Health Insurance Mandate Violates Rights, Indentures Nation

Passage of the highly contentious $1 trillion "health care" bill wrought sweet jubilation and great resentment among Americans today. Among those in doubt, nearly 70% in recent news poll surveys opposed the legislation. Poll after poll again and again showed a mere 35% ever firmly supported it.

Congress' tepid siding with constituents over this hotly sensitive issue wilted only after constant barrage of promises of vote exchanging, poll-scouting, campaign contributions and even in some cases, outright bribe that lasted well over an entire year. This secretive and thuggish approach to governance has shown its rough and blanketing underbelly.

Even those valiantly opposed for months on end gave way to the tempting giggle of the tantalizing moment, the promised miracle gift that was but all along a trojan horse. When in December, Senators Dick Durbin of Illinois, Tom Harken of Iowa, Chris Dodd of Connecticut (self-dubbed in the CNN interview as the "class of '68) went on air to extoll the generosity and benevolence of the government in giving the people of America the greatest Christmas gift. And at the time, Congressman Dennis Kucinich of Ohio stood strongly in opposition to his own party, but most importantly in opposition to the usurpers who hid behind masks of the 'public interest', 'doctor societies', and the 'well-meaning reform lobbies'.

In the public 'debate' that ensued it was the health insurance company's voice who became heard, right next to Democrats and Republicans (as in CBS' "60 Minutes"), as the people's voice was rudely excluded. In this grotesque game of partisanship, the same old lines were trumpeted out like a bad high school marching band, in what Nancy Pelosi soliloquied was her goal as "bringing to life a dream of many decades" and to realize the "dream of Harry Truman."

Needless to say, Rep. Kucinich himself did an about face in the eleventh hour and politely ushered in the dissenting horde who quickly came willing to acquiesce and dispose of whatever conscious of law and justice they ever once had.

The legislation, promised to be signed tomorrow, mandates all Americans, regardless of income, class, race or creed, to buy a health insurance policy. If they do not, they face hefty civil and criminal penalties which could add up to a 3-4% wage garnishing or even a sentence of imprisonment beyond a nominal time.

For the 32 million Americans who do not buy health insurance, in three years time they will, whether desired or not. And with the reason for many not having health insurance being in large part the exorbitant expense of medical costs, they will field all the greater of a burden. While the true issue at stake, in everyone's mind, has been reducing the exorbitant cost of health care, the debate has gone elsewhere. By focusing n the need for coverage rather than the unreasonably high cost of coverage, the entire legislation misses its point and will do little to curb costs and provide more efficient medical care. In fact, it is very likely the opposite will occur. Americans, while required now by law to buy health insurance, will be hammered by radically high costs they simply cannot afford.

Already a civil suit is being arranged to combat the legislation and have it declared unconstitutional. In an unprecedented action, attorney generals from 10 different and disparate states will bring suit, arguing that the provisions mandating coverage on all Americans is unconstitutional. In tips to the press, their argument will convey that if a person chooses not to buy health insurance that due to the fact they are not engaging in interstate commerce, the federal government does not have constitutional authority to force one to buy coverage against their will. In particular, with no transaction ever having taken place, the refusal to buy health insurance coverage would fit outside the interstate commerce clause, which supporters of the bill have fervently invoked. The states of Alabama, Florida, Nebraska, Utah, South Carolina, Pennsylvania, Texas, North Dakota, Montana, Washington and Virginia plan to join in the suit.

A recent CNN poll taken two weeks prior to the bill's passing showed that nearly 40% of all doctors would leave the medical profession if the bill were to pass. This alarming statistic, while perhaps somewhat inflated, is telling in the fallout from the bill will without question cause great upheaval in the medical profession and have a major impact on the development of young doctors entering the industry.

Yet despite all the tragedies of the entire foray, one fact stands alone. Upon each newborn's first breath taken as a human being on American soil, his or her time will immediately tick to the time of the health insurance industry dollar, as his or her life will be measured in premiums, copays, almighty health insurance risk charts and diagrams so carefully planned and made 'full-proof' by the certified men in the white coat. No longer will life be measured in years, but rather health credits, 'healthy' behavior stipends and overall levels of 'equanimity' with the system. This dangerous conformity mandated by law is no freedom, but only the breeding ground for coercion and despotism.

