Reformation
Repealing Obamacare
A few days ago, the newly elected U.S. House of Representatives honored the will of the people by voting to repeal Obamacare. I am grateful for their courage and thank them for sticking to their convictions and the wishes of the American electorate.
Obamacare was arguably the worst piece of major legislation ever passed in the United States. It was a corrupt, brazen take-over of nearly one-sixth of the American economy, a job killer, a massive deficit creator, and just plain stupid.
Kudos to the House for “change we can believe in.”
Now the battle will go on in the Senate and be one of the pivotal issues of the 2012 election.
The following article by Redstate.com is the best summary I’ve seen on the importance of ending Obamacare and what we need to do make our health care system the best in the world.
It boils down to this…..RB
Repeal Obamacare. Them Let’s Do Something Really Radical…Try Freedom
Government is (and always has been) the problem, not the solution.
Redstate – 12-17-10
ObamaCare. No, it’s not dead. Not even close. Yet…there is some hope on the horizon that the foray into enslaving America in a government-dictated insurance scheme may yet be repealed, outlawed, or just thrown into the ash heap of really, really bad ideas.
The reason for this post is very simple: First, we need to recognize that government is the problem with America’s health care costs, not the solution. Second, we need to start coming up with some fresh and bold ideas in the eventuality that we can slay the beast of government-run healthcare once and for all. Even if ObamaCare is repealed in House, unless there are 67 senators who can be dragged away from the altar of closed-market health care to override a presidential veto, 2013 is the earliest ObamaCare can be aborted—but then what?
As a small business owner who just got hit with a $3600 insurance premium hike for 2011 and who will be paying (at a minimum) $177,500 over the next ten years just for the “privilege” of having one family covered with insurance, you can be assured that my points are more than mere rhetorical ones. If I had my druthers, I would have a catastrophic-only plan that covers emergencies and life-threatening illnesses, and pay the rest out of pocket. I’d probably save well over $125,000 in the next ten years with a plan like that—if one existed.
The problem is, a plan like that doesn’t exist…can’t exist. Why? The government bureaucrats won’t allow it. In our state, there are, by law (or regulation), only three types of insurance, provided by three insurers. It is a closed market scheme. In addition, let’s just say (for the sake of discussion) that a plan like that did exist in the next state over and I wanted to purchase it. I couldn’t do that either—because the government bureaucrats have created an artificial wall that won’t allow insurance to be bought across state lines. You see, in this simple and real small-business example, already government is the problem—and we’re paying the price.
Last year, when Nancy Pelosi went on her lunatic rant about insurance carriers being “immoral”, it was the epitome of hypocrisy—sort of like the Devil calling demons evil for doing what their master taught them to do. (Too harsh?…What is it then, if not evil, for those who purposely unleash a disease to also claim to be the cure?) People who claim that insurance companies have monopolies don’t realize that it is Congress that created the monopolies to begin with. That is why Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Barack Obama, and the rest of their kind, have been so disingenuous in shoving ObamaCare up America’s rectum.
Like a healthy person going for a checkup, and going home with herpes, America has been gamed, lied to, and tricked into believing that health care is incompatible with a free market—lied to by the very people who claim to have the cure. Democrats and their union coaches have become nothing more (or better) than snake oil salesmen.
Yes, the cost of health care has risen exponentially for years. Health care costs have destroyed incomes, cost American jobs, caused strikes, and bankrupted companies. But it’s not due to a lack of government, it’s because of too much government. It hasn’t been the fault of the free market, as the socialist union bosses and the Marxist Democrats claim, it has been because it has not been a free market. If America wants to blame anyone, we should blame those who have been controlling and gaming the system—the bureaucrats and their union bosses—who now claim that more bureaucracy is the cure.
So, before we continue talking about “how government should fix health care,” perhaps it’s time we recognize how government caused it to be broken in the first place. Let’s begin looking at the true reason why the cost structure has been so blown out of alignment. And, then, perhaps more will understand why we need to tell government to get out of the way—now!
Last year, as the heated rhetoric of the health care debate was raging all across America, John Mackey, the CEO of Whole Foods wrote an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal that provided some market-based alternatives to the monstrous big-government scheme that has become ObamaCare. While Mackey’s piece was brief, the Left’s reaction to it was extreme.
