Almost universally hospitals in the U.S. began as extensions of Christian Churches. The model for Christians was set when Jesus gave the example of the charitable man in the parable of the Good Samaritan whose only concern was the health of the person who hated him.

When our nation moves away from the Christian impetus to take care of people because all individuals are of infinite value, and regardless of their capacity to pay; to a system where providers of care are employees in a system that is designed for the expressed purpose of lowering the cost; what happens to patient care?

Think about it, would you rather be treated in a hospital devoted to your care because the caregivers consider you to have infinite worth and are deserving of their best care; or in a hospital operated by Leviathan who runs it for the purpose of saving money?

The one is the model of the Good Samaritan who considers it his highest duty to do all for you; the other is the utilitarian whose highest duty is to save money on your care.

Just wondering.

“McDonald’s Corp. will hold its first national hiring day April 19 to fill 50,000 openings at its restaurants nationwide. The company, based in Oak Brook, Ill., says it is making a concerted effort to add staff as its business improves and as more of its restaurants stay open 24 hours a day.”

The news is everywhere touted by Democrats and Democrat Party hacks in the media as the wonderful result of Mr. Obama’s brilliant borrowing and spending plan that resulted in the economy taking off; producing more jobs.  Uh, huh.

Just a couple points:

First, I thought burger-flipping jobs didn’t count.  At least they didn’t when George Bush was president.

Second, didn’t I hear that McDonald’s got one of the more than 1,100 exemptions from having to comply with Mr. Obama’s health care mandate?  Now that they don’t have to get into compliance with the Democrat socialist health care program, they are creating jobs.  Wow!  This is good news.

Hmmmm.  Could there be a message here somewhere?

But what I find ironic is that very famous, very public people are also trying to overthrow our government but nobody says anything about it.  What’s the big surprise?

Consider the move by Franklin Roosevelt, the mama’s boy who had to be constrained by the U.S. Supreme Court in his attempt to overthrow the U.S. government.  

This may come as a surprise to you, but it was the Supreme Court which stated that the Roosevelt regime was attempting to take over the constitutional authority of the Congress.  This was only a very public attempt to overthrow the government of the United States. 

The court further said that even if the Congress was willing to go along with the unconstitutional plan and wanted the Executive branch to take over these duties, they could not constitutionally do it.  The Constitution forbids one branch of our government to abdicate their power to a different branch – even if they want to.  The question of our time is whether or not the Supreme Court of the United States still has the courage to protect the Constitution for us during this present Democrat Party assault against it.  If they don’t, then we will have to revisit our government and make the changes we require.  It is our government; not theirs.  We must not let them take it away from us.

A Closer Look at Attempts to Overthrow American Constituted Government  

Democrat politicians including Mr. Obama have conspired to use the powers of the government through the Internal Revenue Service to force you to purchase a service from a private company.  If you fail to do it, they will know about it because they also force you to tell them the last details of your private financial income and expenses because of the income tax system they have implemented.  They have the power to take money from your bank or Credit Union without your permission and without notice.  They have the power to seize your property, your real estate your boat – anything – without warning and sell it.  Then when you can no longer provide for your children, then can take them too.  Should you seek to hide from them by using cash – living off the grid so to speak – if they find you, you will be sent to jail.

A number of states and other organizations are filing suits in federal courts in order to overturn all or parts of this unconstitutional monstrosity.  Mr. Obama and his regime will count on the Supreme Court to declare that the U.S. Constitution permits the Congress to institute these provisions because of the “Commerce Clause.”

What is the Commerce Clause?

Article 1, Section 8, Clause 3: “The Congress shall have the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.”  That’s it.

During colonial times prior to the U.S. Constitution, some colonies would exact huge taxes on goods shipped through their territory as a means of raising money.  As an example, tobacco grown in Virginia going to Massachusetts would have to pass through Pennsylvania or New Jersey, and then New York.  These colonies could charge whatever taxes they wanted on the commerce being moved through their territory.  This created disunity among the colonies, and if we were to have a union, this problem had to be resolved in the Constitution.  The writers of the Constitution wrote the “Commerce Clause” in order to stop the practice.

Almost universally for the first 156 years of our Republic these words in the Constitution were used exclusively to solve the problem they were written to address.  Progressives like Teddy Roosevelt, William Taft, and Woodrow Wilson routinely tried to overthrow the federalist system outlined in the Constitution, but the federal courts denied them the power they wanted.  But the Great Depression gave Franklin Roosevelt the opportunity to begin the overthrow of our Constitution.  Remember the immortal words of that great philosopher Rahm Emmanuel, “You never want to waste a crisis.”  Especially if it will help you overthrow constituted government.

Enter Franklin Roosevelt, Progressive

During the early years of his presidency, Roosevelt and his allies in the Congress passed a dizzying number of laws that sucked power away from the people and the states to the federal government.  Which our Constitution was written to prevent.  Many of these were challenged in the federal courts, and most of the challenges were upheld by the Supreme Court declaring Roosevelt’s attempts as unconstitutional.

The Judiciary Reorganization Bill of 1937

In the weeks following his re-election and taking office in January 1937 – out of sheer frustration with the Constitution and the Supreme Court seeking to uphold it – in February 1937 Roosevelt proposed the Judiciary Reorganization Bill of 1937.

This legislation would give him the power to “pack the court” as it was referred to.  Despising the members of the court upholding the Constitution and opposing its overthrow; and desiring to impose his own vision of federal power by subverting it, Roosevelt proposed that for every sitting Justice on the Supreme Court who was 70 ½ years old, he could appoint an additional Justice up to a maximum of 6 additional Justices which would make a total of 15 instead of 9.  Everyone knew why he wanted to do this – he wanted to create an imperial presidency;he wanted the power to implement the laws he wanted regardless of whether or not they were constitutional.  He wanted to make himself a ruler rather than a temporary administrator complying with limitations imposed by the Constitution.  He wanted a Supreme Court that was actually part of the Executive Branch – a group of “yes” men who would help him dismantle the U.S. Constitution by rubber-stamping his power grab.

Almost immediately following his death a move was begun to amend the Constitution to prevent any other person from grabbing the power Roosevelt had.  On February 22, 1951 the 22nd Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified by the people of the United States limiting any one person from being elected President for more than two terms; Roosevelt was elected 4 times.  He will live in as much infamy as the the assault on Pearl Harbor which he, himself said would live in infamy.  He did much more to destroy the constituted government of the United States than did Imperial Japan.  What an awful man he was.

