the sciences, and scientific inquiry was animated by the belief that human reason was a gift imparted by God so that man might gain knowledge about Him, His attributes, and the laws which govern His creation.

Without this belief that the physical world is the result of an intentional design governed by fixed laws—laws which we discover through reason and experience—there would have been little cause to engage in scientific pursuits. Faith in the goodness of God's creation and the intelligibility of its design inspired history's great minds to forge ahead into new worlds of knowledge and discovery.

Indeed, many of the great heroes of science pioneered their discoveries under the auspices of this inspiration. Groundbreaking advances in astronomy, chemistry, physics, mathematics, genetics, and other fields of knowledge were made by men dedicated to systematically investigating God's creation—men like Copernicus, Kepler, Pascal, Boyle, Kelvin, Mendel, and Faraday.

Over time, however, the scientific community came to question whether the advancement of human knowledge might be better served by separating itself from ethical constraints arising out of religious beliefs. The idea that man should be guided by transcendent moral principles in his quest for answers to life's mysteries, the idea that some boundaries should not be crossed, was an intolerable thought. Scientists wanted to answer the question "can I?" without having to ask "should I?"

Hence today, when a man who professes faith in the Risen Christ is given the reigns of America's preeminent scientific organization, eyebrows raise in skepticism. Prominent atheists like Richard Dawkins go on late-night TV talk shows to denounce the ridiculous notion that any intelligent person, let alone a scientist, could actually embrace the fantastic teachings of the Bible. Believing that the world is the result of an intentional act of creation on the part of a benevolent and loving God is likened to believing in unicorns or the tooth fairy—Peter Pan fantasies embraced by those too young or too dumb to cope with the cold hard facts of reality.

Regardless of the specifics of Dr. Collins's Christian identity, the idea that his faith impedes his fitness to serve as the head of the NIH operates on the absurd premise that only atheists and agnostics are capable of being good scientists. One might argue the precise opposite of this. If, as previously stated, the origin of scientific inquiry was based upon the belief that the physical world operates according to fixed and intelligible laws, one might ask what kind of foundation underlies a scientific worldview which denies an intelligent design or an ultimate purpose? If there's no designer, no fixed laws, no first principles, then there is no real meaning—no context in which to evaluate the value and significance of newly acquired knowledge. When there is no acknowledged moral source to draw a clear line between the permissible and the forbidden, then human curiosity and ambition are left as the only arbiters of science's use.

Those who profess a commitment to science while rejecting a belief in God want to expand the breadth of scientific inquiry without being subject to ethical constraints. Inevitably, this kind of thinking leads to manipulating or destroying the weaker among us in order to empower the stronger. This is the philosophy that has animated some of our history's most gruesome acts of scientific "experimentation," and it is espoused today by none other than President Obama's "science czar," John Holdren, who has advocated forced abortion and mass sterilization in the name of environmental responsibility.

If this is the kind of ideology that results when the age-old relationship between faith and science is destroyed, then Dr. Collins's "embrace" of religion is the least of America's troubles.

Dr. Sowell on 'Disparate Impact'

In this article on the Ricci case, Dr. Sowell knocks it out of the park yet again.

As you read the article, notice how the concept of 'disparate impact' only makes sense to one who views the world in terms of groups rather than individuals, and completely discounts the possibility of individual or group exceptionalism. It also assumes that the world is essentially 'zero-sum': if one person wins, another must lose. This view creates the sense that those who attain a certain level of success have, in fact, taken that success from others. And that is how people like Judge Sotomayor and Justice Ginsburg have come to rationalize the redistribution of success in the name of civil rights, without regard for individual rights.

Here's a sample of the article:

[T]he growing complexity and murkiness of civil rights law over the years recalls the painful saying: "Oh, what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive."
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A key notion that has created unending mischief, from its introduction by the Supreme Court in 1971 to the current firefighters' case, is that of "disparate impact." Any employment requirement that one racial or ethnic group meets far more often than another is said to have a "disparate impact" and is considered to be evidence of racial discrimination.

In other words, if group X doesn't pass a test nearly as often as group Y, then there is something wrong with the test, according to this reasoning or lack of reasoning. This implicitly assumes that there cannot be any great difference between the two groups in the skills, talents or efforts required.

That notion is the grand dogma of our time-- an idea for which no evidence is asked or given, and an idea that no amount of contradictory evidence can change in the minds of the true believers, or in the rhetoric of ideologues and opportunists.

