In 1997, under the direction of Andrew Niccol, people viewed on their cinema screens a sterilized world of growing government perfection. The movie, “Gattaca,” depicted a world where through genetic selection only children with their parents’ desired hereditary traits were given societal acceptance. The children that were born naturally, void of the process called preimplantation genetic diagnosis, were labeled “in-valids” and were treated as societal junk and placed in menial labor jobs. To the elites of this futuristic world, this made for a more productive humanity. Like liberals today, the power wielders of this science fiction story wanted to make their version of a better, more productive and certainly healthier society, and to do that they needed the power of the government. Gattaca was a world of sterilized government control where the “haves” and the “have nots” of social class warfare could be identified with the technological speed of an eye scan, cheek swab or blood test.

 It would be easy to leave these Orwellian-style cinematic depictions of worlds with governments running amuck at the doors of the theatre if it weren’t for the disquieting reality that society seems to mirror these movies at an alarming rate. One has only to look to recent events to see that it is the modern liberal of today that works feverishly to build the Gattaca of tomorrow. Ed Morrissey of Hot Air reported on July 6, 2010 of New York Governor David Paterson’s attempt to tax the fat out of people, with a high-profile levy on sugary drinks. The ultra-liberal, get-your-Gattaca-here Mayor Gavin Newsom achieved level one of calorie control in his sphere of influence by declaring Coke, Pepsi, and Fanta Orange as in-valid and thus rejecting them from city vending machines and exchanging them for soy and rice milk.

  If you think that you can avoid having to choke down Newsom’s rice milk by simply avoiding San Francisco, you are not seeing the bigger picture. Liberals wish to control every aspect of human life. This is a desire based not simply on their warped belief that they know better than average citizens how average citizens should live, but also on the less altruistic reality that liberals like to wield power through government control. Of these liberal builders of a bigger, better and much bolder government of tomorrow are the Obamas. As president, Barack Obama has expanded government control into the private industries, the banks, health care and soon the energy by which all of these entities operate. Michelle Obama, well she wants to build a better tomorrow by way of your children.

 As reported in Politico, with Michele Obama’s outlet on LetsMove.gov, the first lady tries aggressively to move beyond simple nutrition education and into the world of liberal mandates when it comes to school food. Michele Obama was quoted by Politico as saying, “Kids are malleable, and they’re also open to learn. We’re the ones that stand in the way.” She further states, “We’re going to have to step it up and make some changes on our own to get our kids where we want them to be.” Within this same vein she spoke about her future plans to eliminate school desserts and push her agenda to the public forefront, at the level of attention given to the AIDS epidemic. In other words, move over Newsom, with you rice-milk-filled city vending machines, it’s the Obamas who wish to draw up the master blueprints to a healthier world through government control. The effects in the schools are moving quickly. Alison Bologna of Fox News Boston reports that children are now being sent home with “fat reports.” The school is reported to be required to calculate the body mass index (BMI) of children to decide what portions they are allowed to eat. The “valids” and “in-valids” at school will now be determined by the governmental BMI.

 Is this assessment nothing more than fear mongering, an attempt to falsely portray a soon-coming world of “Obamaca” where only science fiction really exists? Some will say so even as Barack Obama expands the government into every part of the economy and Michele Obama trots school desserts into the parking lot to be shot. I say that any time government mandates supersede education and free choice, we move further away from what America stands for, and what had made this blessed nation great. Freedom—it’s as American as apple pie with all the glorious calories. 

Paul A. Ibbetson is a former Chief of Police of Cherryvale, Kansas, and member of the Montgomery County Drug Task Force. Paul received his Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Criminal Justice at Wichita State University, and is currently completing his Ph.D. in Sociology at Kansas State University. Paul is the author of the books “Living Under The Patriot Act: Educating A Society” and “Feeding Lions: Sharing The Conservative Philosophy In A Politically Hostile World.” Paul is also the radio host of the Kansas Broadcasting Association’s 2008, 2009 and 2010 Entertainment Program of the Year, Conscience of Kansas airing on KSDB Manhattan 91.9 FM, www.ibbetsonusa.com. For interviews or questions, please contact him at? ibbetson91.9@gmail.com

With the April 15th Tax Day Tea Party over and many clamoring for more, where does this take us for the next few months as July 4th is just around the corner. Enthusiasm doesn’t need to wane and our voices need not become silenced. Now is the time for individual leadership to step forward and become the movement we all envision.