Immediately, the attack dogs from the unions launched a nationwide boycott of Whole Foods, Mackey was attacked personally, and the Left screamed hysterically. To see the Left’s ridiculous reaction indicated that they felt threatened by Mackey’s ideas—which meant they were probably pretty good ideas. While you can read the entire Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare here–and it is worth reading in its entirety, below is the main thrust of Mackey’s ideas:
Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs). The combination of high-deductible health insurance and HSAs is one solution that could solve many of our health-care problems. For example, Whole Foods Market pays 100% of the premiums for all our team members who work 30 hours or more per week (about 89% of all team members) for our high-deductible health-insurance plan. We also provide up to $1,800 per year in additional health-care dollars through deposits into employees’ Personal Wellness Accounts to spend as they choose on their own health and wellness.
Money not spent in one year rolls over to the next and grows over time. Our team members therefore spend their own health-care dollars until the annual deductible is covered (about $2,500) and the insurance plan kicks in. This creates incentives to spend the first $2,500 more carefully. Our plan’s costs are much lower than typical health insurance, while providing a very high degree of worker satisfaction.
Equalize the tax laws so that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits. Now employer health insurance benefits are fully tax deductible, but individual health insurance is not. This is unfair.
Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines. We should all have the legal right to purchase health insurance from any insurance company in any state and we should be able use that insurance wherever we live. Health insurance should be portable.
Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover. These mandates have increased the cost of health insurance by billions of dollars. What is insured and what is not insured should be determined by individual customer preferences and not through special-interest lobbying.
Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year. These costs are passed back to us through much higher prices for health care.
Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost. How many people know the total cost of their last doctor’s visit and how that total breaks down? What other goods or services do we buy without knowing how much they will cost us?
Enact Medicare reform. We need to face up to the actuarial fact that Medicare is heading towards bankruptcy and enact reforms that create greater patient empowerment, choice and responsibility.
Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren’t covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program.
While there are likely other ideas that are out there, Mackey’s ideas serve as a good starting point for debate and discussion as to what we will “replace” ObamaCare with, if we can ever get to that point. However, if we are not serious about coming up with solutions that truly reflect a market-based system, as opposed to a government run bureaucracy, there is no point in trying to repeal ObamaCare. If politicians on the Right think they can replace big bureaucracy with little bureaucracy, it will fix nothing, we’ll be right back where we were two years ago, and we’re wasting our time.
In healthcare, as in all other areas of life, we can either choose freedom and a free market, or we can choose to be our brother’s’ keeper—and he our keeper—but you can’t have both. Freedom is incompatible with a government bureaucracy making life and death decisions. And, in healthcare, we can’t just be against ObamaCare, and not be for something to replace it.
The question is, can we take the steps to beat the bureaucrats back? And, if so, then what?
We Must Not Give Up the Fight for Life
It’s easy to be discouraged over the fight against abortion in America. Since our nation made it legal on January 22, 1973, some fifty million Americans have died on the altar of sexual liberation.
That’s a horrific number–and after a decade of a declining abortion rate, the most recent statistics show that the trend is ticking up. We are cruelly killing, in the name of choice, 1.2 million of the most vulnerable among us.
Many of you–like our family–have prayed, participated in marches for life, or gotten involved in crisis counseling and adoption ministries. Yet, after almost forty years, we have very little to show for it. I feel like those who fought against the evil of slavery for many decades, and didn’t see a change.
But then something happened in the 1860s, and the slaves were set free.
In 2011, is there hope on the horizon for ending the abortion holocaust?
When I was in our nation’s capital a week ago, I met with some leaders that are on the forefront of the abortion fight. One of them participated in 24/7 prayer near the Supreme Court for months leading up to the 2008 election. They, like me, were believing that a John McCain election could possibly tip the balance of our highest court in the direction of reversing Roe. vs. Wade.
They were agonizingly disappointed when Barack Obama was elected president. He brought into office the most blatantly pro-abortion Administration that the United States has ever seen.
The prayer warriors were dejected.
Had God not heard their prayers?
It’s easy for all of us to be dejected–especially if you live on the Left Coast (west coast). California is the number one abortion-friendly state in the nation and Washington is number two. Oregon clocks in at number six and Hawaii is number four. It’s very sobering to look at the chart of where states rank in their support of abortion. I encourage you to open this page, find your state, and use it in your prayers. On the chart, “A” is bad (pro-abortion) and “F” is good (pro-life).
