Redistributing Wealth From the Poor for the Greater Good is Still Socialism...

polifrog

In all fairness where I am about to go has nothing to do with the article referenced but a portion of the article does dip into a topic of interest; the scope and morality of socialism:

... in 1994 with the signing of the North American Free Trade Agreement, which opened the American-Mexican border to more economic activity. To encourage foreign investment in Mexico, its government started to strip Indian landowners of a long-held legal protection from privatization. The resulting conflict awakened ethnic tensions that dated back centuries, and spurred a populist support of indigenous heritage.

What interests me here is that the Mexican government recognized a social benefit for Mexico in increasing foreign investment. Whatever the merits, Indian landowners retained legal protection from privatization that hindered much needed foreign investment. Mexico's solution was to strip the Indian landowners of those legal protections that stymied foreign investment for the greater good of the state.

It seems to me this redistribution of "wealth" from the poor (rights of the poor were removed) for the greater good.... is socialism. All but the most socialist of us would rightly recognize this as a wrong. However, many of those individuals who see it as wrong to redistribute wealth from the poor for the greater good see no wrong in redistributing wealth from the productive for the greater good. But if all individuals are inherently equal then where is the morality in treating the poor differently from the productive?

The extreme socialist, of course, has the answer; that the greater good is always moral and that there is no wrong in redistributing wealth from the poor.

The moderate socialist, though, chooses to completely deny that redistribution of wealth from the poor for the greater good is socialist. They prefer, instead, to lay blame on those who benefit; corporations are for them the usual bogyman and, of course, the perennial favorite, America.

The fairer and more moral answer is to understand that socialism is fundamentally immoral and therefore no morality may be gleamed from it.







H/T to Ed Cone for referencing the linked article.
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Brad Miller NC-13 ObamaCare increasing the cost of healthcare...

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Obama attempted to sell Americans on ObamaCare as a way to save money.
1)Cheaper for the individual.
2)Cheaper as a whole due to increased competition.
3)Cheaper due to Government Control.
4)Lowers costs by spreading the costs.

All the above contentions are untrue.

First, I will be among those who are forced to buy more health-care than I would otherwise buy as insurance. I prefer to purchase catastrophic insurance and cover my other health care costs as needed and this plan will increase my costs. I am not alone.

Second. Government competition is not competition. Governments have endlessly deep pockets and private businesses will not be able to compete. This increases costs for the nation as private alternatives are pushed out of the market leaving government as the only alternative. (Will government lament the lack of competition when they are the only provider.)

Third. Government control is another way of saying you will not get the care you want, but rather the care that is offered. Government controls, in the end, increase cost as efficiencies can't be as easily followed as one regulation or another precludes the efficient choices.

Fourth. Spreading the costs actually increase costs as the costs are not immediately born by the end user, but rather the a middleman (government) . The normal mechanism by which costs are controlled is broken by divorcing provider from end user.

The Department of Health and Human Services (RedState)...

We estimate that overall national health expenditures under the health reform act would increase by a total of $311 billion (0.9 percent) during the calendar years 2010-2019

Although several provisions would help to reduce health care volts growth, their impact would be more than offset through 2019 by the higher health expenditures resulting from coverage expansions.

Yahoo...

President Barack Obama's health care overhaul law is getting a mixed verdict in the first comprehensive look by neutral experts: More Americans will be covered, but costs are also going up.

And here..

As for the actual cost involved, the penalty will be the higher of either $695 or 2.5% of income. Effectively, those earning below $27,800 would pay the flat rate, and after that point would begin paying the percentage. Once a person earns more than $40,000, the penalty will exceed $1,000. At $59,000, it would reach $1,475.

And Kathleen Sebelius admits she is clueless as to how much the "High Risk Pools" will cost. Estimates are already beyond original expectations.

And lastly...



Brad Miller's vote for this dishonestly promoted travesty should lead to his replacement.





polifrog

Rep. Brad Miller NC-13 -- Legislating Health-Care Reform by Skulking in the Shadows of Dark Rooms ..

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I bumped into this video (below) earlier today.




