"I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents…" –James Madison
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People who work hard to support themselves and despise government programs that reward sloth are facing further penalties for being responsible. The Senate Finance Committee has announced that passage of a costly health care reform bill is likely.
"We’re coming to closure," Baucus told reporters. "It’s clear to me we’re going to get this passed."
To help defray the cost of the approximately $900 billion package, the panel agreed to modify a financing provision that would make it harder to deduct medical expenses on personal tax returns. After congressional tax analysts reported that the proposal would be hard on the elderly, whose medical expenses tend to be higher, the committee voted 14 to 9 to exempt people older than 65.
But younger taxpayers would still have to shell out more than $15 billion in new taxes over the next decade under the plan. Republicans assailed it as unfair and called it a violation of President Obama’s pledge to protect families making less than $250,000 a year.
"I think this is the worst idea in an ocean of bad ideas," said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah). Making it harder to deduct medical bills "would badly hurt millions of Americans who are already struggling with medical expenses."
If this bill ultimately passes a great travesty will be foisted on decent people. This past year I have witnessed people being given MY MONEY to buy homes, by cars, support failing private companies and now the government wants to limit my ability to take a deduction for significant medical expenses that I have paid out of pocket this year. Financing government health care on the backs of people who have already paid the most is criminal. Thank you Max Baucus, you fucking douche bag.
It looks like time to figure out a way to game the system and get some of my money back before the country goes to hell.
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Private property rights do not conflict with human rights. They are human rights. Private property rights are the rights of humans to use specified goods and to exchange them. Any restraint on private property rights shifts the balance of power from impersonal attributes toward personal attributes and toward behavior that political authorities approve. That is a fundamental reason for preference of a system of strong private property rights: private property rights protect individual liberty.
— Armen A. Alchian, “Property Rights”
John Stossel will be leaving ABC and appearing regularly on the Fox News Network in October.
I’m still considering what I will do with my own show, one hour each week. Economics certainly. Exercises in understanding libertarianism. My “take” on the issues of the day. Kind of like this blog. In fact, maybe we’ll call it, Stossel’s Take?
It will be terrific having Stossel advancing the cause of liberty fulltime.
Sorting Fact From Fiction on Health Care sets the record straight on many of the myths supporting the current government health care bill before Congress.
Zak Maymin has identified Six simple steps to fix our healthcare. I would add two more simple steps to maximize the benefits to Americans.
- Transition away from 3rd party payer programs to restore cost accountability. This will apply tremendous downward pressure on medical costs.
- Remove health insurance from the realm of employment and give the tax breaks for insurance to individuals.
That’s it . . .simple, effective, beneficial and compassionate. What is not needed is more government thievery while ceding control of your health to a bureaucracy trying to address the needs of more than 300 million people.
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When a country is not on a gold standard, when its citizens are not even permitted to own gold, when they are told that irredeemable paper money is just as good, when they are compelled to accept payment in such paper of debts or pensions that are owed to them, when what they have put aside, for retirement or old age, in savings banks or insurance policies, consists of this irredeemable paper money, then they are left without protection as the issue of this paper money is increased and the purchasing power of each unit falls; then they can be completely impoverished by the political decisions of the “monetary managers.”
— Henry Hazlitt
Responsibility, not to a superior, but to one’s conscience, the awareness of a duty not exacted by compulsion, the necessity to decide which of the things one values are to be sacrificed to others, and to bear the consequences of one’s own decision, are the very essence of any morals which deserve the name.
— Friedrich A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom [1944]
View from the 13th floor of Buffalo General. Taken with my new Lg enV touch phone.
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On Thursday the process of giving vast, new, dictatorial powers over the economy to the Federal Reserve Bank begins in the House of Representatives.
We must prevent this move from gaining any traction! 
On Wednesday, we must CALL THE COMMITTEE and let them know that the buck stops here!
If with one hand we are able to force an audit of the Fed yet with the other hand the Fed seizes enormous powers over our economy, will be have made any real progress?
Please join NO NEW FED POWERS:
End the Fed Event: http://endthefedusa.ning.com/events/no-new-fed-powers-call-the
End the Fed group: http://endthefedusa.ning.com/group/nonewfedpowers
Facebook group: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?ref=home#/group.php?gid=102206273111
Facebook Cause: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/312564?m=3124eff7
Please spread the word and invite your friends!