Many of my readers attended one of the many April 15th Tea Parties. The fact is, we all came away with a feeling of enthusiasm and a feeling of empowerment, only a week later to see that nothing really changed. That, in and of itself, needs to be the motivation behind “our” desire to once again, get out the people and renew the commitment to the “Tea Party Movement” that is taking hold in this nation.

First, I think we can all agree on a few things. This “movement” sprouted from the fact that we each feel that our government has gotten out of total control on several fronts. In examining the various posts and articles from others, I have discovered that there are a few basic themes that run through each and every post:

1. Government spending and budgetary policy to increase the deficits and the national debt are not acceptable practices for our nations government. OUR government has grown beyond the capacity of its original intent as designed by our founders.
2. Our government has taken approaches to policy in areas of energy, health care, and reducing personal liberty that we do not agree with.
3. We as a nation have a tax system that punishes the success and hard work of it’s people and is in need of massive reform.
4. The taxes and costs of goods and services will increase dramatically if we continue down the destructive path our government is taking us.

Debt Would Double Under Obama Plan

I could easily add a #5, but I think that it is given that our nations elected representatives are not listening to the people and our desires to reduce the spending. Under the current path this Congress and administration is taking us, we are being told that it is the intent to “reduce the deficit” by 1/2 in the next 5 years. What we are being lead to believe is that is a good thing, when the reality is, we are going to increase the national debt by massive amounts and in such levels that the interest payments alone will consume the tax revenue taken in by the government in a few short years. We are being taken down a primrose path when we are dealt a “budget reduction of $100 million” by the administration that amounts to .028% of the entire Federal budget for this year. Somehow, I guess, that our government really thinks we are going to accept that and move on. Nothing is farther from the truth. A look at the chart from the Heritage Foundation puts the entire debt in perspective. Our national debt will be nearly the entire GDP of this nation today in 10 years. That simply means, that what we are producing today, is going to be needed to eliminate the debt and doesn’t count  the expenditures of any budget that is passed.

Our nation is at a crossroads regarding energy. Currently, many on capital hill have been lead to believe that we, the human race, are responsible for the massive fraud called “climate change” and that our “carbon emissions” of CO2 is somehow to blame. No longer is any dissenting scientific debate allowed and no longer, in the minds of politicians, is there any objections going to be condoned. No longer is this a scientific issue, but a political one and one based on very bad science. In the hearings this past Friday, former Vice President Gore, testified before the House committee drafting legislation to cap carbon emissions. His opposition, Lord Christopher Monckton, a former science adviser to Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was not allowed to testify. According to reports from Climate Depot:

A GOP House source told Climate Depot that the Democrats on the Committee said “absolutely not” to allowing Monckton to appear during today’s Gore hearing. The GOP committee “pushed at multiple levels” to bring Monckton in to testify but the Democrats “refused,” according to the GOP source. Former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich was called in to testify after Monckton was rejected by the committee Democrats, according to the Congressional source.

It seems very obvious that this Committee isn’t interested in hearing any views that the scientific evidence doesn’t support the politics being pushed through Congress. The costs to you, the consumer, is expected to reach nearly $2,000 a year in the price increases of groceries, fuel, electricity, and any other items you might use or purchase. Basically, this SCAM is nothing but another way of forcing you to comply with government desires and increasing the government coffers and the resulting expenditures. No longer is climate change a scientific issue, but has become the political pumpkin that is not going to bring Cinderella to the ball, nor bring about energy independence, but bring an ever increasing interference and control by government into our lives. The resulting loss of jobs and the no-replacements offered in the “green industry” hasn’t even been discussed, but it will be in the millions. Once again, another effort by government to level even more control over your life and liberty as this lie is pushed through Congress.

If you haven’t been following the health care debate, trust me, you are going to very soon. The simple fact is, that this nation stands to move toward a nationalized health care system in which government will run, fund, and provide your needs. In previous articles I have addressed the health care debate through Health Saving Accounts and elimination of the multitude of mandated coverage, provisions that would allow the purchase of health care policies across state lines, and other free market solutions. Eliminating government from the equation is vital to the survival of this nation as the budgetary costs alone will account for well over 7% of GDP of this nation to fund, as it does now. Governments only solution to eliminating the expenses is to reduce benefits, rationing, or basically, forgetting those with long term care needs in primarily our aging population. As an American citizen, I find the government solution totally unacceptable to the foundation of liberty and freedom. One only needs to look to other nations to determine that this solution is destined to be the debacle it is elsewhere it is being used.