West Coast Hotels Co. v. Parrish (1937)

Congress proposed the legislation but was wary about the outcome.  While the legislation was struggling in Congress, the Supreme Court made a ruling in the case of West Coast Hotels Co. v. Parrish in March of 1937.  In this case, Justice Owen Roberts who had consistently ruled in favor of the Constitution and against Roosevelt reversed his previous positions and gave the federal government the power to rule in cases of state minimum wage laws.  This power is nowhere mentioned in the Constitution, but the “Commerce Clause,” they said, gives them the power.  The reasoning of the court was that the restriction of liberty of contract by state law is a legitimate function of government if the government is only trying to protect someone’s health, and, they said, minimum wage laws protect a person’s health.  Note: if your motives are compassionate, restricting freedom is no problem.  (Nose thumb at the Constitution.)

Everyone knew that the Justices were afraid of Roosevelt and the Progressives in Congress and their attempt to pack the court.  Everyone also knew that Justice Roberts had gotten cold feet, backed down, and participated in opening the door to the end of the federalism the Framers had created in the U.S. Constitution.  So his change of heart was “the switch in time that saved nine.”

NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp (1937)

The next domino to fall undermining the Constitution was NLRB v. Jones & Laughlin Steel Corp (1937).  The Justices ruled that the federal government (through the newly created National Labor Relations Board) had the power to regulate all activities between business and labor unions throughout the United States because of the “Commerce Clause.”

Wickard v. Filburn (1942)

Then Wickard v. Filburn in 1942 decided that the Agriculture Adjustment Act of 1938 – which among other things set quotas on wheat production – was Constitutional.  Now, the Executive Branch of the federal government could decide who much wheat you could grow in your own land.  Complements of the “Commerce Clause.”

The Agriculture Adjustment Act was designed to keep wheat prices artificially high even during a time when people in the U.S. were on the verge of starvation, visiting soup kitchens by the millions, and hitching rides on trains around the country to try to find work.  Secretary of Agriculture Claude Wickard was charged with carrying out this abomination, and fined a farmer by the name of Filburn.  Farmer Filburn grew wheat, and was permitted by his masters in Washington D.C. to sell some of it under this legislation. 

Filburn complied with the amount of wheat he was permitted by Roosevelt to sell, but he grew some extra wheat he did not sell – he used it to feed his chickens, he didn’t sell any of it.  For this, the federal government issued him a fine for violating a federal regulation made up in the Roosevelt White House.

He refused to pay the fine, and the case eventually got to the Supreme Court which ruled that not only does the federal government have the power to control the amount of wheat you can sell; it also has the power to control how much you grow for your personal use!  Here’s how distorted the thinking was.  They ruled that if Filburn grew wheat for his personal use, it violated the Commerce Clause because that might mean he wouldn’t need to buy wheat to feed his chickens from someone else who might have grown it in another state!  By not purchasing wheat from someone else for his chickens, Filburn violated federal control on interstate commerce.  By growing his own wheat for his own personal use, he violated the dictates of the President!  Pay the fine.

A Few Other Observations about how the Courts Interpret the “Commerce Clause”

The federal government spends $billions of your tax dollars to keep the prices of cotton, wheat, peanuts, sugar, milk, soy beans, corn, rice, and about 15 more artificially high.  So your taxes provide corporate farmers money to keep the price of all these commodities higher than they would be if there were a free market.  You pay taxes to keep the price of milk high, and then you are taxed to pay to subsidize milk for schoolchildren because the price is too high!  I’m not joking.  All this is accomplished through the “Commerce Clause.”   Progressives call this “progress.”  Some of you vote for people like this.

To further irritate you, I point out that a recent Washington Post investigation discovered 75 acres of Texas farmland that had been converted into a housing development. Today, the homeown­ers on these properties (which are worth well over $300,000 each) are eligible for fixed payments for the lawn in their backyards because of its “historical rice production.“ Residents never asked for these subsidies and have even stated that as non-farmers they do not want the government mailing them checks.  They’re still coming.

Besides this, we have about 40 million acres of cropland for which the owners are paid to not grow crops in order to keep the prices high.  “Commerce Clause” as implemented and interpreted by liberals and Progressives. See here.

Other Things Our Government Masters Control Because They Define Them as “Interstate Commerce”

Today, the federal government controls the racial complement of school classrooms, property taxes for racial balancing of public schools – without representation, racial hiring quotas, affirmative action, federal crimes not listed in the Constitution, the FBI, information required on restaurant menus everywhere, all tobacco products, what you can do with your own land through the “Endangered Species Act,” ( including many species which reside in only a small plot in one state – Delhi Sand fly, Delta Smelt, toads, worms, and more; mud puddles on your own land through Wetlands, Clean Water Act, Navigable Waterways legislation) automobile gas mileage, turn signals and endless other accessories on your car, the breath you exhale…All of this and much more has been permitted by the Supreme Court through the “Commerce Clause” which I remind you says, “The Congress shall have the power to regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes.” 

However noble, however compassionate the motives of those who enact and support such travesties; to define these issues as impacting interstate commerce is a travesty.  If some of these things need to be done, let us find a better; a legal, a constitutional way.  Otherwise, we will have permitted our own Congress and federal courts to destroy our document – the people’s document; our declaration on the limitations of governmental power – the U.S. Constitution.  If they want to change it, let them follow the Constitution on how changes are to be made.

Leslie Salt Co. v. United States (1995)

The Leslie Salt Company dug shallow ponds on their own property permitting sea water to flood in filling the ponds.  The company would then let the water evaporate leaving the salt from the ocean which they could then harvest, purify, and sell.  A suit was filed and finally Leslie Salt Co. v. United States (1995) was decided by the Supreme Court. 