With the health insurance industry and pharmaceutical corps in charge, there's little telling of what may be required of our bodies next. Regardless of what newscaster or even president may say, the debate is never over. For in a free country, each man and woman may speak and act how they see fit on any rule and by law always have the liberty to challenge and change it.

You're Up Next

Amidst the raging health care debate verging on political war, the issue of overhauling the newspaper industry has squeaked out of the dim and into the limelight. After pronouncing the rapid success of bailouts, the legislative brainwork is now proposing a multi-billion dollar newspaper bailout which the President supports. This corporate news media bailout would work to brace most metropolitan areas with one newspaper and aim to solidify the mainstream media's decaying yet sole power of newsmaking.

But what strings will be attached? Surely, the President nor Congress will give away such lavish terms without asking for something in return.

Yes, the scenario is just a repeat of simlar actions taken in other industries. But, in the previous bailouts' cases, they were industries which actually makes up a significant percentage of the American economy. These include the automobile industry, the health insurance industry, the financial banking system and now the news. However, such proud boasts of achievement under these takeovers fail to hold merit as the automobile industry is collapsing, new healthcare 'reform' is being run by Big Pharma and the financial "regulators" like Federal Reserve Bank chairman Ben Bernanke have boldly declared the "end of the recession."

It is in these fabrications and past the fragile veil where our rulers' own words tell the largely unrealized truth.

Yet, there is somehting even more sinister in government relying on the free press and the free press, the government. And it's become no mystery that the corporate media is full of abstractions and opportunistic mischaracterization of history and the present. At the behest of interested corporations, our free press is fast becoming a tool of special interests willing to cause harm in order to achieve political aims.

President Obama has now verbally pondered a chance at regulating press if given the go-ahead. It is no coincidence that many in politics have already accused the President of influencing the media's coverage to distort political realities and marginilize outspoken opposition. Such a claim is not outrageous, after all the description is quite strikingly reminiscent of a time not so long ago under President George W. Bush.

Even worse, in the same speech in which he touted a media bailout, President Obama had harsh words for independent journalists, many of whoms volumes of in-depth and respected work helped fuel his presidential campaign. President Obama chided that, "I am concerned that if the direction of the news is all blogosphere, all opinions, with no serious fact-checking, no serious attempts to put stories in context, that what you will end up getting is people shouting at each other across the void but not a lot of mutual understanding." This analysis of the exploding blogosphere cannot be farther from the truth.

Signaling a bailout/blackout to end independent journalism the President in his carefully placed words has shown contempt for the First Amendment and free speech. Suggesting a possible tax of online news sites including blogs, President Obama's comments fit as a historic parallel to those of King George III's attempt to regulate American media by the much reviled Stamp Tax Act of 1765 that aimed to limit free political discussion. Yet, let it be of note that King George's tax only emboldened the opposition and began the swirl of events that culminated in the American Revolution.

Today is no different, In a day where growing numbers of citizens count themselves as political independents and the loss of credibility of the corporate government complex, this barbaric proposal is an obvious means to stifle the innate human right of free speech.

Simultaneously, the FCC has proposed a new "net neutrality bill" plan for congressional approval which would create a department of government whose sole purpose would involve acting as an adjudicator of news coverage and speech.

Hence, if an official within such a department took the opinion that something published was offensive, hateful or aggressive speech they could effectively silence the speaker by simply removing the content, or the site and surveilling future internet activity and/or written and spoken comment.

So dangerous and pervasive this system could be, that newly sparked extensions of legal intelligence sharing between the Pentagon and local law enforcement could effectively use a "net neutrality" act to harass and force out bloggers and many other journalists. It is a hazardous precedent that only blurs the rule of law and makes a mockery of free speech rights in America.

And for President Obama who seems to believe whole-heartedly in the corporate dream
of micromanaging America, he must know that all attempts in history to do so have utterly failed and any new attempt, no matter how powerfully and aggressively it is applied, can succeed.

This attempted coup of our First Amendment rights will never succeed due to the highly personal and humanistic nature of thought and speech. While such a regulation may be enacted, it can be circumvented always, albeit not easily, with guided and true resistance. Creating another perceived crisis percipitated in order to pass an ill-advised law is and will no longer be a way to silence others.