That's George Bush, helping out in Zambia.
He also said: "I believe freedom is important for peace and I believe one aspect of freedom is people to be free from disease," which reminds me of something the Solicitor General, Donald B. Verrilli Jr., argued to the Supreme Court about the health care law:
“There will be millions of people with chronic conditions like diabetes and heart disease... and as a result of the health care that they will get, they will be unshackled from the disabilities that those diseases put on them and have the opportunity to enjoy the blessings of liberty.”
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W. has done much good in Africa, including helping to create the South Sudanese government. On liberty versus equality, Hayek quotes Tocqueville and I think might help to clarify something on these lines:
"Nobody saw more clearly than Tocqueville that dmeocracy as an essentially individualist institution stood in an irreconcilable conflict with socialism:
'Democracy extends the sphere of freedom,' he said in 1848; 'socialism restricts it. Democracy attaches all possible value to each man; socialism makes each man a mere agent, a mere number. Democracy and socialism have nothing in common but one word: equality. But notice the difference: while democracy seeks equality in liberty, socialism seeks equality in restraint and servitude" (Hayek and Tocqueville quoted in Hayek, Road to Serfdom, 77).
"“There will be millions of people with chronic conditions like diabetes and heart disease... and as a result of the health care that they will get, they will be unshackled from the disabilities that those diseases put on them and have the opportunity to enjoy the blessings of liberty.”
No, not exactly.
Some will get care, no doubt.
But demand will increase by 20% or more (for which Obama-Care astutely provides a 0% increase in providers); wait times and costs (Quick intelligence test for liberals: What happens when demand increases but supply remains constant [or even diminishes]?) will increase.
And, on the back end, federal deficits increase, taxes increase, national debt increases; we *might* be healthier, but we and our children and grandchildren will be enslaved to paying off the debts it creates.
Thanks, Obama Voters!
Idiots. Fucking idiots. All of you.
People who believe increases in productivity because of a healthier workforce will offset the increase costs of Obama-Care are idiots.
Go tell the 14.9% (U-6) un-and under-employed about your fantasy.
Bush is a better person than he was a President.
GW is doing voluntary charity work - he is choosing where to spend his time and money and asks other to voluntary join him.
ObamaTax is a mandatory taking of people's earnings on the premise they are too stupid to know what's best for them.
The first is about moral obligations and the second about creating an amoral society through immoral compulsion.
There is no Liberty allowed in the latter.
"I believe freedom is important for peace and I believe one aspect of freedom is people to be free from disease."
Is Bush implicitly endorsing Obama's healthcare act? His statement only makes sense in Marxist terms, in which socialist "positive" freedoms are substituted for America's traditional "negative" freedoms, i.e., Freedom from Want as opposed to freedom from governmental interference.
"Is Bush implicitly endorsing Obama's healthcare act?"
He's on a private trip promoting his "institute", essentially a charity. The evidence that exists supports the conclusion he is referring to voluntary rather than governmental action.
As one who opposed many of his policies and was really quite worried when he won the presidency in 2000 I have no hesitation saying George Bush is a very good and decent man.
I'm just happy that Bush isn't spending taxpayer's money on this sort of thing anymore.
Bush is promoting charity. The Democrats are pushing compulsion. Most diabetics are type 2 diabetics which can be prevented or brought under control by the patient if they are willing to do what it takes such as losing weight, eating low carb diets and. exercising. Same with HIV, it can be avoided for the most part as well.
Relax, Paul. I think W is referring to the fact that we in the free, capitalist west have used some of our abilities to advance science and medicine to the point that certain diseases are controllable. Humans can reduce and avoid communicable diseases like malaria and cholera and dengue if certain steps are taken. It's not socialist to promote a society that can eradicate communicable disease through better sanitatian or draining mosquito swamps.
That's different than Verilli's reference to diabetes or heart disease, ailments that afflict us here because we've eradicated the kinds of diseases that kill millions much younger in Africa.
Government in the US actually does a few things well, one of which, generally speaking, is sanitation and clean water.
Bush put significant resources and effort into Africa. It was pretty quiet stuff then, too. A lot of liberals had not idea.
Perhaps W is on his way to becoming another Carter. :(
"Scott said...