Trying to reconcile that dogma with the principle of equal treatment for all has led courts into feats of higher metaphysics that the Medieval Scholastics could be proud of.
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It is not stupidity, but ideology and politics, which allow the "disparate impact" dogma to create a tangled web of deception in even the highest levels of our legal system. The recent Supreme Court's decision in the New Haven firefighters' case was a rare example of sanity prevailing, even if only by a vote of 5 to 4.

Coulter on the Ricci Case

I'm generally hesitant to pass along Ann Coulter articles because, although always hilarious, she can be counterproductively inflammatory. However, her article this week on Judge Sotomayor and the Ricci decision is definitely worth reading.

Here's a sample:

This week, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 for the white and Hispanic firefighters, overturning Sotomayor's endorsement of racial quotas.

But all nine justices rejected Sotomayor's holding that different test results alone give the government a green light to engage in race discrimination. Even Justice Ginsburg's opinion for the dissent clearly stated that "an employer could not cast aside a selection method based on a statistical disparity alone."

Indeed, the dissenters argued that the case should be returned to the lower courts to look for some hidden racial bias in the test. For Sotomayor, the results alone proved racial bias.
...
Based on her lifetime of experience working as a firefighter, Ginsburg said: "Relying heavily on written tests to select fire officers is a questionable practice, to say the least." Liberals prefer a more objective test, such as race.
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In the middle of a fire, it can either be a great idea or the worst possible idea to open a door. An excellent method for finding out if your next fire chief knows the correct answer is a written test.

Unleashing the canard of all race-obsessed liberals, Ginsburg observed that courts have found that a fire officer's job "involves complex behaviors, good interpersonal skills, the ability to make decisions under tremendous pressure, and a host of other abilities -- none of which is easily measured by a written, multiple choice test."

So does a lawyer's job. And yet attorneys with absolutely no "interpersonal skills" get cushy jobs and extravagant salaries on the basis of their commendable performance on all manner of written tests, from multiple choice LSATs and bar exams to written law school exams.

I note that Ginsburg has not shown any particular interest in rectifying the "disparate impact" of legal exams: She never hired a single black law clerk out of the dozens she employed in more than a decade as an appeals court judge. (Her hiring practices on the Supreme Court are a state secret, but I can state with supreme certainty that her clerks do not reflect the racial mix of Washington, D.C.)
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Liberals desperately want race quotas -- as long as quotas never come to their offices.

Mark It Zero

A "quote of the day" in honor of my one follower:









"This is not Vietnam, it's bowling - there are rules."

The Ricci Decision

Here is the Supreme Court's decision on the firefighter discrimination case. While the Court clearly came down on the correct side, I'm disappointed (though not terribly surprised) that this was a 5-4 vote. It shows just how politically twisted the idea of "equal justice under the law" has become.

Justice Scalia's concurrence is, as always, spot-on. Laws designed to engineer certain racial outcomes, irrespective of any discriminatory intent, are fundamentally at odds with the Constitution's guarantee of equal protection. This is what Bastiat calls "legal plunder" - taking by force from one to give to another - and it is plainly unjust.

History shows that any legal system commandeered by political powers to actively promote injustice will, in a free society, ultimately collapse under the weight of its own contradictions. I hope our nation can reverse the course of our jurisprudence before that happens, but the nomination of Judge Sotomayor is not a promising sign.

Iranian Options

Differing perspectives on Iran from two intellectual juggernauts of conservatism:

Charles Krauthammer provides the more hawkish, "neoconservative" position.

Pat Buchanan endorses a hands-off, isolationist approach. He offered another defense of this position today.

Which seems best to you?

Foreign Policy Basics

This is a fantastic article from John Bolton. He compares traditional conservative and modern liberal views relating to foreign policy, exposes the weak philosophical foundations of the modern liberal approach, and predicts a dramatic turn away from it in the future.