In the video Brad Miller describes how dysfunctional government follows from government legislated from dark rooms in secrecy. "Democracy dies behind closed doors", said Brad Miller. It is truly astounding that the same man voted for ObamaCare. Hearing the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi say that "we have to pass the bill so that you can find out what is in it..." should have been a hint to Brad Miller that the darkness he described was upon us.

Instead,

The bill was passed with Brad Miller's vote and now the light of day can shine upon it. Here is a short list of what had been gestating in those dark rooms Brad Miller once feared but now finds a home in.

• Existing conditions for children are not covered by the bill
• A tax change that increases costs for corporations and subsequently all consumers
• Increased insurance premiums for young adults
• Writers of the bill are exempt from the ObamaCare mandates

The light of debate would have solved these problems, yet Brad Miller was no longer standing with his morals, preferring, instead, to skulk in the shadows of darkness and secrecy.

The old Brad Miller was correct when he said "Democracies die behind closed doors.", I just never thought Brad Miller, a representative of North Carolina, would be a progenitor of that death.



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Rep. Bob Etheridge -- Dissn' the Contitution...

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I suspect that our government schools failed Bob Etheridge when they covered our Constitution, but how can a person have been so disengaged from society as to have missed being educated on the topic by School House Rock.





In the absence of an acceptable education Bob Etheridge progressed beyond the limitations of checks and balances. Bob Etheridge's Constitution goes like this....



...You'll be taxed and pay, against your will, but today I'm just a bill....


Bob Etheridge, bad for North Carolina, and
Anathema to the Constitution and the United States.






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Rep. GK Butterfield -- Relegating the Citizenry to the Position of Business Costs Through Health Care Reform...

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Do we want a health-care system in which we are a cost,
-or do we want a health-care system that competes for our dollars?


Stupak:

What are Democratic leaders saying? “If you pass the Stupak amendment, more children will be born, and therefore it will cost us millions more. That’s one of the arguments I’ve been hearing,”

This is an insight into the fundamental health-care choice we have before us.

It doesn't end with the unborn either. We would all become a cost under governmental health-care and as such our deaths would work to the advantage of the system.

I would prefer my continued life to work to the advantage of the system, and it does so when the heath-care system has to fight for my dollars. It is to their advantage if I live to bring back more dollars later.

Of course, I have to be the source of those dollars. When I am not the source of the dollars I become a cost.

Should we be GK Butterfield's cost health-care burden or a customer that supports the health-care industry?

I choose customer.





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Rep. Brad Miller -- An Extremist Practicing Immoral Governance

polifrog



Extremism. What is extremism?

Citizens siding, with liberty, with the Constitution, protesting government overreach or Rep. Brad Miller's last two years that have defined him as a practitioner of Governance through the tyranny of the majority?

Brad Miller voted in support of:

• --Cap & Trade --- ignoring conservative input and attempting to force poverty on the nation through higher energy prices. Immoral.
  
• --ObamaCare --- ignoring the input of the citizenry and conservatives and breaking the bond between consumer and health care producer. Immoral.
  
• --$13 trillion financial bailout --- ignoring the input of the citizenry and conservatives and passing the costs of bailing out current failure to unborn generations. Immoral.
  
• --Failed Stimulus --- ignoring the input of the citizenry and conservatives and wasting tax dollars by running them through a soulless government. Immoral.
  
• But voted against the Balanced Budget Amendment. Immoral.
  

Brad Miller has proven himself to be an uncompromising statist who ignores not only the opposite side of the isle but the citizenry and state he pretends to represent. One can not put 1/6 of one's home state's economy under the direct influence of the federal government and claim to represent their state.

How is it, then, that Brad Miller can feel comfortable with charging Bill Randall, a man who sides with the Constitution, liberty and the value of American Heritage, of extremism? The answer is that Brad Miller has been swimming so long with Pelosi, Reid and Obama that has lost sight of the Constitution, the state of North Carolina, and the people he represents.

It is truly sad where the immoral governance of Brad Miller has taken our nation.



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Rep. Brad Miller, Bob Etheridge, and David Price Express Pride in Diminishing America Through Economic Stimulus...

