Legal Theft?

When I start thinking about the word "theft" and compare it to what our government does, both local and federal, it gets a little scary.

Let's say I have a neighbor who has a disease and needs a special medicine to cure it. Since I don't have the money to help him, I go to my other neighbor, break-in to his house and steal the amount of money needed for the medicine and give it to my neighbor in need. Mind you, I didn't take all of the money I found, only what was required to help my sick neighbor.

Did I do something wrong?

Let's say that before I take the money for my sick neighbor, I go around and get the support of everyone else in the neighborhood, township, county and state. Millions of people support what I am doing.

Is it wrong now?

Let's say that a majority of people in my community elect me to a leadership position, and I then take from one neighbor to help the sick neighbor.

Is this OK?

In my previous post, I said that "This is a prime example of emotion triumphing over common sense." We have moved beyond that to emotion triumphing over legality. Many of the laws passed recently are taking resources from one individual and giving it to another. A quick glance at the constitution gives some perspective on what IS allowed to be taken from us.

"The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States; ..." - Article I, Section 8

The legality of the health care bill passed a few months ago was definitely tied to the "general welfare" clause of the constitution mentioned above....see Hoyer, Congress has power to force Americans to buy insurance. Beyond the general welfare clause, I also note that taxes should be "uniform" throughout the United States. The health care bill does no such thing; in fact, our entire tax structure does no such thing.

A couple points stick out in my mind when thinking about the general welfare of this nation:
- A majority of citizens opposed the health care legislation before it was passed.
- The bill does not give or require uniform resources to each individual. The ability to pay the health care tax is unevenly distributed.

The bills that our beloved government pass as law in most cases go well beyond a uniform tax that benefits everyone equally. Taking money/property from someone to give to someone else is theft. In the case of our government, it is legal theft.

Theft: "the act of stealing; the wrongful taking and carrying away of the personal goods or property of another; larceny." - Random House Dictionary

Is repealing the health care legislation really so crazy?

Speechless

In a speech on Sept. 9, 2009, President Obama said: "Finally, our health care system is placing an unsustainable burden on taxpayers. When health care costs grow at the rate they have, it puts greater pressure on programs like Medicare and Medicaid. If we do nothing to slow these skyrocketing costs, we will eventually be spending more on Medicare and Medicaid than every other government program combined. Put simply, our health care problem is our deficit problem. Nothing else even comes close. Nothing else. (Applause.)

Now, these are the facts. Nobody disputes them. We know we must reform this system. The question is how."

Keep this in mind, the American people were sold on the "Obamacare" because it would reduce the deficit; period.

This is a prime example of emotion triumphing over common sense.

Government entities are continually increasing estimates on what the health care bill will cost, showing that the bill will only increase our deficit. On top of whatever the estimates are worth, many admit that we don't know what the costs will be at all.
1) April 21, 2010, We don't know what Obamacare costs will be
2) May 11, 2010, Healthcare costs will top 1 Trillion
3) May 18, 2010, Obamacare would cost over 2 Trillion
4) June 18, 2010, CBO Director expresses doubts about deficit reduction; discretionary spending will create deficit.

Now the democratic party is saying "don't say the law will decrease costs and deficit." Incredible!

"Democrats worked hard to get a favorable score on the legislation from the Congressional Budget Office, figuring a big selling point of the law would be that it reduces the deficit. This part of the sales pitch is apparently not as helpful as they predicted."

Not only was deficit reduction a "big selling point", it WAS the selling point.

If the words our President spoke were true a year ago, once the costs start spiralling out of control, shouldn't we consider repealing this act and go in a new direction? It is plain that cost reduction was not the main point. Rather, creating programs to prop people up and create dependency seems to be more important. All this will make it harder to choose for ourselves and will lower the standard of care that this country exceeds at.

Shrimp

Most of the media reports are saying that the shrimping season in the Gulf of Mexico will be sub-par/devestating/slower-than-expected this year (2010); or that people will not buy the shrimp fearing that it is unsafe.

Due to these reports of death and destruction, I see us being primed for a record year. We'll probably see higher yields and greater consumption of shrimp.

I'll track this prediction to see where it ends up.

The Dependent Society

I'm stuck on the idea of dependence. As our governments, from local to federal, become increasingly larger, I continue to see reliance and dependence on our governments increase. This dependence comes at the expense of our long-term strength, independence, and ultimately our freedom.

Another example of ways our government is increasing this dependence is additional loans to people who can't afford them. A.K.A. Slavery.

"Another $1 billion will go to a new program being run by the Department of Housing and Urban Development. It will provide homeowners with emergency zero-interest rate loans of up to $50,000 for up to two years."
http://www.cnbc.com/id/38658978


I haven't figured out what happens when someone doesn't repay the loan after two years, but the well-meaning, big government hacks who keep coming up with these plans to loan more money are simply missing the point. Debt serves no one. Debt hinders us from becoming self-sustaining.

When someone is suffering under the stress of debt, more debt will only prolong the agony and make the fall to the bottom worse when the eventual collapse comes. This is true for individuals and our nation. Our big government proponents play politics with issues like this, claiming that they are helping those in need, when they are simply pushing their collapse into the future so they can gain a few votes.

There is a glimmer of hope on the horizon as the Feds rethink policies that encourage home ownership, but the crux of this issue then boils down to fixing the problem that the government created. Instead of getting out of the way and letting the market determine how loans work; letting banks and lending institutions shoulder the burden and the risk, the big government response is to make the bureaucracy bigger by creating rules and regulations that drive up costs and force the direction of the market.

Then there's lovely line in the article above that says the government will help low-income renters even more in the face of limited lending; thus driving rental prices even higher. It's a never ending cycle of higher costs and more entitlements.

Our politicians are creating problems and then campaigning on the idea that they can fix the problem. Rather than undo the policies that created the problem, they make them even further reaching. In most cases this is happening on the R and D sides of the aisle. We need to be demanding that entire departments within the federal government be downsized and/or eliminated.

The case for local control and oversight of most programs is more powerful now than ever. Cities and States can much more easily manage and allocate the resources coming out of their communities than the federal government.

Of course, we need to start with ourselves. We need not rely on our government for our needs. If we find ourselves in this position, the options for success in the future are becoming smaller and smaller. We already have far too many people relying on the government for food, housing, and now health care. What else is there?

I keep going back to the analogy of feeding the bears in the state park. What can't we feed the bears? If we do so, they will stop hunting for themselves and eventually forget how.