The Daily Quote
Thu, 11/19/2009 - 4:19pm

"What would you do? Cut a great road through the law to get after the Devil? ... And when the last law was down, and the Devil turned round on you - where would you hide, Roper, the laws all being flat? This country is planted thick with laws from coast to coast, Man's laws, not God's, and if you cut them down -- and you're just the man to do it -- do you really think you could stand upright in the winds that would blow then? Yes, I give the Devil benefit of law, for my own safety's sake!"

Robert Bolt

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

Democracy, Capitalism, and the Republican Health Care Bill

Ken Watts
Thu, 11/19/2009 - 3:36pm

I'VE PROMISED TO RATE the Republican plan on the democracy scale, as well, but before I do that I need to be clear about a fundamental difference between that plan and both of the Democratic plans.

The Democrats are writing real legislation. They fully expect it to become law. Because of this, they have had to consider all sorts of things that the Republicans didn't.

They have had to worry about practical matters, guarding against problems a policy change could trigger. They have had to worry about getting enough votes to pass the bill.

All of these things make the bill longer and more complicated. All of them make it less ideological.

The Republican plan, by contrast, was never expected to become law.

Its authors could ignore many pragmatic problems, and didn't have to make any compromises to win votes which they never expected to get.

The result is that the Republican plan is probably a better reflection of the ideology of its authors. It won't tell us, as clearly as the Democratic bills do, what Republicans might really pass given the chance, but it will tell us what they would most like health reform to look like.

The question I will be asking of the Republican plan is the same one I asked of the Democratic plan—In what direction does it shift power?

Toward big corporations and the wealthy (capitalism)?

Toward government ownership of the entire process (socialism)?

Or toward the ordinary citizen (democracy)?

The four reforms which Republicans emphasize in the bill are: [read more]

The Daily Quote
Tue, 11/17/2009 - 1:58pm

"It was when you insisted that the, uh, the young lady, Tish—that Tish must pay, too. 'Tone-stapple,' or something like it."

"Oh, 'tanstaafl.' Means 'There ain't no such thing as a free lunch.' And isn't," I added, pointing to a FREE LUNCH sign across the room, "or these drinks would cost half as much. Was reminding her that anything free cost twice as much in long run or turns out worthless."

Robert A. Heinlein

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

How Subsidies, Taxes, and Fees in the House Bill Meet the Democracy Test

Ken Watts
Tue, 11/17/2009 - 12:14pm

IN THE PREVIOUS POST WE LOOKED at three areas of the House health care reform bill, to see just how democratic they really were.

The question I posed there was how much power these proposals transferred from the large wealthy corporations to the average citizen and patient:

TriangleArrowWealthToPeople

The first three areas were the Insurance Exchange, the Public Option, and greater supervision of the health care industry:

 

Provision Moves Us Toward Direction
The Insurance Exchange Democracy, Freedom
The Public Option Democracy, Freedom
Greater Supervision Democracy, Freedom

The two other major areas in the bill are government subsidies, and funding.

I take those up today: [read more]

The Daily Quote
Mon, 11/16/2009 - 5:17pm

Under capitalism, man exploits man. Under communism, it's just the opposite.

attributed to John Kenneth Galbraith

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

How the House Bill Stands up to the Democracy Test

Ken Watts
Mon, 11/16/2009 - 2:54pm

LAST TIME I POINTED OUT THAT health care reform is really about freedom and democracy, in two ways:

  1. The value of any health care reform package to the average citizen should be measured, in part, by how successfully restores our power over our own health care.

    As things stand now, that power is vested in large insurance corporations, and generally denied to patients.
  2. If health care reform succeeds in making citizens and families more secure, it will also strengthen our democracy.

    Anxiety and worry makes citizens less grounded and easier to manipulate—security makes it easier for them to fend for their own interests, and those of their country.

I promised that today I would begin looking at the Democratic (capital D) proposal, to see just how democratic (small d) it really is. [read more]

The Daily Quote
Fri, 11/13/2009 - 8:16pm

Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.

Albert Einstein

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

Two Forms of Power

Ken Watts
Fri, 11/13/2009 - 10:30am

IN THE LAST POST I EXAMINED how the agendas for health care change when we consider ourselves—we, the people—as a center of power, alongside the government and the wealthy corporations.

But power comes in more than one form.

Imagine two different futures for America:

  1. Our government becomes more and more democratic in a purely political sense—in that more and more issues get decided by the majority.

    At the same time the people become more intolerant.

    A new religion emerges, which almost completely replaces Christianity, Judaism, Islam, and all other religions now practiced.

    Because this is a democracy, in the political sense, the beliefs and practices of this new religion get enacted into law.

    The laws become completely restrictive: allowing virtually no choice to anyone. Everything about daily life must be lived in accordance with the rules of the new religion. Laws prescribe when we rise in the morning, when we go to bed at night, what we eat and when, who we marry, how many children we have, what programs we watch on television, what newspapers are allowed to print, who can get what job, where we worship—every aspect of our lives.
  2. Our government becomes more and more dictatorial—no one gets to vote anymore, and a single person controls everything.