Perhaps W is on his way to becoming another Carter. :("
Is he on drugs or is the paranaia and delusion of grandeur mental health related?
“There will be millions of people with chronic conditions like diabetes and heart disease... and as a result of the health care that they will get, they will be unshackled from the disabilities that those diseases put on them and have the opportunity to enjoy the blessings of liberty.”
of course this will be true even if Obamacare is repealed as people with pre-existing conditions have had the opportunity to get covered. In fact, closing this window will lead to a better outcome than leaving it open.
You saw the same piece I did.
As I said in the cafe, "Imagine if he was a Democrat".
The media would have completed the process for canonization by now.
phx said...
Bush put significant resources and effort into Africa. It was pretty quiet stuff then, too. A lot of liberals had not idea.
Yes, they did. They were just too busy hating him for winning and going after America's enemies.
Scott said...
Perhaps W is on his way to becoming another Carter. :(
I doubt it.
He's kept his opinions pretty much to himself.
And, God knows, the last 4 years have given him plenty about which to complain.
Carter's public charity was pretty modest after he left office -- Habitat for Humanity and such.
What's W going to be like in 20 years, after he's had the chance to ripen?
I am getting a little "selfish" about the need to put America 1st.
I question the philanthropy that says either America is doing fine so all the wealthy do-gooder money must go to foreign countries. Or that America is hurting, but Africa and Haiti are hurting worse therefore wealthy American do-gooders money and "free doctors care" must go to other nations needy instead of here.
Why not ask doctors that charge full fee for services in America to help fund their "generous and noble work with overpopulated Somalis in refugee camps" to scale back their exorbitant US pay...or work clinics here on what they get from all the US dollars they grab.
And why is it nobler for Bill Gates and Buffett to spend their loot in Africa vs on US Indian reservations, inner cities, or the jobless with no health benefits and hope in America??
Bush, Bono, Theresa Kerry, Sean Penn and Madonna and Oprah all want to focus on Africa? My, how special of them!
We must reduce your liberty so that you can enjoy what little we leave you even more.
Yes, in a way it does make sense.
Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme has 100% free healthcare for life, and all she had to do for it was wave an empty .45 at Jerry Ford.
Scott said...
Carter's public charity was pretty modest after he left office -- Habitat for Humanity and such.
What's W going to be like in 20 years, after he's had the chance to ripen?
He was also working on his first book and seems to need all the attention he can get.
No real sign of that from Dubya.
PS H4H was founded when Ol' Bucketmouth was running for POTUS. He may be part of it, but it ain't his.
"And why is it nobler for Bill Gates and Buffett to spend their loot in Africa vs on US Indian reservations, inner cities, or the jobless with no health benefits and hope in America?? "
Because it doesn't work. We have given billions to our poor to no good effect. Time to punish the rest of the world.
The best thing the rich can do with their money is to invest it in, or loan it to private business. That's how they got it in the first place.
You would think they would understand such a thing, and I'm sure they do, but investment never gets you hero status, no matter how much good it does.
I like my Presidents less charitable, unless it's their own money.
Verrilli's statement presupposes that the healthcare offered under the new act will be more excellent than it would have been otherwise. That might be a stretch, given the track record we can see of other Federal endeavors...
"Unknown said...
Verrilli's statement presupposes that the healthcare offered under the new act will be more excellent than it would have been otherwise"
I hear the entire NIH is working on a plan to turn healthcare up to 11. That will be even more excellent.
"And why is it nobler for Bill Gates and Buffett to spend their loot in Africa vs on US Indian reservations, inner cities, or the jobless with no health benefits and hope in America?? "
Because it doesn't work. We have given billions to our poor to no good effect. Time to punish the rest of the world.
What they can do is create small businesses in inner cities, etc., training people local to the area, gradually hand-off control to those with proven managerial skills, with an option of employees ultimately buying out the business.
Lynette "Squeaky" Fromme has 100% free healthcare for life
I assume you think she is still in prison. Squeaky was paroled in 2009. Of course now whe will have free healthcare for life.
Wherever the schvartzes are the good white people, the best of the best white people must MUST go to help them. Their own kind they make caca on. It's magnificent!
lemondog said...
