Jamie Skaff
(916) 941-1740

Contrary to the view of some (possibly many) opposed to government control of the health industry, I do not think that the vast majority of US citizens who want government provided health “insurance” are “evil”. These ordinary citizens simply and very wrongly have concluded that everyone should have the same level of medical/health care as everyone else *and* that the only way for medical/health care to be equally accessible to everyone is for government to make and enforce regulations (using tax money of course) to ensure that this comes about. These individuals are quite willing to be taxed at some level (?how high?) and maybe even have some of their choices limited (?which ones? to what degree?) in order that everyone have this “health coverage”. These are people who sincerely think that government is necessary to produce not only an orderly society but one that will ensure “safety nets” for those “less fortunate”, whether on an emergency or long-term basis.

As for politicians, I concluded some time ago that the vast majority of them are power-seekers, though many of them likely did not start out that way, if their introduction to politics was at the very local level. In that case they likely viewed themselves as just better at “seeing what needs to be done” and fond of socializing. However, within one term in office at the county or state level they likely found it pleasurable when large numbers of people sought them out for favors (lobbied for desired legislation/regulations) and enjoyed the lavish praise (with favors returned) for “taking care” of their constituents. Definitely at the federal level the intoxication of power backed by physical force – the operational necessity of government – is an enormous driver for more of the same. The system attracts those who want power and rewards them with countless opportunities to use it; just getting on the ballot as a federal candidate for either of the two main parties calls for a lot of power playing – for this reason a starry-eyed well-intentioned, honest candidate rarely will make it. In turn, politicians encourage the notion among their constituents that government is the solution to problems (even if originated by previous government actions) is just one step from the idea held by most that having an orderly society necessitates a government.

The essence of the problem is not that “evil men” (or even “damn-fools”) have distorted and subverted a fine document into a tool for their own aggrandizement. Rather the US Constitution, which has been used to promote and carry out large amounts of harm during its 220+ years of existence, and any government produced by it, is fatally flawed because of its internal contradictions and lack of a correct philosophical basis derived from the essential nature of humans in reality. For a detailed critique of the Constitution Preamble and Bill of Rights – http://selfsip.org/critiques/billofrights.html

Bottom line: it is the system – government, whether here in the US or elsewhere (at least in the industrialized world) – that is the problem and this is what needs to be understood.

Mark A. Hurt, MD

The fact is that EVIL MEN can take ANY written document and distort it for their own selfish gain. The Constitution provided for checks and balances to prevent distortions of it’s words. However, we have a majority of evil men “in power” such as the United States has never had in its history. Wake up America – because we are being “taken over without a shot being fired!”

While very many USers will claim that this compelling of citizens is “unconstitutional”, and therefore should not happen, the problem is that the US Constitution is full of holes, inconsistencies and inadequacies. Probably the most common justification for regulations that are used to compel an individual to act against his/her (hir) own judgment of what is in hir best interest, is in the Preamble itself:

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

“[P]romot[ing] the general welfare” leaves the door open for government to do almost anything – and that is just what has happened from almost before the ink was dry on the last state ratification for the US Constitution. In actuality there is no such thing as “the general welfare” since each person is an individual with hir own values; humans are not hive animals like bees and ants. But that fact has not stopped the US federal government, nor other governments – even those without such phrasings in their laws.

Therefore “upholding the Constitution”, as is often the claim for solution, is actually problematic – because the Constitution itself contains within it the seeds of its own deterioration and destruction, the results of which are all around us. Do not get me wrong. The US Constitution was a remarkable document when it was created and the best that the learned (and they were) men of that time could produce to organize an orderly society. They did not have the knowledge and technology that has become available mostly in the past 25 to 30 years. The Internet itself by which these exchanges of information and views are taking place is one of the major ones. Understanding of human neurophysiology is another. I wrote on this very subject of returning to the Constitution over 6 years ago, “Return To The Constitution??!” – http://selfsip.org/focus/returntoconstitution.html

These is a striking absence of direct health-care cost control in these politically oriented cost-control measures. Anyone familar with nutritional medicine can give numerous examples of how to bypass the cost of various drugs with ordinary foods or low-cost supplements. Upset at the loss of access to thyroid extract, I asked a farmer about buying thyroid glands from the slaughterhouse. Vitamin C promotes healing, and it can be added to IV fluids for post-operative patients without much trouble. Finally, there is some old but good research on FDA-banned intravenous hydrogen peroxide, as for infections and respiratory failure. And the list goes on and on.

If a federal bill does not include dismantling the FDA or otherwise encouraging, or at least permitting worry-free, the prescription and adminstration of such remedies, then we should infer that those who write it and vote for it are more interested in our destruction than in the citizens’ good health at low cost.

What do the Senators fear by preventing a read? In short, they fear rejection.

Just as the public, once they read House Bill 3200, rejected that piece of legislation, which was better suited for the National Socialists in the 1930’s than Americans in the 2000’s, so, too, I believe they will reject the Baucus Bill from what I have read about its principles.

For those who believe in Americanism, in the principle of Individual Rights, limited government to protect those rights, and its logical result, capitalism, we should proudly uphold freedom and the free market. Instead we witness attempts to shackle Americans, infringe their rights, and ultimately, in the name of “brother love” and the “poor”, medicine is stifled, limited, and less available for the very persons the government claims to care about.

The Welfare State, whether in matters of housing, food, clothing, or medicine, is a miserable failure, and it is immoral, both in principle and in its practical outcome, resulting in making more people homeless, starving, in rags, and in need of medical care, all the while politicians are skimming the profits from the hides of any productive person in this country to fund a government orgy of altruism.

Any person of self-esteem should say NO to this kind of corruption; what we need is not to replace the Liberal version of the Welfare State with more corruption of the Republican version of the Welfare State; rather, we need to discover that capitalism, when practiced with a proper government in place, is the great benefactor of Mankind and that medical care will take care of itself in such a system by people paying for the services or by using voluntary charity to pay for the services.

We do not need a Welfare State—at all.

Tell this to all of your friends, and even to your Senators and Representatives.

Mark A. Hurt, MD