Now that the showcase health care summit is over, the progressives in charge of the US government are threatening to ram through Congress a federal takeover of medicine via a a little used Senate process called reconciliation. It’s a procedure that’s been used sparingly before, but only to “reconcile” the details of budgetary bills.

The liberals want to use this “nuclear option” to turn America away from free enterprise and toward the embrace of socialism.

Reconciliation in this context is branded the nuclear option because it will probably cause the average citizen in America to go “nuclear” over this abuse of power.  Every poll in America shows that the citizens of our great nation don’t want this 2700 page bureaucratic monster to burden one-sixth of our economy. If our representatives were democratic they would vote the will of the people.

But they’re not.

Barack Obama was the first presidential candidate in the history of the United States to declare that people have a right to health care. His primary opponent, Hillary Clinton, agreed with this amazing statement–never before heard in thoughtful American political discourse.

Why were these words over the top? Because the US Founding Fathers took a 5000 year leap in  understanding in 1776 when they stated in the Declaration of Independence: “We hold these truths to be self-evident. That all men are created equal, and that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, and that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness–That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed.”

Notice how, according to the Declaration, our legislators are first of all throwing out the “consent of the governed” in the current health care debate. More importantly, we need to be reminded which God-given rights governments are supposed to protect.

They would be: life, liberty, and property–which is the historical meaning of the phrase “pursuit of Happiness.” These are the ONLY God given rights to be protected and promoted by government. Not health care, not jobs, not homes, not immorality, not sex change operations ad nauseam.

These new kinds of  progressive “rights” are made up by people. They do not come from God and always lead to poverty and tyranny. Pursuing these “rights” starts revolutions in nations.

Championing God-given rights and their corresponding responsibilities, on the other hand, lead to spiritual and moral revivals in nations. Which one of these–revolution or revival–do you really think America needs right now?

We need to ponder this truth about rights in the current health care debate: There is no right to quality of life or choice of lifestyle. If we think that there is, then many multi–thousand page bills will coming out of Washington, D.C. in subsequent years that will destroy our lives, our economy and our freedoms.

On a February 10, 2010 Medved radio program, Michael Medved was discussing with a certain Veronica in New York about her eighteen year old friend who desired to have a sex change operation and have the state pay for it. Veronica was convinced that people should have a “right” to have the government pay for this quality of life or lifestyle choice. If the person wanted it, the government (or someone besides the individual) should pay for it.

Mr Medved tried to explain that’s not the proper concept of rights. Our founders knew well that there were only three basic human rights that God has given to all people. These rights are the only things that governments exist to protect:

Governments are ordained by a Higher Power to provide justice, or protect our:

• Right to LIFE from DEATH
• Right to LIBERTY from SLAVERY
• Right to PROPERTY from TYRANNY

When governments stop protecting basic human rights and start providing all types of quality of life and so-called lifestyle choices, they leave their proper domain and open a Pandora’s box of societal demands that can never be paid for or met. Government was never designed to be your provider–only your protector from evil. Other than writing checks (which anybody can do), government is lousy at providing goods and services for people because of the lack of incentives and accountability that free markets provide.

Plus, once you believe you have a right to a certain quality of life or lifestyle choice, where does the list end? It doesn’t. That’s the foolishness of the position. If Veronica’s friend has the “right” for the government to pay for his/her preferred identity via a sex change operation, then why not pay for his or her preferred house, preferred job, or preferred entitlements of any type? This is the absurdity of the Obama-Clinton position. It expands human rights to include anything you want that will improve your circumstances.

Let’s see how this works out in the real world. A few years ago I flew to Europe to have hip surgery  through a process not allowed at the time in the United States. My roommate in Belgium was a gentleman named Graham who was part of the socialized medical scheme in Canada that the progressives admire. He, too, needed hip surgery. I paid mine out of pocket. I didn’t have a “right” to the surgery–it was a quality of life or lifestyle choice for me. It painfully cost our family $15,000.

