The Cure for Obamacare? The Death of Politics

With the passage of Obamacare, now comes all the political fanfare – the name-calling, the finger-pointing, the follow-up legislative strategies to either fix or deep-six this latest government power grab. Demopublicans are largely digging in their heels, being either defensive or self-righteous about the bill’s passage. Republocrats, of course, are attempting to capitalize on the fallout, aiming for big wins in this November’s elections. And it seems the vast majority of the American public are seeking to take some kind of political action in order to bolster whatever position they’ve taken on the issue. Whether this is in the form of demonstrations, Tea Party rallies – or just plain voting – the almost universal reaction is that the very source of the problem in the first place, the institution of government, must be engaged in some way in order to get results.

The problem is that this blind conundrum of colluding with the enemy only bolsters the legitimacy of a cabal of thievery and domination that inherently has none. Creating a health care mandate – enforceable by IRS tax fines, prison, or even death (how’s that for keeping everyone healthy?) – is no different than imposing any other kind of obligation on other human beings under threat of force. What Obama and other pols like to pass off as humane relief for the poor, and fighting corporate greed, is really nothing more than naked aggression. If you or I don’t want health insurance, we shouldn’t be forced to purchase it – from anyone – at gunpoint. If Obama and his supporters truly wanted to create affordable health care, they’d start by repealing existing government laws and restrictions regulating the entire industry, allowing greater competition and innovation in the market. They’d eliminate taxation completely for both health care providers and consumers, making more liquid capital available for research, development, and actual treatment while also radically reducing overhead costs. They’d cut the Federal Reserve loose to sink or swim on its own, and allow the market to replace its fiat paper with a universal exchange medium of actual intrinsic value so as to forever abolish inflation. And they would stop forcing physicians, nurses, surgeons, and other medical specialists to seek a government license to practice. Such an arrogantly imposed piece of paper does precisely nothing to insure the quality of care and professionalism of those employed in the medical field.

What is dismaying is the lack of public introspection into these free-market zero-government proposals. Here are the partial results of a recent CNN poll on public opinion of Obamacare:

“Most Americans disapprove of the health care reform law, but that does not translate into majority support for the ‘repeal and replace’ strategy backed by most GOP leaders, according to a new national poll.

“A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday indicates that 56 percent of the public disapproves of the new legislation, with 42 percent approving of the bill that President Obama signed into law last week. Tuesday the president signs into law fixes to the original legislation that were approved by Congress last week.

“More than three in 10 questioned say they dislike most of the bill, with one in four saying they oppose all the proposals in the new law. Fifteen percent say they approve of the new law without reservation, with another one in four saying they support the new reforms but feel they didn’t go far enough.

“According to the poll, 47 percent agree with the Republican strategy and want Congress to repeal most of the major provisions in the bill and replace them with completely new proposals. But 50 percent are fine with the current law or want Congress to go back and pass something that would increase the government’s involvement in health care even further.

“The 47 percent who favor ‘repeal and replace’ is significantly lower than the 56 percent who say they disapprove of the bill’s passage last week.”

Dismaying, but not surprising, when we consider again the terms on which the mainstream lapdog press has framed the makeup of their poll:

“The survey indicates that half of all Republicans questioned say they are angry about the bill’s passage, with another 38 percent saying they are displeased. By contrast, 29 percent of Democrats say they are enthusiastic, with another 50 percent saying they are pleased.

“Forty-seven percent say that this is a major victory for Barack Obama with another one in five calling it a minor accomplishment and one in three saying it was not a positive achievement.”

So long as what amounts to unbridled aggression is couched in terms of which political party, or what president, feels a certain way, scores a certain number of brownie points, or deals the other guys a blow, never will the actual nature of the vicious, deadly game being played here rise above the clouds of deliberate obfuscation being blown around. Actually, perhaps I’m doling out too much credit: Many in the media, and in government, have been playing this phony shell game so long that they too have come to believe that it actually has validity. Tell yourself lies long enough, live by them, and you’ll likely come to believe them.

The answer, ultimately, to the health care debacle, or any other point of political contention, is the death of politics itself. Voting and requesting “reform” from an institution utterly immune to any manner of functioning except in the manner it currently does (and always will, until its eventual demise), is like beseeching Dr. Josef Mengele or John Wayne Gacy to just please calm down, behave, and be a good guy. You cannot expect an inherently immoral institution to exist and operate according to certain moral standards. It’s a wholly irrational concept.

Free markets – the elimination of coercion and violence in human relationships – is the alternative to the raw physical compulsion that governments, in their infinite arrogance, impose by their very nature. The many and varied means of voluntary association that characterize a free market are what anarchism is all about. We at the Center for a Stateless Society invite you to join us in creating that kind of prosperous, peaceful, and bountiful world.

Anarchy and Democracy
Fighting Fascism
Markets Not Capitalism
The Anatomy of Escape
Organization Theory