But on to the good news.
Then a year went by and an interesting poll came out. At the end of 2009, the national consensus on abortion had changed seven percentage points–across all demographic lines. For the first time in history, more than fifty percent of Americans believed that abortion was morally wrong.
Their prayers had not been in vain. They hadn’t influenced the election, but God had used them to change the hearts of millions of Americans.
My pro-life friends now tell me that victory in the abortion holocaust could be on the horizon. More people are praying than ever before. The tide has changed on the issue. Most Americans now see that we must go back to a culture of life in this nation.
That’s why I marched in Olympia, Washington this morning in our state’s pro-life event. There were nearly 10,000 people. It’s also why hundreds of thousands will march this week in Washington, D.C. as well–as I did with my family back in the 1980s. Just like the anti-slavery movements of the 19th century, we must have the determination and faith to never quit fighting for truth and the unborn.
I don’t know if it will take another Civil War to get this issue right (as it did slavery), but if it does, it will be worth it. On the other hand, because American opinions are changing, it might only take one more election and then one more appointment of a Supreme Court justice.
That’s how close we are to victory.
My dedicated friends believe that by 2013, that victory could be achieved.
We must not give up the fight for life.
This year a new book on the evil of abortion called Unplanned will hit the book shelves of America. It’s written by former Planned Parenthood director Abby Johnson and explains her conversion from pro-choice activist to pro-life advocate as she watched an abortion being performed live on an ultrasound.
Here’s the chilling scene in the book that changed Abby’s life. It’s one of the most powerful statements for life that I have ever read:
“At first, the baby didn’t seem aware of the cannula (the suction tube that will eventually rip the bay to pieces). It gently probed the baby’s side, and for a quick second I felt relief. Of course, I thought. The fetus doesn’t feel pain. I had reassured countless women of this as I’d been taught by Planned Parenthood. The fetal tissue feels nothing as it is removed. Get a grip, Abby. This is a simple, quick medical procedure. My head was working hard to control my responses, but I couldn’t shake an inner disquiet that was quickly mounting to horror as I watched the screen.”
“The next movement was the sudden jerk of a tiny foot as the baby started kicking, as if it were trying to move away from the probing invader. As the cannula pressed its side, the baby began struggling to turn and twist away. It seemed clear to me that it could feel the cannula, and it did not like what it was feeling. And then the doctor’s voice broke through, startling me.”
“’Beam me up, Scotty,’ he said lightheartedly to the nurse. He was telling her to turn on the suction — in an abortion the suction isn’t turned on until the doctor feels he has the cannula in exactly the right place.”
“I had a sudden urge to yell, “Stop!” To shake the woman and say, ‘Look at what is happening to your baby! Wake up! Hurry! Stop them!'”
“But even as I thought those words, I looked at my own hand holding the probe. I was one of “them” performing this act. My eyes shot back to the screen again. The cannula was already being rotated by the doctor, and now I could see the tiny body violently twisting with it. For the briefest moment the baby looked as if it were being wrung like a dishcloth, twirled and squeezed. And then it crumpled and began disappearing into the cannula before my eyes. The last thing I saw was the tiny, perfectly formed backbone sucked into the tube, and then it was gone. And the uterus was empty. Totally empty.”
One book reviewer made these observations about the liiterary power of Unplanned:
“If you are able, I encourage you to read the whole thing. I have to confess to you that I almost was not. The horror that Johnson describes is almost unfathomable, accentuated by the cruelty and insensitivity of the conscienceless monsters cracking jokes as they watched the death of a tiny human unfold live before them.”
“Perversely, the most shocking aspect of this particular story is its mundanity. It occurs every single day in the United States, over three thousand times a day, and has for almost four decades. The only thing that sets this particular abortion apart is that a person possessed of a conscience and some measure of writing skill happened to be present and witness it on ultrasound. Every day, including today, probably several dozen times during the course of the time it takes you to read this article, this horror is repeated in America and no one is present who cares to chronicle it in a book about the way it changed their life. Tens of millions of times since 1973 this has occurred in this country under the color and protection of law.”
“The only way to ensure justice in a society is for the law to recognize that all humans are humans, and therefore entitled to equal protection under the law. Whenever the law takes the position that certain humans (be it slaves or those physically located within a womb) are not in fact humans at all, it is certain that moral outrages will follow, and that other moral outrages will be perpetrated to protect the unjust status quo, and that sooner or later, the conscience of America, however long dormant, will collide with those moral outrages.”
