The word “free” explains everything.
Click here to listen to the broadcast of You Tell Me on KTBB AM 600, Friday, February 17, 2012.
When the story broke about the Department of Health & Human Services mandating under Obamacare that virtually every employer health plan must provide contraceptives, sterilization and abortifacients, I have been talking about the fact that such a mandate constitutes an assault on liberty. That was the thrust of last week’s piece in this space.
Of course, about the mandate being an assault on liberty, I’m right. But with a week of listening to the back and forth on this issue, I finally understand what the argument is really about.
Not that yet another incremental surrender of liberty isn’t worth an argument. It is. And I have either listened to or in one case participated in such arguments over the past week.
But it finally has become clear to me that I have insufficiently appreciated what it is that is actually motivating those that argue in favor of the administration’s position.
It’s not complicated. The word “free” explains it all.
What’s really going on here is that a huge number of people who ought to know better actually believe that contraceptives should be free. It’s not really about the right of the Catholic church or any other institution or individual to oppose these mandates on ethical or religious grounds. It all boils down to ’How dare you stand in the way of me doing what I want.’ This fight is all about the belief held by an astonishing number of people that they should be able to live a consequence-free life courtesy of the taxpayers.
The problems attendant to this mindset are obvious to those with a brain. We have insufficient space to cover them all. So let’s just concentrate on the idea of free. If birth control is free, why isn’t a mammogram? Or a colonoscopy? If you’re entitled to a free “morning after” pill, why are you not entitled to free diabetes care?
(The answer to these questions is, of course, that people believe that they are entitled to free mammograms, colonoscopies and diabetes care.)
So let’s expand beyond health care. If you want free birth control, it’s because you want to enjoy the pleasures of having sex without the consequence of producing a baby. You want sex for recreation and you want someone else to pay for it.
So if the government is going to underwrite your recreational sex, where is the money for my recreational pursuit of photography? Or your neighbor’s recreational fishing?
A quick check reveals that Trojan Ultra-thin Lubricated Condoms can be purchased online in packages of 36 for just $18.00. That means you can “git ‘r done” every single night for the next year for only $184. That’s a mere 1.2 percent of your annual income if all you make is minimum wage. Forget about the food, housing, health, education and transportation subsidies to which you already feel entitled, you’re not even willing to work a half a week in order to have fun in the sack every single night for an entire year? For what exactly will you put forth some effort?
For the debate over government-mandated free birth control to have arisen in the first place is evidence that we as a nation have raised a huge cohort of permanent adolescents, partying and hooking up and having fun on mommy and daddy’s dime.
For you permanent sophomores I have this question: if you believe that someone else should pay so that you can enjoy consequence-free sex, at what point do you assume responsibility for anything in your own life? Does that point even exist?
For an astonishing percentage of Americans, apparently it doesn’t.
Paul,
Your math is flawed….. You evidently assume that most men are like you. Git-r-Done once a night and then go to sleep. You forgot to factor in that the majority of men will never admit to only one time a night. Most men will brag on three or four times a night. The trojans just got a lot more expensive! LOL………………..
Paul,
Mr. Obama has seized upon your conclusion that we have a very large number of Americans that will take FREE handouts and VOTE for more without ANY SHAME of what it is costing their neighbors or future generations. The bailout of every American’s list of “needs, wants, and desires” is about to begin as the entitlement generation is fed the Socialist Big Lie. After all, if it is good enough for the Banks, Wall Street, General Motors (pension plans), Union Leadership, and his favorite GREEN industries, it is good enough for these people.
The mean old Conservative Republicans are party poopers. Who in their right mind would vote for them? Mr. Obama is the big new Sugar Daddy, Santa Claus, and Tooth Fairy, all rolled into one.
It reminds me of Castro, Hitler, Mao Tse-tung, Mussolini and Stalin who early-on were the pied pipers of their day as they promised a collective Utopia as wealth was ripped from the evil rich and given to the masses of the righteous poor. It is a seductive message to the selfish, covetous, and envious malcontents that believe their Glorious Leader can bring them happiness and at the same time get revenge against the long-term target of their jealousy.
Paul you are so right! Mr. Obama did his research. The false contraceptive issue is his opening salvo. The worse the economy, the more desperate become its victims and the greater the ignorant will follow the next despot that comes to their rescue. All Hail Obama-the-Great! The Progressive agenda continues unabated. Mr. Obama IS the INSURANCE for the goodies to continue. The cost of the premium is a simple vote for him.
Ladies and Gents…the arguement is NOT birth control…it is not FREE healthcare…the issue is POWER & CONTROL; plain and simple. Obama and his band of socialist thugs want the power to control our daily lives. It just doesn’t get any simpler than that. A little piece here, a little piece there and BINGO, We the People are tossed into the herd with the rest of the sheep.