Graham and his nation took a different approach. Graham had been a chain-smoker all his life. In his late forties, his lungs were so destroyed by his lifestyle choices that he needed a double lung transplant to maintain his quality of life. The transplant had been paid for by the Canadian tax payers to the tune of $250,000. Then there was the thousands of dollars that needed to be spent on anti-rejection medicines for the rest of his life. That, too, was covered by the tax-payers. But there was a problem. The anti-rejection medicine caused hip joint deterioration, and so he needed the same surgery that I did to correct the problem. He was looking for the Canadian government-run system to cover it as well. Now they are going broke and rationing care.

I think you get the idea. Graham had bought into the illusion that he had a “right” to a certain quality of life. Never mind that he had smoked himself into bad health. He wanted someone else to fix it. When that fix caused other problems, then he had a “right” for those problems to be fixed too. And on and on.

Now you know why socialized medicine never works but rather bankrupts treasuries. It may be a nice idea to have the government pay for my quality of life, but the truth is, either my choices or circumstances in life determine quality of life–and I don’t have a right to have government improve it. I have a responsibility to seek out private, voluntary or charitable means to meet my needs. I need to learn to trust God, be accountable for my life–and not assume that anybody owes me anything.

Governments were designed by God to protect my right to life, liberty, and property. Nothing else. The moment we expand the list, then we end up in absurdity and societal poverty. 

Can you imagine if I had tried Graham’s right-to-quality-of-life approach in my neighborhood or town instead of the federal government? What if I’d gone door-to-door demanding my “right” from my neighbors to pay for the $15,000 surgery. After, all, I have a right to quality of life! So here’s a bill for your portion of it! Pay up or else.

I don’t think that would have worked because on a local level it’s easy to see that none of us has a right to demand a certain quality of life from others. That’s up to us and the charitable choices of others. I did have some friends contribute to my hip surgery–but it was voluntary–not coerced.  Government power is not voluntary–it’s the power of force. That’s another reason why it should only be only used to protect life, liberty and property.

The progressives are wrong about health care because they don’t look to God as our source of human rights and they want to change the role of government from being a protector to a provider.

That would be a foolish mistake–as unwise and detrimental as believing in a non-existent right to quality of life.

 On February 23, 2010 eighteen American leaders gathered at George Washington’s Mount Vernon estate in Alexandria, Virginia to sign an historic document that calls the United States back to her founding principles.

The Mount Vernon Statement is an reaffirmation of the worldview that made America great–and brought the blessings of God for over two hundred years. America was a “unique experiment in liberty”–a nation birthed in Christian revival and the corresponding principles of the God-given rights of individuals and corresponding restraints on government.

I hope we all know that we live in very precarious times–ones in which the biblical worldview and the freedoms that it brings are in jeopardy. 

We need a revival in the Church, an understanding of our history, a reformation in the culture and a change in direction in government. The modern day “tea parties” need to give birth to a new American Revolution that can restore the societal foundations now being dangerously eroded.

I encourage you to study the Mount Vernon Statement below and sign this important call to political renewal. We must be patriots all if this nation is to be reborn.

The Mount Vernon Statement on Constitutional Conservatism: A Statement for the 21st Century

We recommit ourselves to the ideas of the American Founding. Through the Constitution, the Founders created an enduring framework of limited government based on the rule of law. They sought to secure national independence, provide for economic opportunity, establish true religious liberty and maintain a flourishing society of republican self-government.

These principles define us as a country and inspire us as a people. They are responsible for a prosperous, just nation unlike any other in the world. They are our highest achievements, serving not only as powerful beacons to all who strive for freedom and seek self-government, but as warnings to tyrants and despots everywhere.

Each one of these founding ideas is presently under sustained attack. In recent decades, America’s principles have been undermined and redefined in our culture, our universities and our politics. The self-evident truths of 1776 have been supplanted by the notion that no such truths exist. The federal government today ignores the limits of the Constitution, which is increasingly dismissed as obsolete and irrelevant.

Some insist that America must change, cast off the old and put on the new. But where would this lead — forward or backward, up or down? Isn’t this idea of change an empty promise or even a dangerous deception?

The change we urgently need, a change consistent with the American ideal, is not movement away from but toward our founding principles. At this important time, we need a restatement of Constitutional conservatism grounded in the priceless principle of ordered liberty articulated in the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.

