Better Late than Never

A couple of years ago I got into a rather spirited debate with Robert Graboyes, who is the Senior Healthcare Advisor for the NFIB.  You can find this discussion here, here and here.

I was advocating holding a firm line on healthcare reform.  I believed that the system as it had evolved in the US was fundamentally flawed.  What was needed was radical free market reform and not one more round of layering more regulation onto an industry that was already heavily regulated. 

Dr. Graboyes thought that I was being rather naive.  Here is what he said in a comment he posted at my blog:

When I'm a college professor, I can advocate any fantasy health care system my imagination desires. NFIB doesn't have that luxury. NFIB represents 350,000 member firms, their employees, and the larger community of small businesses. Sweeping philosophical declarations won't protect their livelihoods.

He did go on to state:

On the other hand, it's tempting to let pragmatism to turn to sloth and timidity. So Prof. Cornwall and others like him do a great public service by pushing us to achieve as much as we can and not settle for less than what is possible.

In a later post when the healthcare socialization train was pulling out of the station, I pointed out that "pragmatism" and trying to "settle" for as much as they could get was actually leaving small business empty handed.  They had been, well, duped through an old social activism trick called cooptation:

Cooptation is a strategy to bring your opposition to the table, giving them the illusion of power, but with the intention of controlling them by making them feel like they are part of the process.

My concern with becoming part of the "dialogue" came not from my chair in an ivory tower, but from my days as a healthcare entrepreneur.  Many of my views on the role of government in the economy came from my days as an entrepreneur when I watched how the process of lobbying and "settling" on issues of economic and regulatory policy really worked.  Rent seeking and political horse-trading does not lead to sound policy for the country, just enrichment for some of those who have enough money and power to sit at the table.  And it always seems to result in an ever expanding role of government in our lives and a loss of liberty.

Trying to have a voice and to find a way to influence the process got nothing.  Thankfully, the NFIB now realizes this.  Dr. Graboyes sent out a link to a new video from the NFIB that is sounding the alarm bells about the current plans for healthcare "reform". 



If we get another chance to examine how to address the issues related to the current state of healthcare, I hope that we remember that "settling" has led us down the path to where we are now. 

Those pushing us down the road to socialism are not "settling" nor being "pragmatic".  And neither should those of us who support entrepreneurs and the free market economy.

Please pass this video along to others.