In spite of the fact that it was their own property, and in spite of the fact that they were not altering existing ponds in any way, the Supreme Court determined that before the water might evaporate, it’s possible that migratory birds could land on the water thus making these ponds subject to federal jurisdiction because these birds constitute interstate commerce under the “Commerce Clause!”  There was no ‘commerce’ related to the birds because it was not a vacation spot, no one came to see them; the ponds were not involved in any way with the birds’ ability to fly from one state to another because they were recently created; and there was no evidence that the birds actually stopped briefly at the ponds.  No matter, it’s just another power grab on the part of the federal government.  The “Commerce Clause” has become an excuse for the federal government to overturn constituted government in the United States with the willing complicity of the Supreme Court.  The’ migratory bird’ gambit has been used over and over to protect mud puddles and shut down otherwise permitted uses of private property.

Planning to Completely Overthrow Constituted Government

Despite the aggregate damage to our Constitution so far, now the Obama regime would have us go even further to create an imperial presidency by creating legislation that would command you to make a purchase from a private company solely because you are a citizen of the United States.  Because they think you should do it.  Through the “Commerce Clause” of course they get to control the price you can be charged for this service.  Wow, the price of citizenship has gone up.  This gang of Progressives wants illegal aliens and felons to vote, but want you to pay a fine if you refuse to spend your money the way they want you to.

Do you actually think the U.S. Constitution permits the government to force you to purchase what some bureaucrat deems to be a public good from a private company?  Do you?  Are you really willing accept what they are trying to do with your country?   I don’t have time here to deal with it, but the Constitution itself denies all of these powers to the federal government be declaring itself to be a document of enumerated powers listed in Article 1, Section 8; all other powers belong to the states or to the people themselves.  Amendment 10 – part of our Bill of Rights says, ”The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” 

The federal government exercises powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution all the time.  I really hate to sound like a radical, but where in the Constitution does it say Social Security would be constitutional?  Where is that enumeration about giving tax dollars for education purposes?  Where in the list of enumerated powers does it say the government can pay for your health care?  None of this is constitutional.  If we need to do it, let’s find a way to do it without overthrowing the people’s government.

If the Constitution is not a document of enumerated powers, it is a document of unenumerated powers.  Either it has the limitation of the powers granted to it in the Constitution or it has no limitation on its power at all.  Remember why there is a United States of America: to create a government of limited powers so the people can thrive.  Do you really want the United States federal government to be able to do whatever they want to do?  Seriously?

By the Democrat Party Interpretation of the Constitution the Following Could Become Reality:

What if a future Administration and another Congress decide that you need to be required to purchase a certain kind of food only available at stores regulated and approved by the federal government?  What if you didn’t want to buy it or eat it?  By the logic of the current regime in Washington and their supporters, you would be forced to do it.  There is no difference whatsoever between forcing you to purchase health care or forcing you to purchase a certain kind of food.  In fact, they go together.

Since the government is taking over your state of health and paying for it, they get to determine what constitutes health, and which foods hurt your health and which help it.  No doubt Mr. Obama will have us purchasing government subsidized arugula from Whole Foods in the near future because it’s good for your health.

What if another administration and another congress decide that you need to be required to purchase a bicycle for transportation because they control carbon dioxide and don’t want you driving your car anymore?  (With subsidize public transportation; you won’t need it anyway.)  What if the government controls the construction and safety of bicycles?  They do, of course.  What if the government had a controlling interest in one of the major bicycle manufactures and wanted you to purchase their bikes?  Would you buy one?  What if you didn’t buy it, but the government took the price of it out of your tax return?  Would you then be celebrating Mr. Obama?  By the logic of the current regime, you will learn to like the health care bill once you understand what’s in it. Ditto for the new bicycle and health food bill.

What if a future Regime in the U.S. determines that certain races of people are more prone to costly diseases than others because of inherited genetic issues?  What if they determine that the restriction of liberty is a legitimate government enterprise if the motive is to improve health, and that not treating these people is in the public interest?  Would you then support the principles espoused by Mr. Obama?  Would you then want the Supreme Court to continue the dismantling of constituted government in the U.S?  Would you then be silent about what is happening during your lifetime?  What if a future government determined that gay people cost more to treat medically than heterosexual people and therefore the restriction of liberty is a legitimate government enterprise if the motive is to improve health and refuses to treat them?  Would you sit by and let that happen?

If the Supreme Court permits the government to force you to purchase one commodity or service, they can force you to purchase anything they choose.  Anything.  Think about it.

Many utopian, ideological Progressives; along with people who went to public schools for too many years, and those who are disappointed with their present state of affairs are vulnerable to the slick promises of those who would be their masters.  They are subjected to the smooth, slick propaganda of the mountebanks in Washington D.C., and end up supporting ideas and programs that will impoverish their lives, and stifle their freedom.   Like Esau, they are willing to sell their Constitutional birthright of freedom and opportunity for the short term benefit of a bowl of lentil soup.  It is our task to talk them out of it.

If you think the Democrat Party including Mr. Obama are not trying to overturn the Constitution by redefining what it means and making it the antithesis of what it clearly states, please make a coherent comment on this post.  Declaring through legislation that 2 plus 2 equals 7; or 19, or whatever they decide it should be does not mean that they have changed the laws of mathematics.  Nor does their declaration that the Constitution gives the federal government powers that the Constitution clearly does not give the federal government mean that it suddenly has those powers.

Mr. Obama and the Democrat party are engaged in an open attempt to overthrow the constituted government of the United States. It’s tough to hear it stated in such a way, but I think I have made my case.  The charge will be denied, of course.  I will be labeled as inconsequential and uninformed; but my thesis is true.  The attempt to overthrow our constituted government legitimated by the Constitution on the part of the Democrat Party by means of creating unlawful legislation is no less illegal and immoral than those who would try to overthrow our government by other means.  A pox on both their houses.  Let’s prosecute anyone who would attempt it regardless of their motive, position, status, or means of operation.

So What do we do About this Attempt to Overthrow Constituted Government in the United States? 

• We must support those states which are mounting a defense of the U.S. Constitution against the Congressional attempt to overthrow it. 
• We must raise the level of communication from those of us who love our country and those in the Congress who would overthrow it. 
• We must always keep our communication appropriate. 
• We must support and elect only people of whatever political party that we are absolutely certain want to retain the historic limitations placed on federal government by the Constitution as it is legally amended.
• We must make clear our position, and make clear to them that we expect them to follow the Constitution and not subvert it.  
• We must be articulate and not make any statements that can be used against us.  If we give them any reason, they will find fault with the messenger and pretend that there was no message. 
• We must not lose heart; we will reap in due time if we don’t faint. 
• We must stay winsome. 
• We must not make false accusations against those who are engaged in overturning constituted government – the truth itself is bad enough. 
• We must not be confused by slick, pedantic, side-stepping rhetoric from those who want to divert us from our task of saving the Union. 
• We must realize that taking the country the framers gave us back will take years.
• We must cut through the “newspeak,” think critically and make coherent arguments.