The conservatism of the Declaration asserts self-evident truths based on the laws of nature and nature’s God. It defends life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. It traces authority to the consent of the governed. It recognizes man’s self-interest but also his capacity for virtue.

The conservatism of the Constitution limits government’s powers but ensures that government performs its proper job effectively. It refines popular will through the filter of representation. It provides checks and balances through the several branches of government and a federal republic.

A Constitutional conservatism unites all conservatives through the natural fusion provided by American principles. It reminds economic conservatives that morality is essential to limited government, social conservatives that unlimited government is a threat to moral self-government, and national security conservatives that energetic but responsible government is the key to America’s safety and leadership role in the world.

A Constitutional conservatism based on first principles provides the framework for a consistent and meaningful policy agenda.

    * It applies the principle of limited government based on the rule of law to every proposal.
    * It honors the central place of individual liberty in American politics and life.
    * It encourages free enterprise, the individual entrepreneur, and economic reforms grounded in   market solutions.
    * It supports America’s national interest in advancing freedom and opposing tyranny in the world and prudently considers what we can and should do to that end.
    * It informs conservatism’s firm defense of family, neighborhood, community, and faith.

If we are to succeed in the critical political and policy battles ahead, we must be certain of our purpose. We must begin by retaking and resolutely defending the high ground of America’s founding principles.

*Please sign the Statement by clicking here.  Your name will be added to the larger list of signers displayed at the Mount Vernon Statement’s website.

The 18 original signers of the Mt. Vernon Statement:

• Edwin Meese, former U.S. Attorney General under President Reagan.

• Wendy Wright, president of Concerned Women for America.

• Edwin Feulner, Jr., president of the Heritage Foundation.

• Lee Edwards, Distinguished Fellow in Conservative Thought at the Heritage Foundation, was present at the Sharon Statement signing.

• Tony Perkins, president of the Family Research Council.

• Becky Norton Dunlop, president of the Council for National Policy.

• Brent Bozell, president of the Media Research Center.

• Alfred Regnery, publisher of the American Spectator.

• David Keene, president of the American Conservative Union.

• David McIntosh, co-founder of the Federalist Society.

• T. Kenneth Cribb, former domestic policy adviser to President Reagan.

• Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform.

• William Wilson, President, Americans for Limited Government.

• Elaine Donnelly, Center for Military Readiness.

• Richard Viguerie, Chairman, ConservativeHQ.com.

• Kenneth Blackwell, Coalition for a Conservative Majority.

• Colin Hanna, President, Let Freedom Ring

• Kathryn J. Lopez, National Review

 “Love does not rejoice about injustice but rejoices whenever the truth wins out” (1 Corinthians 13:6).

We were all given a unique Valentine on February 14. If we really love the world and the peoples of the world, then we should rejoice that February 14 was a day of truth about global warming. The scientist at the center of the Climategate scandal of the past year–Dr. Phil Jones–has now admitted the real truth:

There has been no evidence of global warming for the past fifteen years.

For fifteen years (1995-2010).

Let that time frame really sink in.  During the past fifteen years:

• Al Gore produced his infamous eco-documentary An Inconvenient Truth which should now be re-named A Very Convenient Fabrication. He also won a Nobel Peace prize–based on a lie.
• Michael Moore produced numerous propaganda flicks and made lots of money based on the notion of global warming. I like Michael Moore’s faith and his heart,  but he, too, got swept up in the fiction-based science.
• We’ve banned off-shore drilling for oil and gas.
• California has ham-strung its economy with wild-eyed environmental policies leading to an exodus of industries and a disastrous multi-billion dollar deficit.
• We’ve become completely dependent on foreign energy sources, losing thousands of jobs in America and allowing the price of energy to skyrocket.
• We’ve place a moratorium on nuclear energy and the multiplication of clean-energy nuclear facilities (President Obama announced today the building of a new nuclear plant in Burke, Georgia which is step the right direction).
• A Cap and Trade bill that would probably produce a depression in this country is still being pushed through Congress mandating carbon credits for business and huge taxes on consumers.
• New EPA regulations authorized by the Obama Administration–if fully implemented–would further cripple our already ailing economy.
• The recent Copenhagen Climate Conference tried to push through draconian environmental measures that would have greatly affected economic growth and prosperity worldwide.

