On the front page of Sunday’s New York Times, John
Harwood presented a lurid picture of what
scares the best liberal marketers since the New Deal. Obama’s White House is
afraid that voters will learn now what history will surely note: Obamacare is
a big deal because it actually does redistribute
health benefits and costs among Americans.
Liberals and social democrats may or
may not be better parents, lovers, and poets than conservatives. On this
continent, however, they’re certainly more sensitive about the words they decide to use
in politics.
Universal health insurance, as Harwood points
out, will redistribute purchasing power from those with substantial pre-tax
incomes, robust health, no family responsibilities, and no blemishes on their
health records to other Americans with modest or no taxable income, with risky
health profiles, and with kids to worry about. Also, it levels insurance
premiums for men and women, at the expense of men who never get pregnant. It
waters down the exorbitant privilege that seniors have enjoyed as automatic recipients
of "socialized" medicine.
Obamacare is defensible on grounds of
fairness, and politically. As with social insurance and unemployment insurance,
it will probably elect future politicians committed to making it work and will
defeat statewide and national politicians who’d wish it away. If Obamacare
survives the next couple of years and becomes another feature of the status quo,
it could be a winner for liberals. But getting there means change — and change
requires “redistribution.”
However, Democrat power broker William
M. Daley has laid down the law:
“Redistribution
is a loaded word that conjures up all sorts of unfairness in people’s minds,”
said William M. Daley, who was Mr. Obama’s chief of staff at the time.
Republicans wield it “as a hammer” against Democrats, he said, adding, “It’s a
word that, in the political world, you just don’t use.”
Norman Mailer (in his book Miami and the Siege of Chicago, I think) sneered that a liberal would rather “jack off at a beautiful thought
than have a dubious fuck with a mean woman.”
Little did he know.
Liberals love the idea that politics
can change things for the better. They even admit publicly that they believe in
public power. They just can’t seem to spit out the mean words that accurately describe
what all productive governments do: redistribute resources, alter market rules,
and provide new benefits to some individuals — but not to everyone, equally, at
the same time.
Harwood ends his piece with a
cringingly fatuous defense of Obamacare by its author, Barack Obama:
“Understand
this is not a redistribution argument,” the President told his audience then.
“This is not about taking from rich people to give to poor people. This is
about us together making investments in our country so everybody’s got a fair
shot.”
Actually, social justice and the amelioration
of pain are only incidentally good investments. They’re more affordable in
affluent societies. They’re done, however, for reasons of conscience and
fellowship and are financed by levying taxes and charges, whether by brand-name
liberals or conservatives.
Not being truthful about what government
does weakens the credibility of reformers on any number of fine causes. Calling
for a "price" on carbon, insisting that we need universal public daycare,
enriching public pensions, and even fiddling with taxes all involve championing
some individuals and not others.
Governments can’t do anything
worthwhile without creating winners and losers.
The most philistine Republican will at
least utter in public the big words he or she uses in private. He or she will
take advice from expensive wordsmiths, but won’t hide words they especially like:
private enterprise, profit, capitalism, states-rights, and liberty, for
instance.
Barack Obama better secure a decent
record of liberal accomplishment, if only to excuse his consistent unwillingness
to restore liberal-friendly words in American politics.
No comments:
Post a Comment