“It is at these times we remember why it is that we participate in this fight even though it wears on us from day to day; why it is that we continue to watch news shows that infuriate us, donate money to candidates that would otherwise be put towards our own retirements, and take time away from our families to pound the pavements, man the phone banks, and get out the word. This is why we ”fight,” if it is still permissible to use such terms to describe battles fought with the ballot box. And it is also why we reject the empty calls for “truce” and silence from those who have hardened their heart to the ugliness, for we know that there can be no truce with unrepentant evil – there can only be victory or defeat. And for the sake of the country we love, we refuse to accept defeat.”
To these words of courage and outrage, I heartily say AMEN.
Please pray that Abby Johnson’s Unplanned will convince more Americans to alter their view on abortion. Pray that mothers and fathers who killed their own children will become broken and repentant; Pray that the churches of America will not become complacent or silent about the number one moral issue of the 20th and 21st centuries.
I believe that victory is at hand in the abortion battle.
We must not give up the fight for life.
Sudan Votes for Freedom: Will There Be a Domino Effect?
I’m flying back from Washington, D.C. after a sobering few days in the nation’s capital. We are all still grieving the assassination attempt on Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in Tucson, Arizona and those who died in the gruesome attack. In the capital city this past weekend, all flags were at half mask and there were hushed conversations everywhere.
This morning I was walking with two friends to a meeting near the US Capitol Building when police cars with glaring lights blocked all entrances to Capitol Hill. We were told that a suspicious package had been found and they were taking no chances. We bided some time at a nearby Starbucks packed with government workers who couldn’t get to their jobs. Sobriety and concern was in the air.
But then, out of this ominous backdrop, I heard the news: Sudan, the largest and one of the poorest nations in Africa, was voting for freedom—and it appeared that liberty might prevail.
Isn’t that just like God—when everything appears to be black–to pierce the darkness with his light?
And is some new found freedom in Sudan a sign of things to come in other nations as well?
You might want to Google a map of Sudan to get a good visual. As you can see, it’s situated in the Muslim band of nations that occupy much of the Saharan tip of Africa. Sudan is a large nation. It’s a dry nation. It’s an extremely impoverished nation.
But today, in all likelihood it voted for freedom. The votes aren’t fully counted, but the result does not appear in doubt. The suffering people of southern Sudan, many of them believers in Christ, are being given a chance to decide their future—and they are overwhelmingly voting for freedom.
This could be a new day for Africa, other nations, and even some territories and states. But before we look at the future implications, let’s think for a moment about this Sudanese miracle.
Do you remember the name Darfur? Yes, it’s a southern portion of Sudan where hundreds of thousands of primarily Christians have been mercilessly slaughtered for nothing else but their faith over the past ten years. The very name Darfur reeks of carnage, injustice, suffering, and genocide.
Darfur is a part of southern Sudan where nearly two million people have been killed in a gruesome civil war. Most have died since 2005, so this is recent stuff. Four million people have also been displaced and forced to live in primitive encampments.
Why? Because the southern portion of Sudan is that area of the African continent where Muslim control of nations and cultures ended—and Christianity has been exploding for the past three decades.
It is also the region where much of Sudan’s lucrative oil industry lies. For decades, the Muslim north has been raiding and pillaging the defenseless south—taking the oil revenues to Khartoum in the Muslim north and leaving the southern fourth of the country destitute and under-developed (there is less than thirty miles of paved road in southern Sudan).
They’ve also tried to force Muslim society and sharia law on some areas of the south, and when that failed and faith in Christ began to spread north, the militants decided to simply kill all the Christians. Two million died. Four million fled their homes.
That’s the meaning of Darfur and southern Sudan: Darkness, tyranny, violence, bloodshed. I think you know where those tactics originate—in the world of Satanic evil– and in this case, evil that is wrapped in the cloak of religion.
But through much prayer, international pressure, and some miraculous changes of heart, even Sudan’s Muslim leader, Omar Hassan al-Bashir was forced to change his mind and agree to allow the south to vote for independence.