    This dictator puts policies into effect which allow everyone maximum freedom.

    He makes sure we have a healthy free market.

    He makes sure that everyone has equal opportunity.

    He makes sure that no one, not even your boss, can infringe on your basic human rights.

    Under this dictatorship the laws become minimally restrictive: allowing maximum choice to everyone. Everything about our daily life is left up to us. We decide when to rise in the morning, when to go to bed at night, what we eat and when, who we marry, how many children we have, what programs we watch on television, what our newspapers print, what job we want to apply for, where we worship or if we worship—every aspect of our lives.

In which of these scenarios do the people have more power? [read more]

The Daily Quote
Thu, 11/12/2009 - 3:35pm

The service of the accepted image of economic life to the political needs of the business firm—the large corporation in particular—is, in fact, breathtaking. Broadly speaking, it removes from the corporation all power to do wrong and leaves with it only the power to do right.

Are its prices too high? The corporation is blameless. Prices are set by the market. Are profits unseemly? They too are determined by the market. Are products deficient in safety, durability, design, usefulness? They reflect the will of the sovereign consumer.

John Kenneth Galbraith

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

How the New Player Changes the Game

Ken Watts
Thu, 11/12/2009 - 12:23pm

THE LAST POST OR TWO have addressed the standard model within which health care reform is being debated.

That model is a simple continuum, with socialism on the left and capitalism on the right:

ContinuumSocialimsmCapitalism

In practice, that model gives us only two choices—give the power to the wealthy, or give the power to the government:

ContinuumGovernmentWealth

But this model is deeply misleading, because it relegates us—we, the people—to a passive position: our only job is to cast a vote for either big government or wealth.

In fact, government and wealth are not the only two options in the field.

We, the people, do not need to be merely choosers, we can also be a choice.

TriangleGovernmentWealthThePeople

We can ask, not just whether a given policy such as health care reform moves the "X" closer to wealth or the government, but whether it moves the "X" closer to us.

Does it, in this case, give us more control over our own health care?

Under the current system, the "X" is, on average, about here: [read more]

The Daily Quote
Wed, 11/11/2009 - 5:26pm

For a successful technology, reality must take precedence over public relations, for Nature cannot be fooled.

Richard Feynman

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

The Third Option

Ken Watts
Wed, 11/11/2009 - 9:18am

THE CONTINUUM I PLACED health care on in the previous post was a simple line, stretching from Socialism, on the left, to Capitalism on the right:

ContinuumSocialimsmCapitalism

Using that model, our current health care system shows up about here:

ContinuumMostlyCapitalism

By contrast, the Democratic plan, in either of its configurations, shows up about here:

ContinuumTwoThirdsCapitalism

"Obama care" is not an attempt to seriously socialize health care. It's an attempt to make a capitalist system a little more stable and a little more responsive to the people.

This can be hard to understand in the present climate because our thinking is stuck on the continuum above—but that continuum does not represent the real world.

It's meant to be a kind of map, showing where the power lies. [read more]

The Daily Quote
Tue, 11/10/2009 - 12:55pm

The extreme socialists desire to run every nation as a single business concern. I do not suppose that Henry Ford would find much difficulty in running Andorra or Luxembourg on a socialistic basis... But while nationalization of certain industries is an obvious possibility in the largest of states, I find it no easier to picture a completely socialized British Empire or United States than an elephant turning somersaults or a hippopotamus jumping a hedge.

J. B. S. Haldane

Patriot Notes

Capitalism, Socialism, and Democracy: What the Health Care Battle is Really About

Ken Watts
Tue, 11/10/2009 - 11:55am

IN THE CASE OF HEALTH CARE reform, as in many others, the real story is in the subtext.

The battle isn't over good health care—which everybody wants.

It isn't over less expensive healthcare—which everybody wants.

It isn't over more reliable healthcare, or even over making sure everyone is covered.

The battle is not over heath care at all.

On the pure level of party politics, it's mostly about the Republicans trying to stop the Democrats from getting anything done, because they think they can win the next election that way.

But even that is not the real issue.

The real issue has to do with where the center of power in this country will be.

The usual way of framing that issue is as a choice between capitalism and socialism.

But that leaves out the largest and most interesting possibility.

We've been taught to view the power struggle on a continuum like the one below: [read more]

The Daily Quote
Fri, 11/06/2009 - 3:22pm

They flew out of the cloud.
They saw the staggering jewels of the night in their infinite dust and their minds sang with fear.
For a while they flew on, motionless against the infinite sweep of the Universe. And then they turned round.
"It'll have to go," the men of Krikkit said as they headed back for home.

On the way back they sang a number of tuneful and reflective songs on the subjects of peace, justice, morality, culture, sport, family life and the obliteration of all other life-forms.

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