Until we decide to stand up, replace the BS RINO’s and phoney Conservatives at the local, state and federal level…we are all going to be herded to slaughter.
Rick Armstrong
Tyler, Texas
Paul you have identified a class of people that shamelessly expect to be “taken care of”, even as able bodied adults – the “permanent sophomores”. Years ago we would call such people spoiled brats, bums, panhandlers, or beggars, not because they were impoverished necessarily, but because they were LAZY.
We have a President who has an arrogant disregard for personal responsibility and wants to cater to this group of misfits, only for his own ascension to power and to camouflage his sanctimony with a “health care issue”. When was procreation a “health care” issue instead of a “personal choice” issue? When was recreational sex (fornication, whoredom, etc.) a “health care” issue instead of a “personal choice” issue? These Marxists are in love with “choice” aren’t they? Does this mean “choice” is now a Constitutional Right and a Righteous President is going to ORDER that it be paid for by your neighbor or company down the street? If “choice” is now a Constitutional Right, where do I go to get the steak dinner I haven’t had for a month?
obama knows no shame when it comes to securing votes. This is just one in a long list of bargaining chips he is pushing to the center of the table. obama is willing to gamble, for the deck is stacked in his favor. Since half of his voters pay no taxes anyway and are on the government dole, this bargaining chip can be the tipping point.
For generations now, the liberals have pushed their agenda by stealth. Like a drug dealer who hands out “samples” of his wares, “it’s free, no harm” he says…until his prey gets hooked. The unsuspecting pigeon becomes enslaved to the drug dealer to be able to keep the “happy” going. The dealer makes it increasingly hard to break free by throwing in little extras every once in a while. The dealer has a subject for the rest of their lives…however long or short that may be. It doesn’t matter to the drug dealer…others will come along, the enticement is too strong! obama IS the drug dealer and the “FREE” samples are his enticement! His pigeons never see it coming. His pigeons never learn that NOTHING is “free”, there are ALWAYS costs. But it doesn’t matter for they only live for the moment.
I’ve never received anything for “free”. I was taught that if it was “free”, it probably wasn’t worth having, or there was a long term price tag attached to it.
It is so sad to me that there are far too many people in this country who have no clue where the government gets the money it so generously slings toward them with no accountability.
Much like the lady I referred to in another post who was applying for “free” housing. When interviewed she said, “I’m here to get my house President Obama is going to give me.” She was then asked how he was able to do that, and she said “It’s coming from Obama’s stash.” She was then asked where he got his stash and she said, “I don’t know, but he has a stash and is going to give me my house.”
The dumbing down of America is just one step in the great socialist plan, and obviously is working very well.
At the close of the Constitutional Convention of 1787, when queried as he left Independence Hall on the final day of deliberation a lady asked Dr. Benjamin Franklin: “Well Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”
John Adams said: “Avarice, ambition, revenge and licentiousness would break the strongest cords of our Constitution, as a whale goes through a net. Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”
Mr. Obama and his Marxist advisers have decided to shred the Constitution and destroy Liberty with a “death by a thousand cuts” (an old Chinese torture punishment). The Republican leadership wimps in Congress are more concerned about their careers than stopping the continued desecration of our founding document by Obama’s every move. Why isn’t there a least a dozen investigations being conducted into all the violations of his oath (failure to enforce the law) and the FREE money being routed to his crony organizations while the national debt is increasing at astronomical rates.
When is someone going to suggest a way out of this hamster wheel of endless Socialism? The overwhelming conservative victory in 2010 didn’t seem to help. A number of religious leaders volunteered to go to jail to protest the current violation of conscience, the “(false) woman’s health care” dictates of this administration. What’s next?
It should be obvious to everyone that Mr. Obama and his czars are seeking a serious Constitutional confrontation because he believes he can win by default. If Obama and his teeming masses of “takers” keep him in office and Obamacare (serfdom by a thousand cuts) is not repealed, what do we do then – simply join the western European Socialist community?
i see your point on the comparison of the pill for free and other drug treatments.
now, please dont put every person that uses birth control in a sterotype of horny free loaders that are dumb and selfish. first of all , you are an older man and more than likley are married and need no birth control. this doesnt ivolve you as much as younger generations.
i have made sure and even bought my partners birth control bc of the opposite reason of your aligations. I DONT WANT CHILDREN YET, AND YES I WILL STILL HAVE SEX. Bc i am a human and i know how to enjoy sex responibly ei. birth control and condoms. I am going to wait to have children when i am finacially stable so taxpayers dont have to pay for me and my child to live. On the contrary to what you think, birth control is usually used by more intelligent people bc they know the consequences of having a child.