Harold's Left:
There is a new group on Facebook that is meant to poke fun at the hypocrisy of the conservative argument that a public option for health care is socialism. The group is called 1 Million Strong Against our SOCIALIST Fire Departments. Here's the groups stated premise:
For too long now, fire departments across the United States have been socialist organizations, resulting in taxes on the American people.
FACT: Most Americans never use the socialized services of the fire department. The Obama administration has been very clear about keeping the status quo when it comes to taxpayer-funded fire departments.
It is time to open the fire department up to private industry. We have the best fire departments in the world in the US, but that doesn't mean that anyone (even non-US citizens) should be able to dial up and have fires put out, etc. There are private companies (Halliburtion, Etc.) who could step in tomorrow and take over every fire department in America and charge the consumer directly.
This is AMERICA. NO FREE FIRE SAFETY.
"Better DEAD than fire truck RED."
Awesome right? I started thinking more about this premise. If Hannity and Beck continuously tout that government is essentially the root of all evil, then why are they not against the privatization of fire departments, libraries, police departments, the entire school system, the national weather service, the national parks system, the national highway system, or the Food and Drug Administration. According to their logic, fire protection is not explicitly in the Constitution, therefore it should be left to private business. Liberals maintain that health care is a right. Conservatives maintain it is a privilege. Well, is fire protection a right?
Prior to the 20th century, many of the fire departments in major metropolitan areas were managed by "fire brigades". Independent organizations that were paid through insurance companies if the owner of that property could afford fire coverage (fire coverage in the since of actual firefighters, not fire coverage to insure stuff that may be lost in a fire). Shortly after the Civil War many of the major cities like Boston and New York began to make their fire departments government run, insuring everyone in the city was covered by its services. This is essentially socialism. An entire industry run by the government. Plus, most people today will never have to use the services of a fire department, which according to conservatives taxing people for services like fire departments is equivalent to theft. What's the reason we can't have good, affordable health care for all Americans? Because conservatives are terrified of one stupid word: Socialism. They are more concerned with a notion that most of them do not clearly understand, rather than what is really important; health care reform. I think that word keeps them up at night, it's like a some ghost that haunts their dreams... socialism, socialism.
Who cares if it is "socialism" (Which it isn't because that would require the government owning the hospitals, paying the doctors, making the medicines, etc. All of which no one is proposing). This should be about fixing the system, not trivial bogeyman words that are not even applicable to the situation. So, the next time someone tells you the the new public option is socialism, ask them how they feel about firemen.
Post a Comment 18 comments:
Brilliant!
Now if they can just close down the police department and make everyone responsible for hiring their own security, then people can truly be free.
August 22, 2009 5:59 AM
great post! if you follow the idea thru, you might have more emphasis on prevention as well!
August 22, 2009 7:19 AM
But wait! There's an obvious difference between fire and disease. If not attended to, a fire at a property that is not protected could spread to one that is. It's not like diseases ever spread from one person to another, is it?
Well, is it?
August 22, 2009 7:32 AM
Interestingly (or sadly?) there are indeed people who believe that all the government services you list should be private. These anarcho-capitalists (for want of a better expression) believe axiomatically in the success of the free market, with the state reduced to the role of enforcing contract law.
I think it is completely nuts, because there's no evidence that their axioms of free markets really are true. They are probably more wrong than Marx was.
However, it is laudable that they are at least consistent, a virtue the current so-called conservatives have trouble aspiring to.
August 22, 2009 7:39 AM
I think the military is a socialized institution. When run by the gov't we see excessive spending and major inefficiency. Surely private military contractors are more efficient, and cost the tax payers nothing. ;)
August 22, 2009 9:56 AM
Yes! Let's return to Gilded Age New York City, where competing fire companies would actually let whole city blocks burn!
August 22, 2009 10:08 AM
I've been saying this forever.
These conservative dingbats scream that we can't trust the government when it controls all the things that REALLY hold our lives in the balance.
This is bigger than just the fire department. What about the military? That's the biggest socialist organization of all! Bigger than some countries! How can these people scream against trusting the government and applying socialism when both are in control of the most powerful military ever created on earth?
"Don't trust the government, but give them enough nukes to destroy us all. . . "
Uh huh. . .
August 22, 2009 10:36 AM
While I'm sure that many fear "the socialism," I think these people are--at the risk of sounding elitist--"less sophisticated." The conservatives are more interested in protecting and expanding business merely as a matter of philosophy; it should be business taking your money, not the government--and the less you pay in taxes, the more can go to business. They are just meta-husksters who seek to sell SOMETHING-ANYTHING-ANYWHERE to make a buck...and isn't interested in any consequences beyond the sell. From this comes the philosophy of "business above all else."
Consequently, I've come to believe that conservatism is less like the conspiracy it seems to be (and belief in conspiracy is a trap-take it from a reformed conspiracy theorist!) and more like the simple philosophy/religion it is; the rules are simple, and everyone believes the rules/mythology, and so it seems like a conspiracy because everyone is on the same page...but it's not a conspiracy, any more than Christianity is. Is the end result evil? if it seems powerful beyond our ability to overcome it and we think it will cause us harm ...then yes, it appears evil. But by that measure, so does a shark. The GOP is just a eating machine that seeks to feed itself and has created a philosophy that allows it to prosecute that goal.