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According to MyNC three of our nation's most liberal representatives, Brad Miller, Bob Etheridge, and David Price toured the goodies they forced our grandchildren to buy for us...

Congressmen David Price, Brad Miller and Bob Etheridge made stops around Raleigh including one at the City's Transit Operations Center, which is under construction on Poole Road.

City officials said $11.6 million of stimulus money is helping pay for the $21 million facility that will house and maintain Capital Area Transit buses.

Having served over 40 years combined, they have become power brokers pure and simple. They endorse funneling money earned by North Carolinians through the Fed Government with the tool of the IRS. They later claim that they are bringing federal dollars "home" to NC in a shameless attempt to garner votes. Of course, they claim to be Robin Hoods as they impoverish us all; they are not; they are shysters accumulating political power on the backs of our confiscated income and labor.

What is sadder is that they now spend more money gathering votes than we give them in taxes. They make up the difference by taxing the unborn. This is the sort of governance that leads to the end of nations, yet...

Brad Miller, Bob Etheridge, and David Price publicly parade with pride by the fruit of their immoral governance.

These three representatives swim in seas of immoral governance so deep and so wide that they know nothing else and see nothing inherently wrong in attempting to gleam votes from the goodies they forced later generations to buy us.

Of course, our grand children not only have to pay for those goodies, they also have to pay interest to the Chinese for Miller's failed stimulus. Yet Miller, Etheridge, and Price seem proud of the fact that they are stealing American prosperity from later generations and leaving them a diminished America.

These individuals are leading this country toward a generational embarrassment in which we will have left our progeny less than our parents left us.

-- Immoral governance personified by three individuals lost in governance.



polifrog

A PBS History of Rep. Brad Miller's Disenfranchising of His Constituency Via His Self Drawn District...

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There is an often repeated charge that Rep Brad Miller drew the lines of his district. Although, I didn't doubt the validity of the charge I felt it was tainted by the kookiness factor. Now, I no longer feel that way due to a quick history lesson via WFAE 90.7 (PBS) out of Charlotte.

NC was not always a state subjected to gerrymandered districts and the resulting party rigidness gerrymandered district create. Our gerrymandered districts are the result of two court decisions and an utter disregard for the NC State Constitution since the 1980's.

According to PBS's WFAE out of Charlotte, NC:
For most of North Carolina's history, redistricting wasn't much of an issue at all. Our state constitution requires legislative districts to stay within county lines. There wasn't much lawmakers could do about that.

But the US Supreme Court ruled in the 1960s that districts - congressional and legislative - had to be pretty close to the same size in terms of population. It's called the "one person, one vote" rule, and lawmakers had to make exceptions to the county rule to comply.

Then there was the Voting Rights Act of 1965. That required lawmakers to avoid breaking up minority communities into different districts to dilute their voting power. And it required 40 North Carolina counties where there was a history of discrimination at the polls to get clearance from the Department of Justice whenever they change their districts or election laws.

The NC Constitution's requirement that districts be drawn according to county lines imparted too much power to the citizenry as far as the Democrats who were in power at the time were concerned. Democrats found that they could consolidate power through the tools of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and the Supreme Court mentioned above. With these tools Democrats found that they could empower themselves with incumbency at the expense of the citizens they served. Brad Miller was one of those Democrats.

"Since the Democrats were in the majority, it was mainly to protect incumbent
democrats, to keep control of the General Assembly in the hands of the Democratic party," said attorney Thomas Farr.
...
Farr says gerrymandering has led to a lot of corruption in North Carolina politics, because it doesn't give voters the power to hold their lawmakers accountable.

After the 2000 census Brad Miller was involved with redrawing the congressional districts in NC.

Congressman Brad Miller was one of the lead architects of the 2001 plan that Farr took to court. Miller was in the state Senate then, the chairman of the Redistricting Committee.
...
The next year, Miller won his seat in Congress in the new district he helped to draw.

The end result has been increased corruption due to politicians being able to rely on districts so heavily biased toward one part or the other that they often go uncontested.

Brad Miller did not begin his disregard for liberty by ignoring the US Constitution, he first cut his teeth through the disenfranchising of NC voters by ignoring the NC Constitution.

