This is interesting. A proposal to convert it to a 21st-century pocket battleship.
Category Archives: Political Commentary
Health Care
Yes, access to it is limited by overregulation:
The problem is that healthcare consumers have limited options. At the two ends of the spectrum, they can see a licensed doctor, or they can do it themselves. One option is extremely expensive, time-consuming, and reliable, and the other is free and still time-consuming but not as reliable. In between, there are few other choices. It’s possible to use a service like Teladoc or visit a drugstore clinic in some areas for minor issues like strep throat, an earache, or a sprained ankle, but in the absence of the current system of occupational licensing, there’d be a much broader continuum of possibilities between my unlettered amateur visits to Dr. Google and visits to an actual doctor’s office.
The problem is compounded by the fact that we pay for health-care via “insurance” coverage, which isn’t really insurance but just prepaid health-care. This system requires lots and lots of rules about what can and can’t be covered and what constitutes medicine. The entire healthcare market would function much more efficiently if there were more options. For treating a lot of conditions, you don’t need someone who went to four years of medical school and worked through a grueling residency. Better to save that talent for more challenging stuff and allow people to seek marginal improvements over DIY diagnosis.
But instead, we’re forced to buy “insurance” that isn’t really insurance, and they’ve totally destroyed the concept of insurance.
The Tea Party
Jim Antle says that the Republicans have repealed and replaced it. It was another victory for the statists.
Guess we need to primary some of them next year.
[Later-afternoon update]
Arizona resident Bob Zimmerman is less than impressed with his senior senator. Emphasis on the “senior.”
Iran
The health-care debacle is devastating on the domestic front, but probably the worst legacy of the Obama presidency will be its nuclear program. And it continues to play games with its ships in the Gulf. At least now we’re ready for it.
The Trump White House
Yes, there is no staff shake up that can fix it. The problem is Trump himself:
at every turn, the president has acted as if he has something to hide. Whether he actually does is an open question, but his obsession with the unfairness of the Russia story — and his refusal to credit claims that the Russians meddled in the election, or to criticize Russian President Vladimir Putin — is a perpetual smoke machine causing people to think there’s got to be a fire somewhere. The author of Donald Trump’s problems is first and foremost Donald Trump.
So what’s my point? Simply: The author of Donald Trump’s problems is first and foremost Donald Trump. It’s fine to point out the excesses of the Democrats and the media. There’s certainly ample reason to criticize his staff. It’s understandable that Trump supporters think the “establishment,” the “swamp” or the “Deep State” have undermined him — because they have.
But Trump is not a victim. He is the hamster spinning the wheel in the massive Rube Goldberg machine that is the spectacle of presidential dysfunction.
And an ignorant emotional 71-year-old man with attention-deficit disorder and no impulse control isn’t going to change.
Wind And Solar
You’ll be as shocked as I am to learn that researchers have been underestimating their cost.
Space Property Rights
More common law than Marxism, and that’s a good thing. I am cited.
Presidential Power
Yes, a president can be indicted. And he can pardon himself.
The only ultimate Constitutional check on a president’s power is impeachment. Something that has been done far too rarely, largely because Congress’s sense of its own prerogatives has become overwhelmed by partisanship.
A Liberal Party
Bob Zubrin thinks we need one. I haven’t read the whole thing, but I generally agree. (Yes, I know it’s a few months old, but I just ran across it, and not much has changed.)
Regular Order
Angelo Codevilla says we need to return to it to restore the Republic.
I agree, but the problem is, he doesn’t say how. Op-eds clearly aren’t going to do the job, in and of themselves. It may require an amendment.