Obviously, taxation in this nation is abhorrent to our private citizens, our businesses, and corporations. We as a nation shoulder the entire burden of governments- local, state, and federal. It is estimated that roughly 50% of middle class incomes (and I hate that term as it classifies people based on the very notions Liberals use to dictate their agenda driven policies of wealth redistribution) is needed to fund government at all levels. Our system is easily manipulated by politicians to favor a sector or group of people to repay political favors, discourages financial achievement, and punishes those who do desire to increase their financial prospects. Furthermore, it takes income from those who work and earn it, redistributes it to those who won’t or don’t, and those on the receiving end never make a single dimes worth of contribution to the very system they often live from.

There must be radical and decisive changes to our tax system. I spare no words in my support for the FairTax as it fixes the very problems with our current income taxation system. It gives us choice as to paying taxes by our spending habits, it brings everyone into the system, and eliminates the ability for politicians to manipulate the system for political favors or constituents. Needless to say, the political climate in Washington is adverse to this now, but unless we take this under advisement and actually push Congress to pass this legislation, we are going to find our current system more than burdensome, but leaving us with less and less to simply survive the very life we live today. Additionally, those “evil rich people” will no longer be able to provide the increasing amounts needed to fund the increasing numbers of people being dependent on government for an existence. The very tenets of Marxism required a progressive income tax and that in and of itself is the means to Socialism/Fascism in this nation. It will force government takeover of all business and industry to provide the means to peoples needs being fulfilled by government.  We as a nation are heading straight down that slippery slope and accelerating as we go. Now is the time to end this insanity and only a massing of people in this Tea Party movement will garner Congress to seriously pass this mandate.

These issues alone needs to be the focus of the Tea Party movement. It will take a grassroots effort to bring about the change we really need and really can believe will happen in this nation. These four issues alone should not only concern you, but galvanize you to not just appear at the next one, but become active in finding others, volunteering for organization, writing your Congressmen/women constantly, and making known that we are simply not going to sit still as America is taken down this path leading to destruction. It is even more obvious that we are not being taken seriously in Washington, by the main stream media, nor by those on the left. Appeasement isn’t going to work and our voice stating as such needs to be louder and louder.

It’s time to tell Washington, we are NOT STUPID! It’s time to bring the government of the people, by the people, and for the people back to it’s basic Constitutional roots or we as a nation face extinction. I, personally, do not care to go the way of the Dodo bird. It’s time to become even more excited and more determined to work this Tea Party movement into a force that can no longer be ignored or fought. This time, rather than dumping “tea” in the harbor in protest, it’s time to dump the politicians who refuse to listen.

Is it time to take our Grievances to Congress?? Only YOU can decide. Take a moment and read the Petition for a Redress of Grievances. When you take that simple action and sign it, you are taking a stand against bigger government, more spending, and unfair taxation. Only with your support will this be a reality. THEN tell others as the voices of a few can turn into the collective voice of many more with the same concerns. I thank you in advance for your efforts and help.

When we examine the health care debate in this nation, we are actually pitting true liberty against true tyranny. On the side of Statism we find the argument that health care is a “right”. Yet, those who embrace liberty believe that it is the individuals responsibility to provide for their own needs and desires. A careful examination by Conservatives reveals the truth as to why the government “solutions” are the actual source of the problem.

“Under the law of nature, all men are born free, every one comes into the world with a right to his own person, which includes the liberty of moving and using it at his own will. This is what is called personal liberty, and is given him by the Author of nature, because necessary for his own sustenance.” –Thomas Jefferson: Legal Argument, 1770. FE 1:376

As early as 1770, there is written record of Jefferson’s belief that personal liberty was one of the three basic rights of man and it is also clear that the source of our liberty comes not from man, not from government, but from our Creator. Within that argument, Statists will lead you to believe that health care for the masses is a “right” that we should have. Where the flaw lies in that argument is that I have yet to discover in any discussion about the Creator that He bestowed that “right” to mankind. But what about the right to “life”- doesn’t that qualify and even quantify the argument for health care as a “right”?

Not at all. You first have to understand that our government is charged with the responsibility to PROTECT our rights of Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. This is accomplished by the protection of our citizens from enemies, the construction of roads to allow free movement of citizens, goods, and services, safety of our food supply, other functions of government that protects those three basic rights. In order for government to PROVIDE a “right”, they first must deprive someone else of one or more of what is bestowed upon them. Read this statement carefully:

Government cannot “give” a right that they first did not possess, but can only take or deny the rights of free men either by force or coercion.