"And why is it nobler for Bill Gates and Buffett to spend their loot in Africa vs on US Indian reservations, inner cities, or the jobless with no health benefits and hope in America?? "
Because it doesn't work. We have given billions to our poor to no good effect. Time to punish the rest of the world.
What they can do is create small businesses in inner cities, etc., training people local to the area, gradually hand-off control to those with proven managerial skills, with an option of employees ultimately buying out the business.
Guess how much non military money has been spent on Africa since the 50s.
Just make up a figure.
Got the figure in your head?
10 trillion dollars.
Perhaps it's time to quit sending them money.
Perhaps it's time to quit sending them money.
I wasn't being clear.
My suggestion for Gates, etal., to direct their wealth creating businesses in US inner cities, etc.
Sorry.
"Allan Lichtman, a history professor at American University, notes former president Jimmy Carter ...... is now held high esteem by many for his work in promoting democracy and eradicating guinea worm disease."
By some maybe, but not by those of us who wish he keep his big, toothy mouth shut. Stick a cardigan in it.
@ampersand,
So, how is she coping?
As I remember it, she pulled that stunt with Ford, because she felt unable to cope with the world and wanted to be shut up and taken care of - including "free" healthcare.
That's not a bad sentiment. I would, however, advise identifying and mitigating causes rather than treating symptoms. The latter is surely more profitable, but it does not offer a sustainable improvement in the human condition.
President Bush seems to be a decent and sincere person. However, his equivocation of political freedom with "freedom from disease" is emblematic of his anti-conceptual mentality, and a significant reason why his presidency was a failure. This is the mentality that enabled Medicare Part D, "war" fought gently, so as not to offend the locals (the consequences to the American soldiers be damned), and bailouts of investment banks.
At times, I wish he had lost to Gore or Kerry, so that it would be more clear that statism is responsible for our current fiscal and foreign policy predicaments. Bush shared most of their fundamental convictions, and thereby lead us very far along this path, but was still labelled as a "capitalist" by our equally conceptually addled intelligentsia. He was anything but.
Freedom from disease is surely a worthy objective. But the trick is, as always, matiching desirable social ends with the most effecitve means of achieving them. That's where Verrilli's argument goes astray.
As for W, he was and is an admirable and thoroughly decent fellow, even if he flubbed some major issues as president.
I'm just happy that Bush isn't spending taxpayer's money on this sort of thing anymore.
Amen to that, brother. Bush has always had this noblesse oblige thing going, and when he was in office he was scratching that particular itch with my tax dollars.
My suggestion for Gates, etal., to direct their wealth creating businesses in US inner cities, etc.
How successful are businesses crated by charities? My guess would be the goal of the business will morph into getting more charity money at some point.
One way to keep medical costs down is limiting payouts on lawsuits. Finland's top payout is 20 g. If a cop shoots your husband by accident you'd get 20 g tops. I imagine litigation costs are low in places like Zambia? In Finland they're high and the payouts are miniscule.
bagoh20 said...
I like my Presidents less charitable, unless it's their own money.
This.
May I remind all Obamacare lovers who are eying all the care diabetics and those with heart disease are not (!) getting here in the States to google "postcode lottery health UK" to see how the NHS is doing.
Sample quotes: The percentage of patients receiving nine key checks on their diabetes control - including for kidney damage, cholesterol and weight - varied from 60 to 70 per cent in Norfolk and parts of Yorkshire to zero to around 40 per cent in places like Cornwall, Lincolnshire and Northamptonshire.
Barbara Young, chief executive of Diabetes UK, said the charity was "seriously concerned".
"This demonstrates that the NHS is failing to provide universally high quality care across the country and shows that diabetes care is still a postcode lottery," she said.
Different areas of the country receive different health benefits and if you draw the short straw by living in the wrong postcode (zip code) for your particular disease -- well, rots of ruck, old chap.
I was tipped off about the "PCL" by a friend who is a NHS nurse in London.
I know some diabetics -- how exactly are they being shortchanged in their care? How will monitoring their blood sugar unshackle them from their disability under Obamacare any differently than they can do now? The lawyer was not well informed about medicine, and typically, as Obama did previously, picks some disease about which they are grossly ignorant as a emotional tool to manipulate. Certainly not to inform and educate. Who would want to separate a diabetic from his $4 Metformin?
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