The price of apples keeps going up. The
government decides that every American must buy apples. But some
can't afford them.
Government starts controlling how much apple farmers are paid, it
mandates that every single American buys apples and subsidizes those
under a certain income level so they can.
Will the price of apples go down, stay the same or go up? Or, in
economists' language, if you limit the supply of a commodity and
increase demand, will the price of that commodity go up or down?
Did you say "up"? You get an A. But if you did say "up," you surely
are not a Democrat.
Democrats have just committed multitrillions of our money, and, as a
bonus, sold a big chunk of American freedom down the road, betting
that everything a college freshman learns in basic economics is not
true. Or, that health care doesn't follow the rules of economics.
Because our new health-care system is pretty much the apple scenario
described above.
Or, maybe they don't care? Maybe it's not about economics, but about
ideology and political power. And that the real issue is freedom.
They think we've got too much and that politicians should decide
what is fair and who should have what.
A revealing moment during the presidential campaign occurred when,
during one debate, ABC's Charles Gibson pushed then-Sen. Barack
Obama about his stated intent to increase capital gains taxes.
Gibson brandished data showing that when you cut this tax,
government tax revenues increase, and when you raise it, revenue
drops (punishing investment surely produces less).
"So, why raise it?" Gibson asked. Obama responded that maybe it
won't happen that way this time. And besides, he said, his motive
was "fairness."
After voters in Massachusetts elected a Republican to replace the
late Sen. Ted Kennedy, killing the Democrats' filibuster-proof
Senate majority, many pundits wrote that President Obama had to move
to the political center.
I wrote then that this wouldn't happen because, unlike President
Bill Clinton, who did moderate, Obama is a left-wing ideologue. He
didn't run for president to be somebody. He did it to do something.
He did it to change America.
As polls showed waning public support for what Democrats were
pushing on health care, many assumed they would back off. It was
still conceivable that they could stand rules on their head and ram
the thing through using the so-called reconciliation procedure. But
why would they do it when polls suggested they would be punished in
November elections?
But Obama understood that when you are selling dreams, numbers don't
matter.
So, as in the housing and financial debacle we just went through,
you commit taxpayer money to subsidize a product to make it look
cheaper than it is, you get people to buy it, and when it all comes
crashing down, it doesn't matter. By then you're long gone.
And, another bonus, as more Americans get herded onto the government
plantation -- 30 million more with this new bill -- it's easy to
keep them there. So the most likely political outcome going forward
is higher taxes and income redistribution to pay for it all,
entrenching socialism more.
As I have written before, if you want to know where it all leads,
look at our inner cities that were long ago taken over by government
compassion. This is our future, my fellow Americans.
Oh, back to the apples. Their prices were rocketing up to begin with
because government was already controlling and regulating them.
Republicans are mad. But will they be able to entice Americans off
the ever-growing government plantation? Will they propose and
succeed in selling the bold ideas necessary to turn the basket case
we're becoming around?
We'll see.
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