Since when did charity become a birthright?

Growing up, nobody wanted to be dependent on charity.  Apparently a lot of Americans have no problem with accepting charity today.  Of course, it's not called "charity" anymore -- that would hurt someone's feelings.  But it's still charity, nonetheless.    

Food stamps are charity.  Payments through WIC are charity.  Welfare is charity.  Free cell phones and service are charity.  Subsidized insurance is charity. 

The list could go on and on, but in simplest terms when the government gives money or goods to anyone who hasn’t earned them it’s charity.  And by “earned” I mean actually doing something valuable in exchange for the money or goods.  Breathing and reproducing don't count.  

Sitting on your ass and popping out kids like Pez candies is not something valuable.  Training to be a “nail technician” at the community college isn’t either.  Nor is filling out job applications just to keep your benefits flowing.  Any money you get is charity; you haven’t earned a dime of it.    

On the other hand, Social Security benefits and UC are not charity.  That’s because we and our employers pay into these via payroll deductions from our paychecks for – wait for it – real jobs where we work to earn real money.  We contribute toward the benefits we ultimately receive.  

Now there’s nothing wrong with providing charity; it’s an entirely noble thing to do with your own money. There’s nothing wrong with accepting charity, either, if you really need the help. However, when the government takes money from you to provide charity, it’s different.  And when recipients of charity abandon any façade of striving for self-reliance and turn the charity they receive into a lifestyle, it’s just wrong.  Unfortunately, when government hands out charity that often happens. 

Honestly, we should always take care of the sick and disabled among us.  But we have no moral obligation to support those who aren’t.   Why government continues to do so is maddening. 

It does no good to feed people and give them money just because they aren’t willing to get off their butts to support themselves.  We’re not giving them “dignity” or ‘respect” by telling them it’s okay to be wholly dependent on government charity.  We’re not giving them a means to better themselves.  Government is just buying them off, postponing the inevitable realization that a lot of those people are just sponging off the system until they get caught and kicked off.  If ever. 

In short, we’re not improving anyone through handouts.  In national parks they have signs about feeding the animals.  The reason is that the animals can become conditioned to expect you to feed them.  If you don’t, they can become aggressive and hurt you. 

Here’s how that scenario plays out with humans.  Last weekend the EBT system was shut down for a day.  That’s the “debit card” those on the dole now use instead of the physical food stamps of yesteryear to buy things; the idea being that this allows the user to maintain their dignity. 

Now remember that the EBT program is about helping the working poor and the destitute get the food they need to survive.   So on Saturday the system went down and the cards either didn’t function or retailers couldn’t verify balances.  Walmart in one town decided to continue to allow EBT users to purchase stuff even though Walmart couldn’t verify the balances.

A near riot ensued as EBT card holders stripped the shelves of as much as they could carry to take advantage of the verification gap.  When Walmart announced that the EBT system was back online, people abandoned carts piled high with food in the aisles.  One woman tried to buy $700 worth of food before the system came back – she had 49 cents in her EBT account.  Others simply walked out the store with loaded carts full of stuff they never paid for.  

This wasn’t an isolated event.

Furious EBT card holders took to social media to flame Xerox for the hiccup in transactions.  Twitter was alive with hateful invectives and threats of riots and insurrections if service was not restored immediately. 

A couple of things …

First, if these people are so poor and destitute they need help to buy food, how can they afford devices and services to send Tweets, post on Facebook and the like?

Second, these people should be so damned glad they are getting something for nothing.  Instead of bitching about a minor inconvenience, they should be thanking everyone for their generosity.

But no.  These people acted like someone had arbitrarily decided to withhold their paycheck.  That’s because this is what all those benefits have become to them – a regular paycheck.  They’ve been conditioned to expect these benefits as their “rights.”  In their minds, they aren’t getting charity; they’re just getting what is owed them.

For what … I have no idea. I suspect they don’t either.   Except once they start getting these benefits, no one apparently has any right to limit or end them.  Certainly not the government.  

No one expects them to beg for benefits.  But for once it would be nice to know that we’re taking steps to assure that we’re spending our money on people who really need assistance on a temporary basis and – as sappy as this sounds – people who appreciate what they’re getting. 

Don’t expect that to happen anytime soon.  If anything, “the end of welfare as we know it” has morphed into a richer and more robust plethora of payments and subsidies designed to insure abject dependency for generations.  It's not “welfare as we know it” anymore, that’s true; it’s much better, more rewarding, and more inclusive than ever before. 

That may thrill the takers and the politicians dependent on them to maintain power, but a large part of the public is getting fed up with these leeches.  I don’t think I’m alone in this. 