Here are some excerpts (emphasis added):

Conservative foreign policy is unabashedly pro-American, unashamed of American exceptionalism, unwilling to bend its knee to international organizations, and unapologetic about the need for the fullest range of dominant military capabilities. Its diplomacy is neither unilateralist nor multilateralist, but chooses its strategies, tactics, means and methods based on a hard-headed assessment of U.S. national interests, not on theologies about process. Most especially, conservatives understand that allies are different from adversaries, and that each should be treated accordingly.
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Defending U.S. interests is neither arrogant nor disrespectful of others, but is instead the basic task of our presidents. Despite the 2008 election, neither the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, nor international terrorism, nor the challenges of geostrategic adversaries have in any way diminished.
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Conservatives understand that these and numerous other threats are not anomalies in an otherwise peaceful and friendly world, but manifestations of the inevitable international clash of interests and philosophies. Conflict with our interests and values is not some unfortunate exception to normality, it is normality. While harmony is desirable, it is far from inevitable, and the causes of disharmony are just as natural and human as their opposites.
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In particular, conservatives reject the idea that America's actions are the foundation for most international discord, and that it is our deviation from international "norms" that must be "corrected" for the natural state of harmony to return.
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The American people actually expect to be defended against international threats and adversaries, and they will undoubtedly punish any American president who does not understand and implement their strong and entirely justifiable views. That is why we may well see the future of conservative foreign policy bloom as early as 2012.

Violence in the World's Major Religions

This is an interesting article by Raymond Ibrahim examining the popular relativist argument that Christianity and Judaism are as violent, if not more violent, than Islam.

Ibrahim readily conceeds that the three major monotheistic religions have all experienced their share of violence and intolerance. So, in light of these realities, can it be said that Islam is unique in its tendency to foster violence among its adherents?

He makes the point that an evaluation of a particular faith's violent proclivities must be undertaken with an eye toward the presence or absence of scriptural exhortations to violence, rather than the presence or absence of violent periods or incidents in a faith's historical tradition. As he puts it, the key question is "whether this violence is ordained by God or whether warlike men merely wished it."

If I claim to be a Christian but occasionally tell a lie, no serious person would see my individual failings as evidence that Christianity promotes dishonesty. The correct conclusion would be that I'm simply an imperfect person - which is, by the way, the fundamental assumption of the Christian faith. In the same way, a religion cannot be honestly described as violent unless it's authoritative texts command violence as a matter of practice.

The article makes a compelling argument that, seen through this lens, any attempt to equate the violent tendencies of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is either misguided or dishonest.

Book Recommendation

In light of the recent discussion of Judge Sotomayor's judicial philosophy, everyone (and especially those with some background in law) should read Judge Robert Bork's The Tempting of America: The Political Seduction of the Law. I am reading this now, and there could not be a more relevant book.

Judge Sotomayor

Read Charles Krauthammer's brilliant analysis of the Sotomayor situation. Here's the argument in a nutshell, as he presented it on the Fox Report:

This ought to be a seminar that [focuses] on two issues — number one, identity politics.... She and the president believe that her background is extremely important in her ruling as a judge. She says that she has the physiological, cultural, experiential tools as a Latina woman to be a superior judge to a white male, which is reflective perfectly of the Democratic Party's identity politics, in which free citizens are herded into groups, arranged into a hierarchy of wisdom, authority, and entitlement. That's a Democratic idea, and I think it's her idea and ought to be emphasized.

Secondly is the idea...of justice as empathy, as understanding a person's positions, their needs, their wants, their history, and how a ruling will affect their lives. That is entirely contrary to the western tradition of justice, which is blind as to the person's station in life.

Republicans ought to ask her, "How do you believe in that, and swear your oath?" If she is on the court, she has to swear an oath which says I will solemnly swear I will administer justice without respect to persons and to equal right to poor and rich. That's what Republicans ought to do, and not attack her in a personal way.

My two cents:
I am absolutely amazed by the hypocrisy of the Democratic Party in selling Judge Sotomayor to the public based on her ethnicity and inspiring personal story rather than her judicial competency. She has impeccable professional credentials for the position (despite her backward judicial philosophy) so why make her ethnicity the central issue of her confirmation? To do so completely undermines the concept of a goverment of laws, rather than of men.

No one in the history of the Supreme Court has a more inspiring personal story than Clarence Thomas - a black man born into abject poverty in the south, abandoned by his father and raised by grandparents. And yet, despite his inspiring story and astounding academic and professional success, he is almost universally reviled by the left. Why? The answer is obvious.

Interesting Articles

Pat Buchanan article on Cheney's resurgence as a force in the national security debate.

"The Republican Party needs to get off the psychiatrist's couch, and stand up and fight for what it believes. You don't need a moderate with a pretty face to deliver a moderate message. The former vice president with the crocodile grin has just shown the way."

Political Trivia

Who is older?

Nancy Pelosi or Dick Cheney?
















Answer:
Pelosi

Pelosi - Age 69; Born March 26, 1940
Cheney - Age 68; Born January 30, 1941