First, I do not accept the premise that it is necessary to upend the health coverage currently available to all Americans for the sake of covering those who are uninsured. Expanding access to insurance is far less complex and far less costly than Democrats would have you believe. It does not involve a government takeover of 1/6th of the American economy. It involves insurance market reform but it also and more significantly involves providing choice and competition. The bill I support, the Patients’ Choice Act, provides the framework for such an effort. However, my views were not considered nor were the views of other lawmakers who sought to improve the system we have today. That’s because Nancy Pelosi and her liberal associates intend to destroy private healthcare with the ultimate goal of a Washington centered government healthcare monopoly.

Even before this monopoly takes its final form, the Democratic bill will speed our nation into financial crisis. Simply put, we can’t afford a new government healthcare program—a fact acknowledged by the President and Congressional Democrats. This is why they claim their reforms cost nothing; that it will actually reduce the debt. In truth, the bill conservatively spends a trillion dollars and the final toll on our budget will be many times greater than the initial cost. In their urgency to enact their plan, Democratic leaders papered over the financial problems we face with new government agencies and creative accounting gimmicks. Ultimately, the mechanisms created by this new law will force federal bureaucrats to ration benefits to control spending—a practice that is already common in government programs such as Medicaid.

Unchecked federal spending and the new entitlement just created should concern every American.

Our nation’s long-term financial outlook is worse than at any point in American history. Spending by the federal government outpaced revenues by $1.4 trillion last year and the red ink continues as far forward as we can see. In the real world, this financial condition would result in bankruptcy. Washington, however, can print money and borrow from foreign governments as long as those foreign powers are willing to keep us afloat. Any bets on when the Chinese will cut up the U.S.A. credit card?

The logic behind Speaker Pelosi’s health bill math defies common sense. Indeed, anyone claiming to make things cheaper by having the government provide it would do well to delegate financial decisions to someone else. A quick glance at the Treasury Secretary’s annual financial statement is all the proof we need. The United States is in a financial freefall and a new government healthcare entitlement will only make things worse. Existing entitlement programs like Medicare have unfunded liabilities amounting to $43 trillion—a figure that grows by nearly $2 trillion per year.

If all of these facts were not enough, the Democrats enacted their new law as a result of bribery. The American people have heard about many of the deals made prior to the vote. The Cornhusker Kickback, Florida Gatorade, and Louisiana Purchase are but a few examples. It is a national disgrace that our Congress has become an institution dependent on extortion to enact major legislation. And while the process is not easily discussed or understood, we cannot ignore the historic level of oppression implemented by Speaker Pelosi’s Rules Committee in her effort to gain passage of the bill. As much as the content of the bill itself, the manner in which it passed Congress provides clear evidence that the bill was about government power not the health of America.

As a far right wing nut job I will enjoy the coming downfall of the Democratic Party. I will enjoy the stunned looks on the faces of those who will lose their union and employer health care plans if this legislation stays around long enough to take effect. I will enjoy the coming revolt of the middle and upper class taxpayers. I could of course, be wrong. Maybe the American people are tired of being free and maybe rugged individualism is dead. Maybe the vast majority of my neighbors are looking forward to the never ending growth of the Federal Government. Maybe everyone except we gun owning, SUV driving, meat eating, smaller government, right wing nut job pro lifers want the nanny state.

So now that the first battle of the “health care reform” movement is over we need to ask some questions. Is that it from the left? Will there be no further movement to start a government option? Will there be no push to get to a single payer system? If you believe that you need to get in the line that starts right behind Rep. Bart Stupak.

Rep. Stupak has become the Neville Chamberlain of our time.

Chamberlain, for those of you who attended public school, was the British prime minister who returned from a meeting with Hitler and thought he had reigned in the plans of the Nazis by getting them to sign a piece of paper. Stupak has traded his principled stand for the unborn for less.

Although I don’t approve I can understand someone like Mary Landrieu or Ben Nelson selling their vote for a payoff to their state. What did Bart Stupak get for giving up his values? He got Obama’s promise that he would issue an executive order. This brings to mind a line from the old Simon and Garfunkel song, “The Boxer”, “I have squandered my resistance for a pocketful of mumbles, such are promises.”

Which has the greater force under the law, an Act of Congress or an Executive Order? If you answered an Act of Congress you are correct. So if the President’s Executive Order for Congressman Stupak is determined to be in conflict with the bill then the order is out and the bill is in. I would believe that if this Executive Order isn’t in conflict with the bill then there would have been no point in Mr. Stupak making a big deal about the abortion language all along.

Even if I am wrong, does Rep. Stupak think that the left wing of his party will now stop their push to have federal dollars fund unlimited abortion? He is waving his agreement and thinking he has done well and right. What he has really done is taking his place next to Chamberlain as one of the great political fools of all time.

This wasn’t unexpected. What someone will have to explain to us in the future is, why did the GOP let many pro-life Democrats off-the-hook by supporting the Stupak Amendment to, perhaps, prevent federal funds from being spent on abortion. As usual, the GOP tried to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and gave some conservative democrats cover going into the fall elections.

Update: Not really an update, but something we should have noted at the outset. Although Obama and Congressional Leadership have been stressing the absolute urgency of passing this bill, most of the provisions–the ones expanding benefits, etc–don’t take effect until 2013. (That’s a pretty long-lead time for something that is so urgent, if you ask us.) Of course, the tax increases take effect much sooner.