What's Wrong with Obama's Latest Mandate?

In case the news doesn't concern you, or perhaps you mistakenly think the mandate is a good thing, I offer a few things to consider in response to Obama's 'ruling' that insurance companies must offer contraceptive services in plans where the purchasers of the plans do not want them. Forget that these buyers reject it on religious grounds for just a minute, though that objection is a serious one to me.

The president is essentially saying that the government can dictate what products are available to everyone, since insurance is essentially a product. Companies that offer insurance of any kind take a calculated risk on an individual basis. However, they really face little statistical risk if they can sell enough policies to minimize the effect of individual claims. If that doesn't make sense to you, you may not be able to follow this post, and you might want to check out something lighter.

The point is that insurance is a product that is bought and sold. How it ever became viewed as a right is beyond me. Regardless, the greedy insurance companies, and the greedy pharmaceutical companies who have created an astonishing arsenal of treatments and medicines over the past 100 years, fueled primarily by capitalism, are now subject to governmental strangleholds that are sure to curtail innovation and advancement to some unknown extent, since one can never measure what might have happened if some outside force hadn't prevented it. If Jimi Hendrix were still alive, would he have created the greatest catalogue of modern music ever seen?

Our current incarnation of government foolishly believes that creating a national healthcare program will provide better living conditions for the poor, the downtrodden, and the destitute. What will happen, however, is this. The poor people may very well gain better access to treatment, but their having such will not make their lot better. Every system has managed to find a way to create or allow a peasant class. Human nature says that people will take less care of themselves, since the response to poor health will be more frequent doctor visits, or more demand, not less.

In simple terms, people behave most appropriately when influenced by fear of something. Why worry about getting sick, or not taking care of yourself if the medical community will have to bail you out? Some might say that such an opinion reveals a dim view of human nature. Guilty. I know that people can be noble, altruistic, and amazingly resourceful and resilient. I also know that these traits are born and nurtured most effectively when effort and setback, and persistence has ultimately been rewarded - either extrinsically or intrinsically. Moreover, I know that those who do not have fear of calamity woven into their being still find a way to foment calamity upon themselves and others.

I may have lost you there, so let's get back to the mandate. If the governemnt has the right to determine the characteristics and features of a product, which insurance is, they also have a right to mandate that other products have the features they decide are right and just and true. Taken to an extreme, it means that the government can decide that all cars must be blue, and all shirts yellow.

The liberals are now dismissing this as ridiculous, and they are allowed, since I will defend their right to think and act for themselves, even if I find their choices stupid or wrong-headed. If I don't believe in contraception, or sterilization, or abortion, or a vegetarian lifestyle, or homosexuality, why should I be driven to impose those beliefs on others. At present, all of those things are legal in fact. Some may not like the law, but I don't see that the government should be in the business of telling individuals what to think.

So the fact that religious institutions have enjoyed some protections is, in my opinion, a great thing. If I want my health care plan to include services that prevent pregnancy, and unwanted births, then I need to work for one of the million organizations that offers such care. An employee of an organization that does not espouse these things will know the rules when he pursues employment. What right does the government have to force the issue?

Seriously, what is gained in this case by forcing any religious organization to offer health care options that are contrary to their creed? How is that making the country stronger, or the world a better place?