“If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say this or that even, it never happened—that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death.”

“And if all others accepted the lie which the Party imposed—if all records told the same tale—then the lie passed into history and became truth. ‘Who controls the past’ ran the Party slogan, ‘controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.’” 

“Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date. In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct; nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record. All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary.”  1984

Let Mr. Obama make idiotic statements about there not being any earthquakes the day after the legislation was passed; no asteroids destroying the earth…  I don’t think Mr. Obama is any towering intellect, but I think he is smart enough to know what we are talking about when we say this is the end of legally constituted government in America – he only wants to belittle people who disagree with him.  Nasty sarcasm shrinks Mr. Obama to a 25 inch inseam, and he knows better.  It’s just his well hidden anger leaking out when he goes off the teleprompter.

Here is a link to a post at www.americanthinker.com with some more suggestions about how this power grab may be overcome.  Hat tip, Larrey Anderson.

It was created this way because the people forming it had real life experience with a hegemonic, central governmental power – that of King George III.  The Parliament and the King instituted whatever they wanted – even if the people didn’t want it.  (This may sound vaguely familiar.)

This exercise of the power of the few over the many has been the experience of all humans from the beginning.  Dictators, Kings, Pharaohs, Emperors, and military Generals have forced the common citizens to comply with the leader’s vision of what was the good society in every corner of the world in every time throughout history.

The brief experiments at democracy and republicanism during the existence of the Greek city states are not a real exception.  Yes, citizens had input on the influence and structure of government, but in almost every case, there were many more slaves than citizens living in those cities.  Slaves had no input whatsoever, and could not vote, so government by consent of the governed wasn’t practiced at all.

Following the Dark Ages, the influence of Christian ideas about the central value and importance of individuals began to chip away at the concept of the divine rights of Kings.  Having to listen to the concerns of noblemen and barons and Pope Innocent III diminished the power of the central government in England.

The major liberty sought by those who finally left the British Isles and parts of Europe for the Americas was freedom of religion.  They came to these shores and created – over a couple of centuries – a republican, federalist system designed to forever constrain the power of the central government from gaining increased hegemony over individuals.  This is why the Constitution is a document of enumerated powers; the founders created it so the federal government could not do anything other than what the Constitution stated specifically it could do.

Unfortunately, at this period in our history the Constitution has long been disfigured beyond recognition by political manipulation on the part of Representatives, Senators, and Presidents; but most of all by the federal court system including the Supreme Court.  For some 80 years our republic has existed on the accumulated goodwill, and  moral and economic capitol of previous generations.  Not that many lately have not pursued moral and economic success, but only that our effort has been increasingly seen as immoral and bigoted by those who desire to return power to the king.

With the recent overstepping of our Congress at the urging President Obama imposing their vision of what your your life should be, we have indeed returned to government without the consent of the governed.  The imposition of what the few believe to be ‘good for us’ rather than continuing the concept of freedom for citizens probably puts any return to Constitutional federalism and the Bill or Rights out of reach.  The Democrats have just denied you significant parts of your Bill of Rights.

Mr. Obama has said in the past that the U.S. Constitution is an impediment to his vision. He has stated, “…the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf.”  With those words, Mr. Obama reveals that he sees the U.S. Constitution as a roadblock to imposing the laws, rules, regulations, and benefits he wants to implement.

It also shows that his vision for the country is entirely different from what the founders created it to be, and what most Americans think it is.  He wants the government to have powers the framers denied to it.  He wants to take powers of freedom away from the people and give it back to the government as if our War for Independence to end coercive powers of government never occurred.  He does not believe in the divine rights of Kings, but it is clear that Mr. Obama believes in the divine rights of Presidents.  Because he believes in his right to force you to live the way he wants you to live rather than the way you want to live.

By his willing and open overthrow of  the U.S. Constitution with its prohibitions on any activity by government other than what is explicitly permitted, he reveals his belief that he should be free to choose for you, and you should not.  Under this regime, the government does not owe you independence from its coercive powers to control your speech, your economic welfare, your freedom to assemble with those you choose; no - in Obama’s world it owes you retirement, healthcare, income of a certain level, and so on.  This means, of course, that it will have to confiscate money from other people in order to hand out these new ‘positive rights.’

Mr. Obama has also been quite open about his intentions of taking money away from some people and giving it to others – some special people he personally wants to support.  He lamented the direction of the civil rights movement because they followed the Constitution; because they had “…a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change.”

By “redistributive” he means that he sees wealth earned by those who sacrificed, denied themselves, and worked hard to accumulate as not belonging to them at all.  Rather, it actually belongs to the government; in his view, your wealth is a government commodity.  It is a commodity that the government has the right to “redistribute”  to the people Mr. Obama sees as more deserving of it than you.  Certainly in his mind, those who earned it and sacrificed to accumulate it are not deserving of it, else he would not use the coercive powers of government to take it away from them so he can give it to people he deems worthy of it.  And so the concept of “private property” dies with most of the remaining parts of the Constitution under President Obama.

There is no longer any doubt about what he meant when he said just prior to his inauguration that he was just 5 days away from fundamentally transforming America. Forcing us to pay taxes without our consent, forcing us to purchase a product from a government controlled entity against our will, denying us the right to enter into contracts with people of our choosing for purposes of healthcare – all of this and more is breathtaking.  We have just witnessed a coup d’état sans violence.  The Constitution was written in order to protect us from people like Mr. Obama.  Now it is gone.  The smiling, benevolent, suffocating bureaucracies he is imp0sing are no less coersive than the Politbureaus, Oligarchies, and Star Chambers we have seen elsewhere.  Denying you freedom is denial if it comes with a fist or a smile.

It only remains to ask if you are willing to throw them out of office before we lose another Constitutional right – the right to vote.  This one is no more or less sacred than the others we have already lost.