If someone can work and they don’t, if they can feed their family but won’t, if they can afford things they want but won’t use their own money to buy the things they need, then that person is a worthless piece of crap.  He or she is a drain on society and contributes nothing of value.  They have no dignity, and are not deserving of respect.  They are a parasite. 

To all of you scamming the system:  I’m tired of hearing about you and your “needs.”  I, for one, couldn’t care less about you.  Piss off.  While you’re at it, STFU.  And stop reproducing – we don’t need any more of you; we’re all full up on generations of perpetual leeches and future criminals.

 

So let’s stop the bullshit about “human dignity” and “respect” for those laughing at the working stiffs supporting them.  Let’s help those who truly need help and cut off those who don’t.

Instead of constantly trying to find new ways to raise more money to squander on the same people, generation after generation, let’s stop the cycle of rewarding irresponsibility and bad behavior.  Certainly there will be blowback, as there was when welfare reform was enacted under Clinton.

But for a short time, it actually worked.  People moved off the dole and into jobs because they were forced to.  They had fewer "babies for benefits," too.  Then over time we got all warm and fuzzy again and made it more attractive to take money from the government than make money from a real job. 

That’s upside down and crazy.  We need to start paring back now.      

This isn’t selfish.  It’s just commonsense.  And it’s high time for us to start cutting our losses on a broad spectrum of the population that believe they are “owed” something simply by existing. 

Fruit of the poisoned tree

That’s what ObamaCare is in its present form.

Conceived in secrecy, nursed by special interests, and birthed prematurely, what did anyone expect?  When someone says that you have to pass a bill to learn what’s in it, shouldn’t that be a clear signal that something is desperately wrong?

I cringe when supporters say “it’s the law of the land” and held to be Constitutional by the Supreme Court.  Well, the Dred Scott decision – which essentially held that slaves were property with no rights – was also made by the Supreme Court.  And bad laws get made and repealed all the time. 

So just because a bad law gets jammed through by a majority party, and survives scrutiny by the Supreme Court on a technicality, doesn’t mean it’s up there with the Ten Commandments. 

Sooner or later, bad laws get overturned.  The Supreme Court usually gets another bite at the apple, too.  Common sense prevails and mischief is undone.  Unfortunately, this can take a lot of time and bad things can happen in the meantime. 

Right now, the media and the Obama Administration are trying to convince the public that there’s so much more good about ObamaCare than bad.  In short, they tend to highlight three things:

      People with pre-existing conditions can now get covered …

      There’s no cap on coverage …

      There are subsidies to help the poor pay for insurance. 

Well, that’s certainly looking on the bright side.  Kind of like saying that the bright side of WWII was that it pulled the country out of the Great Depression. 

So now there are lots of stories about Joe and Flo Blow somewhere who are just thrilled that they can now get coverage after being turned down by insurance companies for years.  There are tales about people who needed an organ transplant but didn’t get one because they couldn’t afford it.  And let’s not forget those who think they’ll be able to get good insurance essentially for free. 

You’d think that until ObamaCare people were dying in the streets for lack of medical care and only the rich had health insurance.     

Mind you, an overwhelming number of people already had insurance through their employers before ObamaCare.  Most of the people who had no insurance either didn’t think they needed it, couldn’t afford to pay for it, or perhaps were “undocumented.”  

If something happened to someone without insurance they just went to the local emergency room and were treated, because … wait for it … there’s a Federal law that requires emergency rooms to treat everyone, regardless of whether they have insurance or can afford to pay. 

Nobody in this country – here legally or illegally – has been denied medical care for lack of insurance or ability to pay for many years.  Long before ObamaCare. 

ObamaCare does nothing to change that.  People without insurance and with no money can still use emergency rooms as their family doctor as they do now.

But won’t everyone now have insurance?  Well that’s the plan but it’s not going to happen.    

Several things will rip it asunder. 

You see, the Affordable Care Act isn’t that affordable.  As with a lot of other big-government ideas many people aren’t going to do what government idealists think they will – or should – do. 

If you aren’t paying anything for something right now, what’s going to make you start paying for it?  The goodness of your heart?  Your innate altruism?  The request by your government that you do? 

Does anyone actually believe that the estimated 10-15 million uninsured who pay nothing for insurance now and get medical care free through their local emergency room are willingly going to start paying for care?  Seriously? 

And the young healthy people the plan is depending on to enroll – the people who won’t need any medical care for years – are they suddenly going to be thrilled to pay hundreds of dollars a year for something they don’t think they need?  Hell, they already bitch and moan about paying back their student loans – good luck with squeezing them for more bucks. 