And all of these and hundreds of other global warming initiatives were based on a lie. 

Professor Phil Jones has finally told us the truth. Here’s the story by way of the London Daily Mail on-line (a news story by Jonathan Petre last updated at 5:12 PM on 14th February 2010):

“Professor Phil Jones admitted his record keeping is ‘not as good as it should be.’ The academic at the centre of the ‘Climategate’ affair, whose raw data is crucial to the theory of climate change, has admitted that he has trouble ‘keeping track’ of the information.

Colleagues say that the reason Professor Phil Jones has refused Freedom of Information requests is that he may have actually lost the relevant papers.

Professor Jones told the BBC yesterday there was truth in the observations of colleagues that he lacked organisational skills, that his office was swamped with piles of paper and that his record keeping is ‘not as good as it should be’.

The data is crucial to the famous ‘hockey stick graph’ used by climate change advocates to support the theory.

Professor Jones also conceded the possibility that the world was warmer in medieval times than now – suggesting global warming may not be a man-made phenomenon.

And he said that for the past 15 years there has been no ‘statistically significant’ warming.

Professor Jones has been in the spotlight since he stepped down as director of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit after the leaking of emails that sceptics claim show scientists were manipulating data.

The raw data, collected from hundreds of weather stations around the world and analysed by his unit, has been used for years to bolster efforts by the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change to press governments to cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Following the leak of the emails, Professor Jones has been accused of ‘scientific fraud’ for allegedly deliberately suppressing information and refusing to share vital data with critics.

Discussing the interview, the BBC’s environmental analyst Roger Harrabin said he had spoken to colleagues of Professor Jones.

According to Mr Harrabin, colleagues of Professor Jones said ‘his office is piled high with paper, fragments from over the years, tens of thousands of pieces of paper, and they suspect what happened was he took in the raw data to a central database and then let the pieces of paper go because he never realised that 20 years later he would be held to account over them’.

Asked about whether he lost track of data, Professor Jones said: ‘There is some truth in that. We do have a trail of where the weather stations have come from but it’s probably not as good as it should be.

‘There’s a continual updating of the dataset. Keeping track of everything is difficult. Some countries will do lots of checking on their data then issue improved data, so it can be very difficult. We have improved but we have to improve more.’

He also agreed that there had been two periods which experienced similar warming, from 1910 to 1940 and from 1975 to 1998…He further admitted that in the last 15 years there had been no ‘statistically significant’ warming.

Harrabin added that the professor’s concessions over medieval warming were ‘significant’ because they were his first public admission that the science was not settled.”

Wow! How’s that for game-changing blast of the “hockey stick of truth?”

The other hockey stick graph was a fraud–just like the “Evoutionary Tree” in many science textbooks.

This is a Valentine’s Day present we can all rejoice in. It doesn’t mean we shouldn’t care for the created world,  be good recyclers, and be looking for ways to clean, improve, and make more efficient the human institutions and industries we serve. 

It does mean that nature and nature’s God have more to do with the weather than we do. We should respect both–but never tell lies for political ends. I have personally written on this subject a number of times during the past year including:

• The Global Warming Dog & Pony Show
• Earth to EPA: “Don’t Worry, We’re Chillin'”

 You might want to peruse those articles again. They make even more sense now.  The very best column I’ve seen on this topic was Charles Krauthammer’s insightful article called “The New Socialism” that we also published.

Krauthammer rightly points out that the hoax of global warming due to man-made causes was all about money and power. It’s that simple.

It was about tyranny–“wearing an EPA cap.”

Truth brings the opposite of tyranny–freedom.

Let’s rejoice in the liberating truth we’ve heard this week that the world has not been warming in the past fifteen years and let’s throw all our might into drilling, building those nuclear plants, scrapping the Ethanol subsidies, loosening the chains of environmental laws and regulations, spurring innovation and invention, and achieving energy independence and blessing for our own nation and others around the world.