Hmmmmm.  Never is the question asked about which parts people support, because I don’t think people want a half $trillion taken out of Medicare’ I don’t think people want 139 new boards, commissions, and projects; I don’t think people want their health insurance costs to go up by 13%; I don’t think people want rationing of healthcare by bureaucrats who will decide which medical treatments “work” meaning that they will be deciding that certain procedures don’t work for people over a certain age – which in a rational world would be called “rationing of medical care,” and so on.

I think people do want real competition in health insurance by being able to purchase a policy from any company regardless of the state they are in, they do want tort reform, they do want to reverse pre-existing conditions limitations (although this will require coverage of the 600 pound lady in New Jersey who is going for half a ton, and Obama’s increased risk of lung cancer, sex change surgeries, ugliness, hairloss, cavities and all manner of other” pre-existing conditions” raising healthcare premiums by huge percentages).

When “The One” promised to fundamentally change America he meant what he said.  It’s up to us to stop him from doing it.

As seniors we better remember that we have to look out for ourselves because neither politicians nor so-called ‘advocacy groups’ like ASRP will.  They look out for themselves.

We see this with empty suit politicians selling their vote for the personal benefit of re-election money in the health care debate.

We see this with groups like AARP which supports the health care bill despite the fact that it will destroy Medicare by removing $500 billion from the program over 10 years, and will make Medicare payments to physicians even lower than now so even fewer of them will accept Medicare patients.

AARP is all about using their list of members to sell various kinds of insurance and other services keeping the machinery running, providing fat salaries and job security.  And they are using seniors to do it. 

They have not lobbied on behalf of seniors at all during the health care debate.  For AARP, seniors are only a group to exploit for money. 

My suggestion – get out of AARP as soon as you can. 

At 55 when they sent me the invitation to join for free, I bit.  Then the second issue of their magazine I received focused on homosexual seniors.  I called them, ended my membership, and told them to remove my name from their computers.

Well.  The Democrats have spent enough of your tax dollars to purchase 60 votes to bring the Senate health care bill to the floor for debate.  Odds are it will cost hundreds more $millions to pass it.  Too bad the president is busy lecturing Afghanistan on corruption to deal with it here.

We know that the health care bill isn’t about improving health care; lowering the cost of health care, or improving delivery of health care.  We know this, because the legislation does none of these.  

It’s not about improving health care 

The best health care system in the world is about to be junked.  Soon it will be run like Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac and Amtrak. 

Bubba says the one who pays the fiddler calls the tune.  That means neither you nor your doctor will be deciding anything  about your health care.  Bureaucrats will be telling doctors what they can and can’t do.  Standard of care indeed; a much lower standard of care.  Spread the misery.  

Government employees making your health decisions: think incompetent, obnoxious, factotums with power – the Transportation Security Administration Agents at the airport looking out for your “air safety”.  Think IRS agents helping to insure you are doing your part to preserve liberty.  Soon all doctors and hospitals as extensions of the government will be delivering the same friendly, high-quality service for your breast and prostate exams.   

Yeah, you can keep your doctor.  If he’s still practicing medicine in the asylum. 

It’s not about lowering the cost of health care 

The argument is that we are spending too much on health care because those with health insurance have to pay for the cost of those who don’t have the insurance just go to the emergency room.  So the Democrat Party’s answer to this problem is to require those who have insurance pay for the health insurance of those who would otherwise just go to the emergency room.  For liberals the problem IS the solution!  Neat. 

In order to accomplish this brilliant maneuver they want to create more than 100 new boards, and give government employees access to all your medical information.  (We know how careful government employees are with your private information: remember Dan the Plumber, remember the Pentagon Papers, remember CIA leaks on the front page of the New York Times?)  Give bureaucrats not doctor’s decision-making power over who gets which procedures, and spend another $2 trillion over the next ten years.  What could go wrong? 

It’s not about covering everyone with health insurance 

Mr. Obama says he can cut $425 billion in waste and fraud in Medicare over the next 10 years.  Hooah!  Let’s do that now.  That would save us $42.5 billion a year. Then let’s add the $54 billion a year we can save through tort reform limiting junk medical malpractice awards making the total available now to $96,500 billion.  A year. 

Simple math; divide $96,500 million a year by the highest possible estimate of people in the U.S. without health insurance – 35,000,000 – and you get $2,757 per person.  This amounts to $11,028 to pay for health insurance for a family of 4 covering every individual in the United States said to be without health insurance.  How much will this cost in addition to what we already pay?  Zip.  Why not do it this way?  Because the Democrat health care plans are not about lowering the cost of health care.  They would rather spend a couple $trillion for other reasons.  It’s all about control. 

Government-provided health care – the loss of freedom

Rationing will happen because the government will budget a specific amount for health care services; and then in order to approximate the budget they will deny, delay, and dilute medical services based on their budget, not yours. 

We have already seen how a government panel will use the new Democrat health care legislation – if passed and signed by the President – as a means to denying access to health care; they recommended delaying access to mammograms for more than a decade, then using the diagnostic tool only half as frequently as in the past. 

Screening for breast cancer is a preventative measure; denying and delaying it INSURES more cases of breast cancer.  Denial or delay of treatment is bad enough, but taking steps to guarantee more women get cancer is just too much.  But there’s a reason for it.

More cases of breast cancer and more deaths, means that by killing off more people the Democrats will save hundreds of $millions on health care now; and hundreds of $billions later by not having to provide Medicare and Social Security for so many people.  A twofer money saving tactic.  This is how liberals do cost-cutting. 

Rationing of health care in the U.S. will become an issue of bureaucratic fiat rather than personal economic decision-making. 

The Democrat plan removes choice.   You cannot choose what you want so it fits your own situation; and you do not have the choice to purchase only what you can afford.  Nor can you choose to use any procedure available to treat your diagnosis.  

Possible consequences 

Since the government will be in control of what is covered, they may choose not to pay for the birth of Down Syndrome babies.  It’s their choice, not yours. 

Physicians and hospitals will have no choice but to comply with what the bureaucrats want because the government writes the checks.  Doctors apparently will keep the choice to go into another profession.  The doctors who would stay in such an enterprise for a long term will probably come only from the same bottom 20% of the graduating class as public schoolteachers.  Probably produce the same result as well. 