Now, the counter argument is that people won’t have a choice – everyone is compelled by law to have insurance or pay a tax.  Also, generous subsidies will help people afford this insurance. 

Unless the subsidy brings the cost to zero, or pays people to take it, don’t hold your breath. 

Next, the Affordable Care Act does allow people with existing conditions to get insurance, and there are no caps on coverage.  Which is a good thing for those who couldn’t get insurance before because they had cancer, a heart condition, or some other serious ailment that could cost hundreds of thousands of dollars over their lifetime to treat.    

You may be wondering – or if you’re a Democrat, probably not – how can insurance companies afford to take on these open-ended risks now when they couldn’t before.

The answer is simple.  They can’t.  Not at the rates they’ve been charging. 

ObamaCare didn’t change reality.  It just distorts it to make it appear different. 

Insurance companies are still for-profit enterprises.  That means they have to take in more money than they pay out, unlike the government.  That also means they have to change the way coverage is written to account for their overall increased risks.  They also have to raise rates for everyone to account for stuff they’re ordered to provide “for free” like birth control, preventive care, etc. 

That’s why everyone’s premiums have gone up, despite what Obama promised.  You can order insurance companies to provide services and absorb more risk, and in turn those companies will do what they need to do to still turn a profit.  Otherwise, they won’t stay in business. 

So they raise rates and increase deductibles.  This is going to be a big shock for those who haven’t had insurance before, and especially for the deluded who think ObamaCare means great insurance coverage at an affordable cost.   

They are in for an unpleasant surprise. 

If your out-of-pocket deductibles before your insurance kicks in are thousands of dollars – as they will be on the over-hyped Exchange products – the deal is not so sweet.  Imagine paying several hundred dollars a month for insurance for the first time, going to the hospital, and discovering that you have to spend $5000 or more of your own money before your insurance starts paying.  Or finding that you have to spend thousands of dollars of your own money before your family’s prescriptions are covered. 

I’m not making this up.   This is how it’s going to work for a lot of people.  Yes, they’ll be able to get insurance, but aside from limited preventive care, it’s not going to be particularly useful once you factor in high deductibles. 

Even Obama cannot change the basic economics of health insurance.  It’s all about risk – insurance companies need to shave the odds and potential payouts wherever they can. They want to put some limits on what could turn into an “all-you-can-eat” buffet for some people. 

Unfortunately, the prevailing belief among some groups is that through ObamaCare they will have access to the vast buffet of services, docs, specialists and brand-name prescription drugs.  I’ve heard it from people who should know better – they think ObamaCare will prevent insurance companies from making decisions about what they’ll cover and how much they’ll pay.  In essence, there will be an all-you-can-eat buffet and there’s nothing insurance companies can do to stop it.   

Nothing could be further from the truth. 

By making you spend your own money before they start to pay, they’re betting you’ll be a bit more judicious in consuming services and prescription drugs.   And they’re probably right.  You’re less likely to run to your doc for the latest TV-advertised wonder drug if it’s coming out of your pocket.  You’re more likely to opt for lower cost generics when you do need a prescription, and treat a sprained ankle with hot and cold compresses at home before demanding an MRI.   

ObamaCare also reduces payouts to doctors and hospitals for treating Medicare and Medicaid patients.  Again, idealists in government are wrong: they believe docs and hospitals will work for less because they feel morally compelled to help Medicare and Medicaid patients.  As if docs and hospitals are powerless to resist.  Well docs are like a lot of us – they have to make a living too and if you cut their payments they’ll simply stop accepting Medicare and Medicaid patients.  If hospitals get jammed the same way, they’ll change their working model or close. 

Apply that to insurance reimbursements as well and you’ll see a lot of practices  and providers that won’t accept insurance any more, either. 

Now Obama’s spokespuppets say none of this can happen. With enough young people in the pool, the risks go down so insurance rates will go down.  And people won’t have a choice – everyone will be required by law to have health insurance.  Doctors and hospitals will learn to adjust. 

They are whistling past the proverbial graveyard.  This is a disaster that’s only getting worse.  The more the public learns about it, the less they like it.   It’s an ugly piece of legislation. 

If ObamaCare was so great, why aren’t all government employees on it?  Why isn’t Congress?  Hell, why isn’t Obama and his cabinet?

And why have so many vocal supporters at the beginning requested waivers later on? 

I don’t fault Republicans for trying to stop it. But they are going about it the wrong way. 

Don't repeal it; let it go through.  Just strip out all the waivers and exemptions. 

Let Obama and the Democrats own it 100%.  Then see what happens.