Flame — HabitableZone

Flame » in reply to re: Okay, maybe if I ignore all the foundational stuff...

Foundations
TB — (archived)

The old "negative" versus "positive" rights argument. Ayn Rand went over all this over forty years ago.

While usually couched in words like "opportunity" and other fuzzy and pleasant-sounding terms, a positive right--health care, food, education, transportation, you name it--demands a forced redistribution of wealth and property. After all, it isn't a "right" if I don't get it unless I pay for it.

"Securing these rights" in the Declaration means government preventing these rights from being violated. It is a statement of defense, and the entire rest of the document gives examples of how rights are violated. It doesn't mean free health care.

There is not one frigging word in the Declaration stating that the government should provide the day-to-day needs of anyone. Nor, despite the grotesque expansion of the simple phrase "promote the general welfare," is there anything like that in the Constitution.

This argument isn't going to be settled here. It isn't a matter of the idealistic extremes--total anarchic libertarianism or complete communism--it's a matter of where you're going to put the line. And the line has been moving steadily left for seventy years.

You really think it's going to stop with socialized health care?

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