Delay PSA tests, deny physical examinations, deny coverage for certain prescriptions that are too expensive, control which citizens get fined or jailed for non-compliance, raise the amount of the fines, raise the taxes on ‘Cadillac’ health plans, lower the amount that constitutes a ‘Cadillac’ plan and so on.  God, please let the fools who think someone else is going to pay for this survive long enough to lament the day of their folly. 

The Second Amendment will be controlled by the health care apparatchiks at the National Institutes of Health, because guns can cause damage to people, and therefore is a health issue.

What you eat will also come under the control of bureaucrats, and these decisions will be made politically.  Just wait until the international agri-business corporations get to work on various Representatives and Senators to set out what constitutes a good diet.  They will be in the position of forbidding certain products for sale; and placing taxes on stuff they don’t like.  Got to look out for your health, you know. 

They already do as much as the law allows – tobacco taxes fund all kinds of things the government wants to do.  They don’t want people to quit smoking; they just want to use the industry as a money generating machine to fund what the Democrats want to impose.  Got to keep the money coming in.  Next it will be soft drinks, whole milk, ice cream, coffee.  See part two of this series to look at the kinds of taxes the government already imposes on your freedom. 

The kind of car or truck you drive will become a health care issue.  How fast you can drive, and where.  Air quality will be a health care issue meaning that the backyard barbecue will alternatively be taxed, or forbidden altogether. 

You can expect that government inspectors will be arranging to come into your home to insure safety.  If they’re going to pay for it, they have the right to control it.  They will be checking your stairs for safety, how hot the water heater is, the deck, cleaning chemicals – all of it.  Think of it as your personal visit by an OSHEA bureaucrat.  This has already begun in England; expect it here when the Democrats get the control over your life they have been seeking since FDR. 

The government will control your fireplace, and your dryer exhaust, how warm or cool you can keep your home, how large it can be, and how it is insulated – all health issues you understand. 

So what how much you weigh, and how much of the health care budget you consume will all be controlled by the federal government.  Goodbye state and local government. 

What will it really cost (besides $trillions)? 

Consider: when the federal government was able to predict the cost of anything?  They can’t tell in advance how much it will cost to purchase a toilet seat, a hammer, a jet, a boat – nothing.  When they have undertaken to set the expected cost of any piece of legislation, they have been universally wrong – always.   

Guess – did they estimate the cost too high, or too low?  Silly question.  It depends on what they are predicting.  If it’s bad news, the estimates are low, if it’s good news, the estimates are always too high. “Unemployment (may rise to 8% from 6% without our Stimulus plan.”  Actually it rose from 6% to 10.2% so far with the Stimulus plan.  Do you actually think they would lie?  A crucial question is: why would any single person in the U.S. believe government estimates about how much health care will cost. 

Lyndon Johnson began the War on Poverty trying to convince us he could end the problem.  Today in means tested poverty programs including Social Security and Medicare amount to $17,939 per person below the poverty level.  This would be $64,756 for a family of four to eliminate poverty.  The aggregate money spent on poverty programs since the 1960’s is $15.9 trillion; and we still have the poor with us.  Do you believe the government’s estimates of the cost of health care? 

It will cost more; it will do less; it will take control of almost every aspect of your individual life.  Why would you permit them to do this to you?

John Marshall the 4^thChief Justice of the Supreme Court wrote in 1819 in McCulloch v. Maryland that “The power to tax involves the power to destroy.”  Since the apparatchiks who work for and run the federal government levy and collect taxes they need to operate the projects and pursue the ends that make them happy, it follows that the people who are taxed have their happiness destroyed.  Our right to pursue “life, liberty, and happiness” is cancelled so the happiness of the ruling class can be pursued.  (I have posted about our pampered and overpaid bureaucrats here.  Since the power to tax can destroy, the government uses it specifically to destroy things.  I mention smoking, alcohol consumption and other “sin taxes;” gas taxes to force people into public transportation, energy taxes to force us to quit consuming energy, (remember Mr. Obama’s announced intention to make your energy costs “skyrocket”), ”government option health care” for us, but not for them.  They’re happy; we’re not. 

So, for all our posturing about the principles of freedom and personal happiness we once held, the thick, heavy layers of taxation and bureaucracy of the federal government are actually much more suffocating than the political milieu our forbearers experienced under monarchies in England the Europe.  In fact, our taxes are higher, the regulations are heavier and more numerous, and government knowledge of our private affairs much more extensive than under any monarch, tyrant, of dictator in history.  Our allegiance to our founding principles is, at this point in history, no more than an empty symbol of what used to be.  The thin gruel of liberty permitted us by today’s ruling class in America is intended only to keep us from awakening and throwing off our present oppression to regain the liberty we created at the beginning. 

This is the second installment of my series on Nationalizing Health Care: The Path to Total Control.  This time, I deal with the question of whether or not it is wise to spend any tax revenue to expand government control of the nation’s economy given the history of taxation in the country.  You will be astounded at what has happened to us as a result of committed leftists promising utopia. 

I show here that giving the government access to large amounts of money only feeds the beast enabling it to demand even more.  The federal government is an insatiable money eating machine; it consumes an infinite amount of our money, makes its employees fat with salary, benefits, and early retirement with unsustainable incomes; and expels some stunted, malodorous waste product demanding that the people who pay for their excesses eat it.

The taxes we pay

FYI, here are federal government taxes now being collected (not including state, regional, county, or city taxes). 

Cigarette tax, large cigar tax, small cigar tax, pipe tobacco tax, chewing tobacco tax, snuff tax, cigarette papers less than 6.5 inches long tax, cigarette papers more than 6.5 inches long tax, cigarette tubes less than 6.5 inches long tax, cigarette tubes more than 6.5 inches long tax, pistol tax, rifle tax, ammunition tax, liquor tax, gas tax, diesel tax, inland waterway fuel tax, non-commercial aviation fuel tax, wagering tax, bow and arrow taxes, fishing rod tax, other fishing equipment tax, outboard motor tax, non-long distance telephone tax (designed to pay for the Spanish –American War ended in 1889.  The war cost $6 million, the phone tax has raised hundreds of $millions over the decades.), insurance policies issued by foreign companies tax, personal income tax, corporate income tax, capital gains tax, Social security tax, Medicare tax, self-employment tax, gas guzzler tax, truck tax, semi-trailer tax, trailer tax, millionaire tax, ship passenger tax, coal tax, natural gas tax, chemical tax, floor stocks tax on ozone-depleting chemicals, transportation taxes, airport travel security tax, wireless communication tax (check your wireless phone bill), air transportation tax, beer tax, wine tax, naturally sparkling wine tax, artificially sparkling wine tax, hard cider tax; and then there are import duties that you pay in the price of certain goods imported from certain countries, and all manner of fees that are not considered taxes – licenses to drill for oil, and the like. 