This an yet another example of Brad Miller's immoral governance that concentrates the political power in the hands of the few at the expense of the many.




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Rep. Bob Etheridge -- Image Management or Deception?

polifrog


According to HomeInHenderson.com Bob Etheridge hosted a jobs conference with hundreds in attendance this past Monday and Tuesday.

It is interesting, though, the amount of information this article leaves out.

Bob Etheridge is quoted twice in the HomeInHenderson article:

“Our government is for the people, and by the people. This two-day job creation and economic development convention provides a great opportunity for me to talk to business leaders about how we can work together to spur job growth,”

and,

“Keeping in touch with community leaders needs to be a bipartisan operation,” said Etheridge. “That is what these two days have been about – keeping in touch with the people we are here to serve.”

Coming from a community "paper" this all sounds very local especially when there is no hint within the article of where Etheridge met these community leaders.

Moreover, the title of this article gives the impression that Etheridge hosted the event and that he had gathered an impressive group of local community leaders to discuss the issue of jobs and find how to corral a few more toward district 2.

A better description of this conference can be found at WWAY, McIntyre to host business and economic develoment summit.

First,
This was not Bob Etheridge's summit and was in reality Rep. Mike McIntyre's event (the 14th such conference). His co-hosts for this particular gathering included G.K. Butterfield, Bob Etheridge, Larry Kissell, Patrick McHenry, Walter Jones, Mel Watt, and Virginia Foxx. That's right, Bob Etheridge was only an honorary co-host.

Secondly, Rep. Mike McIntyre refers to his event as “The Washington Perspective” business and economic development summit, a name left out of the HomeInHenderson article. The name is appropriate, though, as the event was held in Washington DC. Why would an event centered on helping the economy of NC be held so far from NC and where the attendees were drawn? One would think holding it locally would have benefited the economy of district 2 and if space were an issue Raleigh could have supported the event. Why drag hundreds of people and more importantly their dollars to DC? North Carolina and district 2 seem to have been forgotten.

Third, here is the list speakers over the two days:

On Monday the 13th:

• Dr. Joseph DeSimone, Chancellor's Eminent Professor of Chemistry, UNC
• The North Carolina Military-Business Opportunity Panel
• Eight North Carolina U.S. Representatives

On Tuesday the 14th:

• General James T. Conway (Commandant of the U.S. Marine Corps)
• General George W. Casey Jr. (Chief of Staff of the U.S. Army)
• Secretary Ray LaHood (U.S. Department of Transportation)
• Barbara B. Kennelly (President & CEO, National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare)
• Rep. John Lewis (U.S. Representative from Georgia’s 5th District).

I'm not convinced a group of local business leaders entirely made up of government employees fits Ethridge's description of "keeping in touch with the people we are here to serve."

Etheridge also said, "For the people, by the people" How? -- When the only people scheduled to speak were government employees at an event called "The Washington Perspective" held in Washington DC. How do community leaders outside district 2 help the people of district 2 by meeting in DC?

Additionally Etheridge appears to have mislead when he said,"Keeping in touch with community leaders needs to be a bipartisan operation,”. There was a time when community leaders meant just that, community leaders, not state leaders from across the state meeting in DC. who have been drawn exclusively from government employment rosters.

It appears that the community Etheridge is referring to are not the communities of district 2, but rather the government community. This conference seems to be government by government for government. Although Bob Etheridge is able to utter platitudes like "Our government is for the people, and by the people," he seems to have lost all touch with the people outside of government who make up district 2. Is Bob Etheridge aware that there is a private sector from which to draw advise? The private sector should not be viewed only as a beast of burden on which Bob Etheridge funds his governance.

This is faux campaigning or image management to an almost dishonest extent. It takes more than another man's jobs summit to burnish another man's jobs reputation. Although Etheridge's quotes can not be denied, I believe that some of the responsibility of this poor HomeInHenderson article can be laid on HomeInHenderson.com itself. -- But then I wonder who the source for this article was.

I do know this, district 2 should be wary of these stunts.

Check out Renee Ellmers; she is a community leader in the traditional sense. There is a good chance you may have even met her.



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