Don't fear it; fear will destroy you as surely as the shark will. Instead, out think it, attack from the flank, turn it against itself.
How? unify the message, stay on the message, make the message simple because it needs to convince the currently "unconvinceable."
August 22, 2009 10:37 AM
I never saw the GOP, when they were the majority, push very hard to reduce the size of gov't by abolishing the VA system and putting vets into the freemarket healthcare system. Socialist healthcare is OK for the veterans they claim to support so much.
August 22, 2009 1:24 PM
Problem is, the military is in the constitution. You gotta use examples that aren't in the constitution. I think fire departments are a good example (police can probably be argued as part of the military). Streets are another good example. Public education, however, is something most hardcore right wing dingbats see as a privilege, not a right. They believe that those without kids should not be paying taxes to support a public education system.
August 23, 2009 11:23 AM
Well, the discernment would be between the FEDERAL government and LOCAL government.. but I don't want to befuddle your leftist brain with such details - after all, if I were to get into the question of "why is there fire insurance, then? why don't we create a Federal Fire Department that would pay for burnt buildings?".. I might give you some ideas and there's nothing worse than somebody who is willing to force their ideology at the point of a gun (all statists - left and right wing) that has even grander schemes.
August 23, 2009 12:28 PM
There are legitimate gov't functions which protect individual rights. Those are the courts, the military, and the police. Fire departments should be private owned and operated. Insurance companies should negotiate the prices for it's client in case they need the fire departments services. If my neighbors house is on fire and they don't have insurance my insurance company would have an incentive to make sure the fire doesn't spread to my house (there policy holder). This would be a much greater system. Insurance is insuring against high loss of value. If you don't purchase insurance against your house getting burnt down then you are pretty stupid and you don't deserve others people's help if that situation arises. Now, you could always still call the fire department and pay the price they arrange. Now, if they charge you through the roof to save the value of your property don't be surprised. I don't see the flaw in the argument that privatizing fire departments isn't consistent with the gov't as protector of individual rights.
August 23, 2009 4:04 PM
Bill,
You are arguing against a straw man. You are arguing against anarchy and not limited gov't which is what conservatives supposedly advocate. They would agree that you should have the police, the military, and the courts. Now the police would have much less to do in a free society because they would be limited to protecting individual rights and not chasing after drug dealers, prostitutes, and other non rights violators. Many of the office functions of the police departments could be privatized too.
August 23, 2009 4:07 PM
@Anonymous,
What evidence is there that your private fire dept scheme would actually work? Private health care is meant to work the same way (even regarding transmittable diseases = transmittable fire), but fails to cover everyone. Of course, insuring health is even more of a moral imperative than insuring dwellings.
Any anarcho-capitalist system would burden the individual with a maze of contracts, not to mention the legal know-how to prosecute them. The potential for marketing fraud, for one, would be massive. Just look at the health industry today.
The free market answer is presumably that people would organize themselves into coops/unions/groups (much like a gated community does nowadays). These organizations would deal in standardized contracts, so that individuals wouldn't have to, thus becoming de facto states.
This is the best possible outcome I can think of. You have to convince me that this would be better than what we have now, or that we wouldn't end up with a carbon copy of what we have now.
Yes, the government is often crap. But nothing about private corporations is intrinsically less crap. Short of ideology, we have very little evidence of what a tiny (not small) government would mean in terms of social dynamics, save perhaps the 'Wild West'...
August 23, 2009 4:47 PM
Imho, this straw-man example is unclear, misaligned, and thus unpersuasive. For instance, what is supposed to be the equivalent to the fire department in the health-care world? Doctors and hospitals?
What about the insurance question? After all, isn't most fire insurance a private matter?
If one's home catches on fire, the fire department will hopefully show up to put out the fire, minimizing further damage to that structure and stopping the public threat of a spreading fire.
However, if the homeowners have no insurance, if they have not properly managed risk, then they see a total loss do they not?
In addition, the government does not force other home owners to pony up to rebuild their house.
In addition, private insurance agreements, legal contracts, require home owners to take certain precautions to prevent fire damage or at least to minimize the threat. Homeowners shown to be in violation of such agreements can lessen their insurance payouts in the event of loss, right? Wouldn't an easing of such requirements in response to a more general government mandate of coverage as a "right" risk each individual home and the wider community as well?
There are better arguments to make against government-run health care than those presented here. Likewise, there are also better arguments to make in favor of government-run health care. This Fire Department angle isn't it.
Rather than mocking the weaker opposing arguments, can we not celebrate and cultivate the strongest? Argument can be a process of discovery, not merely dispute.
This is a complex, serious topic. Let's bring our best to the discussion, not our worst.
Thanks.
August 24, 2009 7:16 PM
Perhaps homeowner's insurance isn't a good example. Let's think to another type of insurance that is a good example... auto insurance. Most states mandate that you have auto insurance. Explain that one.
August 24, 2009 7:20 PM
I love how everyone THINKS it's the word 'socialism' that scares people away from the idea of gov't run health care. Did it ever occur to anyone that the reason people don't want the gov't involved in health care is because they are already FAILING at their current social health care plan - Medicare. The gov't can't handle the health care for the elderly in this country, what makes you think they can handle the entire nation?
August 26, 2009 9:04 AM
What's funny is that they offer congress a great health care plan.
August 26, 2009 9:07 AM