The progressives needed two things to impose their hegemony over the American people: money, and power.  The former creates the latter.

The 16th Amendment and the decline of America

The 16^th amendment, passed in 1913, changed the U.S. Constitution permitting the federal government to levy taxes on individual incomes.  We need to understand what has happened as a result.  This move gave them the money; they would soon gain the power. 

The federal deficit is the difference between what the government receives in revenue and what it spends in a single year.  As the annual deficits pile up, they accumulate and are known as the federal debt.  Understanding the difference is critical. 

For 59 of the first 124 years of the Republic, the federal government spent only what it received in taxes, it borrowed money to cover emergencies, then paid the money back.  During that time we had many challenges, and were able to deal with them all.  We expanded into the west developing many new states and territories, and we fought 7 wars, some of them lasting for years, and sometimes more than one war at a time.  No legal income taxes. 

During the next 94 years – 1913 to the present, only 24 years were on-budget years.  The progressives have been spending us into oblivion ever since. 

Taxes as a percent of our national wealth

In 1902, before corporate or personal income taxes were levied, the entire federal budget amounted to 1.3% of the nation’s entire output (GDP).  This meant that most of the money was privately reinvested making the nation a formidable economic giant.  For the last 30 years, the government has spent an average of 18.5% of GDP.  This represents an 1,800% increase in the amount of the nation’s wealth the government extracts from the citizens and spends depriving us of the freedom to spend that wealth on what we think is appropriate, and slowing economic growth and job creation. 

Federal spending is overtaking our entire economy.  By 2050, Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid alone will consume 100% of all federal revenue if things continue as they are. 

In 1913 when personal income taxes began, only 1% of the American population paid any tax at all.  After deducting interest expenses, and all business expenses and losses, and after a $20,000 exemption, the tax rate was 1% of income from $20,000 to $50,000.  From $50,000 to $75,000 the rate was 2%.  At $500,000 and up, the rate was 6%.  But this wasn’t enough for the progressives; they wanted more. 

By 1916, the lowest rate was doubled to 2%, and the top rate was 15%.  In three years, they doubled the tax rates, now 5% of the population paid income taxes. 

By 1936 the lowest rate was 4% (a 400% increase in the rate from when the tax began) the top rate was 79% and federal spending had risen from 1.3% of GDP to 6.8%.  These increases in government economic hegemony are breathtaking; but it wasn’t enough for the progressives. 

“Spreading the wealth around”

“Redistribution of wealth” has always been a central part of the progressive program.  If we don’t insure that people have a family wage or sufficient income, they will steal and plunder.  Besides, some people have too much anyway.  Progressives think it’s better for all if the government takes what they have earned and give it to people who didn’t earn it.  They refer to this theft as “fairness.”  The idea that people steal because their heart is corrupt isn’t part of their reality; it can only be because they are hungry, or someone else has too much.  In this way, envy is rewarded.

You need to now that this “redistribution of wealth,” concept is more formally stated; “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”  This is a direct quote from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels in their book, “The Communist Manifesto.” Mr. Obama announced his intention to fulfill this plank of the Manifesto when he said he thought it was a good thing to spread the wealth around.  Perhaps we have a red president.  

The $trillions the federal government has taken from us in income taxes that were forbidden for the first 124 years of our nation is not enough for them.  The progressives have to borrow even more to carry out their vision of the good. 

Increasing the debt

The Second Liberty Bond Act of 1917 established a statutory limit on federal debt, and Congress has had to raise it many times over the years because theywant to impose their vision, but don’t want to admit how much it costs.  The current legal limit the federal government can borrow is $12.1 trillion.  Presently we are approaching the $12.1 limit, and if they don’t increase it, the government (gasp) would have to live with the actual revenue coming in. 

Without question, they will have to raise the debt limit over and over again in the coming months and years.  During George Bush’s last year in ofice – 2008 – the accumulated federal debt (not the deficit) was equal to 70.2% of GDP – $9,986 billion.  In the first year of the Obama administration it has risen to 91% of GDP, and by 2011, by Mr. Obama’s own calculations the country will have more debt – $15,674 billion – than GDP during that same year.  During October 2009 alone, the federal debt rose by $176.36 billion; that is, they spent $176 billion more than the revenues that were received in one month.  Do not try this at home! 

Tapping into everyone’s private affairs in order to confiscate money from your personal income has given them more than they could ever spend.  But they managed to squander it anyway.  But they have squandered another $12 trillion in addition, and are promising $14 trillion more in borrowed money over the next 10 years raising the debt to $25 trillion by 2019.  But wait, there’s more!  Taxing us into poverty, and borrowing unimaginable sums of money aren’t enough for these people.

Raising new taxes and raising old ones

The progressive mental defect so confuses the mind that when they get all of the above, it still isn’t enough.  So as I write they are planning new ways to tax the citizens to impose their utopia – VAT tax, financial transaction tax, income tax surcharges, taxes on your health care plan, taxes on medical devices  – pacemakers, artificial joints, needles for diabetics, catheters, feminine napkins, toothbrushes, and God only know what else. 

Presently because of 17.5% unemployment government revenues are down 34%  in October over the same month last year.  This is the largest single monthly decline in monthly revenue since 1932 in the depth of the Great Depression. 

Unfunded mandates

Beyond all the taxing; beyond all the borrowing, the progressives running our government require that state governments and private businesses carry out their agenda through “unfunded mandates.”  This amounts to an “off-budget” item that moves toward the progressive wet dream of cradle to grave welfare provided by laundering the nation’s wealth through government, and cetting into bed with business.  Business have already found that when you get into bed with the government, you wake up with social diseases.  Nevertheless, this particular leftist approach to governance is mor in keeping with facism than communism.  So we see progressives have been sucking at both teats.

