Obamacare and Positive Liberty - Intercollegiate Studies Institute

Obamacare and Positive Liberty

The fundamental confusion in the debate over the Affordable Care Act stems from the language of “rights” among the Left. We know that since Obama’s days as a teacher of Constitutional Law, he has disliked the traditional American view that rights are primarily negative. By negative, I mean the view that the most important rights we possess are rights to not be constrained by external forces in certain areas of life, such as the rights to speech, press, and assembly. However, Obama prefers positive rights talk. What duties does the government have towards us, in his view? An example would be FDR’s Second Bill of Rights. The government coerces one group or individual for the benefit– to secure the “rights”–of another group or individual.

This perspective explains how the language of “rights” came in on the Obamacare side of the debate. Imagine you pulled someone out of a past epoch of American history and sat them down to have this law explained by a proponent. “You see, we are going to force everyone to buy a certain product because it’s their right to have it, and if they can’t afford it, we are going to take from others to pay for it. If anyone disagrees that this is a right and does not buy the product they will be fined X amount.” Our person from the past now asks, “Wait a minute, you are saying that there is this right that people disagree about but you believe it’s good so they have to buy a product or pay you a lot of money; and you are saying that this is a right? They have a right to be forced to buy a product or pay you money? That sure sounds convenient for you.” Our Obamacare representative now responds: “No! I am a really nice person and if you don’t think that this law is great then you must want poor people to die! That’s it! You hate the poor!”

By this point, our normal American from the past would have returned to his own time. If only we had that option. Our current political culture has a weak spot for any policy change that is put in terms of rights. Whether or not the issue under discussion actually concerns any rights many American’s swoon at the slightest suggestion that a right is involved. It is a good instinct, but one that needs to be governed by reason, if we are to resist the lies of demagogues.

Please check out this video for a humorous summary of the Left’s  reasoning.

 

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