Starting on January 10, an estimated seven million Sudanese began going to the polls. It is an election that will probably last a week. Polling places have limited hours because there is no electricity after dark. Since 85% of the southern Sudanese people are illiterate, ballots simply showed pictorial choices that stood for YES for independence (freedom) and NO for the status quo.
And the Sudanese are voting for freedom. It’s a God-given cry of the human heart. If they prevail, the southern quarter of Sudan will become a new and free nation with a new capital—Juba– where families and children can be safer, and a desperately poor and persecuted people can build a future filled with new-found dreams of hope.
Many thousands of displaced Sudanese who now live in other nations are voting as well and look forward to returning to their homeland. Lee Everisto, a 48-year from Juba who now lives in Cairo, Egypt, said over the sounds of drumming and singing: “It is a historic day, a day that is going to put an end to our tragedy. I’m ready to go back as soon as possible.”
Freedom is a precious thing.
It is the birth-right of all people—made in the image of God.
Some individuals with whom I do not usually agree–former president Jimmy Carter, Senator John Kerry, and actor George Clooney—were all in Sudan for the historic vote and hailed the process. I applaud their efforts and stand with them in this historic milestone.
Maybe there is hope for bipartisan ship when the choice is between liberty and tyranny.
As I was meditating on the expected results of the elections in Sudan—and probable creation of a new and independent nation—my thoughts went back to a “prophetic vision” that is told in the first chapter of my 1989 book Leadership for the 21st Century: Changing Nations Through the Power of Serving. In a futuristic passage covering 1986 to 2025, Lee Grady and I accurately predicted the fall of the Iron Curtain (three years before it happened), and some of the social developments of the 1990s.
We also made this prediction for the 21st century: “By 2015 there was no longer a Third World. The globe was only divided into two areas: The Free World and the Dark World. And freedom was growing in the nations of the earth.”
Lee gets most of the credit for that perspective. He’s was right. Free Nations and Dark Nations.
That is the meaning of today’s events in Sudan. There are really only two forms of government in the world. One form tends to tyranny, and this includes most of the Islamic nations on earth. The other form produces liberty based on the creation of man, human rights, and societies based on biblical principles.
One of these principles is de-centralization of many aspects of life including economics, technology, and civil government. Where the ways of the Living God are practiced, people tend to be freer to communicate, invent, build, create, grow wealth, and govern themselves. The Christian worldview diffuses tyranny and central control and multiplies freedom and autonomy.
Freedom includes the right to vote for your leaders.
Another metaphor is light and darkness. A light-filled society creates the freedom for self-determination and an explosion of blessing—like sunshine to a summer day. A controlled, tyrannical society brings a creeping darkness of domination, lack of democracy, and loss of fundamental human rights. This would be the ultimate result of a one world system.
Yet, God appears to be expanding the longing for liberty in the nations of the world. Communism is dark by nature. The Chinese, North Koreans, Cubans, and others are longing to be free. Socialism has many shades of gray. It is hurting nations in Europe and growing in influence in America. Muslim nations that enforce harsh forms of sharia law may be the darkest of all.
But darkness does not do well when the light is turned on.
It flees.
It ceases to exist.
I believe we stand at the beginning of a new day when many nations—even states in some nations of the world—will take votes for liberty and cast off their chains. I believe we will see a liberated and re-united Korean peninsula; I believe many African nations may rise to fight the fight for freedom in their societies. Freedom marches and votes will also take place in many parts of Asia.
In my U.S. state of Washington, I know some folk who would love to “vote for independence” from King County—the liberal bastion of the Northwest. If they want big government, high taxes, and decreased liberties, let them have it. The rest of Washington can become another state where the biblical principles of freedom are allowed to thrive. Many Californians feel the same way about the north and south of their fair state. And Texas hints that if the federal government forces Obamacare on them as a people, they just may vote for liberty and succeed from the Union.
These are radical steps to take—but we live in radical times. Peoples should not change their governing structures lightly or no compelling reason. However, “When in the course of human events…”
Ah yes. That is the heritage of the American Revolution.
I encourage you to pray for a great expansion of personal, social, and civil liberty in the nations of the world in the 21st century. If I am reading the heart of God right, we just might have a rendezvous with destiny that is drenched in the blood, sweat and tears of an explosion of freedom.
And when we are dead and gone, and the history of the 21st century is written, Remember Sudan in 2011. It may be pointing the way to a light-filled future through the power of prayer and the principles of liberty found in Jesus Christ.