Unfunded mandates are largely unconstitutional requirements for states and businesses to pay for some of the dreams that progressives have for all of us: how much you have to pay an employee, how many hours a day he can work, how many day he has to have off in a given year, how many days off for childbirth and family time, which companies must provide health insurance, Medicaid a mandate on state governments, and so on. 

The beauty of unfunded mandates for deceptive progressives is that this $1.2 trillion annual expense for their utopian programs is part of somebody else’s budget!  This is what is driving states into bankruptcy, and business to charge more for their products and services. 

What to expect if we don’t change directions

The situation they have created is so idiotic, that by 2080, three programs – Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid – alone will consume 25% of GDP.  If taxes remain the same as a percent of GDP, and benefits remain the same for these programs, by 2052, these three programs will consume 100% of all federal revenues.   The consequence is that all federal spending for federal employees, all White House Executive expenses, all Congressional salaries and overhead, all federal court and federal prison expenses, all Defense Department expenses, all federal retiree benefits – everything.  Of course things will not stay the same, they will either change who receives Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, or they will raise taxes and borrow more money.  In any event this burden will be politically distasteful, and will make the U.S. a very large third-world country economically.  Thank your nearby Democrat. 

How do the appratchicks respond?

So what do these people do in circumstances like this?  They write a 2,000 page bill outlining how they want to take over medical services in the U.S. and spend $trillions more! They want to include more millions of people in government health care because the vision is that they are helpless and must be looked after.  They will pay for it by delaying of medical services, denial of medical services, and dilution by limiting what they will pay for and withholding treatments for the elderly.  Besides this, they will raise $trillions in new taxes to pay for the scheme.  Utopianism is truly a mental disease.

The next phase of their paternalistic nonsense has already been passed in the House; Mr. Obama lobbied long and hard for it.  Democrat Senate Majority leader Harry Reid is pushing to pass a similar bill in the Senate immediately because the president wants this done before the end of the year.  

This stupidity has to be stopped.  Here, I have dealt with the economic reasons it must be stopped cold.  In the next, I will tell why the legislation as now constituted will give the government total control over your life. 

What you need to do

The House has already passed this legislation, so call your two Senators and tell them to oppose the proposed health care proposals as now constituted and support things that will help solve the problem.  Permit real competition by letting insurance companies sell policies across state lines; forbid junk lawsuits against doctors and hospitals, and set reasonable limits for actual malpractice; let individuals and sole proprietors deduct the cost of health insurance the way businesses deduct it as a cost of doing business; consider forbidding companies to offer health insurance to employees forcing people to shop for what is truly a competitive policy rather than shielding them from the actual cost of healthcare.

Yes, the Obama-Pelosi-Reid government put into office last January has passed legislation in the House during the dark of night last Saturday that includes fines of up to $500,000 and prison sentences of up to 5 years for failure to purchase something you may not want or need. 

When we first mentioned this, many in the media were flabbergasted, called it stupid, not true, and those who would say such a slanderous thing are crazy.  

Here are two authentic, unimpeachable sources that prove the Democrats are prepared to send you to jail if you don’t purchase a commodity they want you to pay for. 

First, the Congressional Joint Commission on Taxation affirms the truth of the legislation here; and Nancy Pelosi is asked about jail time for not purchasing something she wants you to buy by a journalist from KOMO during a press conference, and she admits that such a provision is in the legislation, and says, “The legislation is very fair in this respect.” 

The people voted for change without bothering to consider what kind of changes Mr. Obama had in mind.  How’s that hope ‘n change working out for you now? 

May I suggest that you be in touch with your Senators and ask them to tell you where in the Constitution it gives them the authority to spend government money to provide health care for anyone since the Constitution is a document that grants only specific powers to the federal government.  

They will almost universally go to the “general welfare” clauses in the Preamble, and in Article 1; Section 8; clause one, “The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defence and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.” 

If they cite this provision, tell them that they can levy taxes for the general welfare of the United States, not the individual citizens of the United States; two very different entities.  In addition, the 9^th and 10^th Amendments – part of the Bill of Rights – state explicitly that the powers of the federal government are limited, enumerated, and it has no powers other than those specifically granted to it in the Constitution, with all other rights belonging to the states or the people themselves. 

If they want to change the Constitution, tell them to do it legally.  They must stop this treasonous, perverted power grab.  The Democrat coup must be stopped.  Medicare isn’t Constitutional, Social Security isn’t Constitutional, federal money for education isn’t Constitutional – in fact most of the money our federal government spends is not permitted by the U.S. Constitution.  If that sounds radical, just read the thing for yourself. 

The health care bill passed by the House is 2,000 pages long; 9,000% longer than the Constitution.  That ought to tell us something.

We know that the car manufacturers; along with the service and repair shops have been ripping people off, making immoral profits.  We have been trying to deal with this for decades, and they always complain and offer false information to prevent us from fixing the problem. 

In order to create competition, we are going to begin manufacturing and repairing cars.  Every auto manufacturing company along with every service and repair company will see an increase in their taxes in order to fund our operation because we plan to subsidize our cars; along with all service and repair functions in order to create competition. 

Additionally we will set the charges that can be made for all diagnostic services, regular maintenance, and other services and repairs – whether or not the work is done in our shops.  We think it is a moral imperative that everyone has access to transportation; our only motive is to ensure that no one is cheated or pays too much.  The cost of automobile ownership, service and repair is entirely too high, and will wreck the economy if increased costs are permitted to continue. 

Once their costs go up to subsidize our operation, and we begin controlling what they can pay their personnel along with what they can charge for their services we think they will be compelled to bring down their charges since they will have to compete with us.  

We will then monitor the best approaches to all these services providing for the best outcomes for your automobile needs. All sales, service, and repair shops will have to report their diagnosis of the problem, what approach they used to solve it, and the outcomes experienced.  Our panels will use this data to determine the best approaches to solving your motoring problems, and then require that all service and repair personnel follow our recommendations or not get paid.   

As another cost saving move, we will have a panel determine when we will no longer permit your car to be repaired.  Some of you have been driving your vehicles for a long time, and we no longer have the luxury of permitting you to continue servicing and repairing your vehicle.  Somebody may have to tell you that you will just have to get used to the idea that it’s time to let your car go. 

Eventually, of course, our plan is for everyone to ride public transportation.  Then no one will need cars at all; we’ll do the driving for you.