When we begin to believe that our rights are bestowed by government, we are in direct conflict with the desires of our Founders in writing the two documents that established this nation. The Bill of Rights does not give government any authority to CREATE rights, it was included as a direct statement of what government could not deny any citizen under any circumstance. It was feared that government could enact laws that would be able to deny individuals the very basic rights as outlined again, by Jefferson:

“I do not like… the omission of a bill of rights providing clearly and without the aid of sophisms for freedom of religion, freedom of the press, protection against standing armies, restriction against monopolies, the eternal and unremitting force of the habeas corpus laws, and trials by jury in all matters of fact triable by the laws of the land and not by the law of nations.” –Thomas Jefferson to James Madison, 1787. ME 6:387

Now what does all of this mean regarding health care for all Americans? Simply put, we MUST recognize that individuals are to be RESPONSIBLE for their own life and the care thereof. We have the RIGHT to live that life in any manner we desire as long as it does not deny others the same identical rights. We can move freely within our nation and can engage in any form of commerce we desire, again, as long as that does not deny another their rights. This is the basis of our laws regarding taking of the life of another, fraud, theft, robbery, etc. When one denies us our rights with any of these and many others, then they are subject to a trial before a jury and dealt with accordingly. In order for government to make national health care a reality, they are going to force others to give up their property (income) for the benefit of another. Statists will argue that is the “Christian” thing to do, but will vehemently take every possible action to remove references to religion from our government. You can’t have it both ways- you either embrace Christian principles and stop the attacks on anything “religious” in nature, or you end the “Christian thing to do” argument. The forced taking by government is NOT a “Christian” thing to do, but arguably, a seizure of property without due process as GUARANTEED under our Constitution as a protected right to our property.

Our current health care system accounts for 7-8% of this nations GPD. Currently, government expenditures on healthcare is roughly 45% of overall health care costs. Total health care expenditures in 2006 accounted for well over $1.9 TRILLION. By 2017, according to most studies, government included, our total expenditures will be over 20% of GDP. These costs will only continue to escalate over the next 20 years. Yet, we hear the Statists claim that “health care costs must be controlled”. Face some hard cold facts: our population is aging, we are living longer,and the advancements in medicine are growing exponentially to continue to cure disease and increase the quality of our lives. Government can ONLY control health care costs with one of two methods- ration the availability of care to every citizen with a Socialist medical program or continue down the path of reducing payments to medical providers as is happening under the Medicare/Medicaid programs. Some studies indicate that Medicare payments only cover roughly half of the true costs billed by doctors and hospitals. Recipients are left with either paying these costs out of pocket or purchasing a “medigap” insurance plan to prevent financial disaster.

Where Statism fails is that there are no other choices other than those above. Yet, they espouse the desire for complete government control over the health care system in this nation. Now, if government dictates the terms and conditions of medical care, without the free choice of the individual, the basic right of Liberty has been infringed. If they also use the rationing route, they are going to determine who lives, who dies, or who receives a less than agressive medical treatment modality. Government has already put into place the ability to dictate the level of medical care in the “stimulus” bill recently passed. Bureaucrats will determine if a treatment method is “effective” for a diagnosed disorder or disease and if it doesn’t meet the cost-effective guidelines, payments will be denied. Once again, personal liberty is denied under the auspices of “health care reform for all”.

As our population ages, it is in the best interest of government to reduce costs by rationing life and death in order to reduce the longivity of our population. Facts are simple- the longer you live, the more costly your medical treatment and care. That in and of itself reduces government expenditures for medical care so both methods above are used to “balance” the cost reductions. The Conservative solution needs to refrain totally from using our health care program to control our population and deny personal rights to life and liberty. Further, the ideas of cost shifting to cover medical care to indigents and those with limited medical insurance needs to be stopped. Estimates point to the fact that cost shifting to insured patients adds over 25-30% of the total cost of care of private or insurance paid care. There is also tremendous cost shifting for those Medicare/Medicaid patients who are only able to pay for “Medicare/Medicaid approved charges/treatments”. Few doctors are morally willing to be the one determining life and death by playing the system, so treatments are seldom denied in those cases, regardless of ability to pay.

Now that the foundation has been laid for the issues and the Statist’s ideology and solutions, Part 2 will discuss the various solutions to reigning in health care costs, making health care possible for anyone wanting to obtain coverage, and Conservative principles that allows our citizens to maintain their personal liberty without giving up a single God given right to government leaders. These ideas will not only work, but are the only real solutions that are sustainable and does not  require the forcible taking of anothers property to pay for it all. Stay tuned- this is a discussion that every single American can and should support.