So starts a risible (and mercifully short) exercise in irrational “compassion” by Joel Mathis.
Joel trots out the usual favorite go-to Left-lib statistics on how Americans are just so much “sicker” and “die younger than they should” and clutches his pearls so tightly you can almost hear his voice go up full octave
What is that rugged individualism getting us? We’re living sicker and dying younger than we should.
America leads the developed world in deaths of people before age 50, according to a new report from the Institute of Medicine, and it’s largely because, well, we don’t have that much of a nanny state. […]
And let’s not even get started on the gun issue and its effects on public health.
Can’t we all Think.Of.Teh.Childrens!!1!1!
And Joel’s emotional devotion to NannyStatism affects his reading comprehension; he “interprets” a litany of multiple conditions that underline “crisis” statistics and declares
Get that? We’re providing lousy care.
I will give Nannyboi his due, though; he’s honest in his yearning to rewrite the definition of American Liberty to mean benevolent serfdom
Why I’m a liberal? I believe you can have freedom and care about reducing income inequality. I believe you can have liberty and smaller soda sizes. I believe you can be throw off tyranny and still have a smarter health care system that delivers care to more people. I’m a liberal because even though conservatives and libertarians can sometimes come up with good ideas to address these problems, mostly you sense they’d rather not be bothered. Which leaves good old-fashioned Big Government as the most likely option to actually fix stuff.
In one packed paragraph is the essence of all Left Nannybois & Nannygrrls — an unhealthy urge to control other people’s lives through Government power and a stubborn adherence to refusing to address what conservatives and libertarians actually believe.
Joel’s closing is a classic case of refusing to grasp reality.
Nannies don’t imprison you, after all, and they never did. Their job is to help you stand on your own.
It’s true that Mary Poppins leaves the Banks family when her job is done … The Nanny State never considers its job done.
h/t Powerline
I’m a liberal because even though conservatives and libertarians can sometimes come up with good ideas to address these problems, mostly you sense they’d rather not be bothered.
What Mr. Mathis doesn’t seem to understand is that Team R’s last two nominees were overexcitable cowardly nannysluts: John McCain and Mitt Romney to name names.
I suspect though that what Mr. Mathis is interested in isn’t really nannywhore chris christie mike bloomberg statism it’s outright fascism.
you know – like hitler
Well, no need to read that entire article. Mathias trots out several favorite left-winger tropes that are easily shot down (infant mortality for starters).
Quite obviously he is an idiot.
I don’t know, leigh, he is dead nuts right there, I would rather not be bothered.
beemoe
partly right, I don’t want to be bothered by government. I do like to support the charities and causes of my choice. Mathis doesn’t want to give me a choice.
Same here, BMoe. It still doesn’t take away from his being an idiot.
In some goofy sense, it seems as though Mathis is happy to proclaim that genuine freedom necessarily entails rejecting the principle of non-contradiction as a non-starter. Which, hey, good luck with that liberal principle.
On the infant mortality thing, we consider every baby born with a heart still beating alive, and try to save them all. Most places have a minimum weight requirement before they consider the baby alive, even when it is, in fact, alive.
Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
Live to be 100 with a boot on my neck?
No thanks.
Something like 2-4% of smokers get lung cancer. The vast majority of persons with lung cancer have never smoked. Smokers are more likely to have heart disease, but then so are people who don’t take care of their teeth. A weird but true fact.
Cranky, not only do we count every baby born with a beating heart, we go to heroic measures to make sure that everyone lives if they make it to the hospital with a pulse. We don’t tell you to get the fuck out and go home because we’re too busy right now. Like the NHS.
” I believe you can have liberty and smaller soda sizes.”
And that’s stupid. Because if you can’t buy and sell larger soda sizes then you ain’t really free.
“Which leaves good old-fashioned Big Government as the most likely option to actually fix stuff.”
Big Government’s record for fixing things is awful. It usually makes the problem worse. Observe the fuel ethanol initiatives effects on food prices. Observe the increases in insurance rates and reductions in full time employment (usually to temp status) caused by the Affordable health Care Initiative or its predecessor the HMO system designed by Liberal Ted Kennedy. Observe the increase traffic accident deaths caused by CAFE standards that make cars smaller and smaller.
“Nannies don’t imprison you, after all, and they never did. Their job is to help you stand on your own.”
Nannies are people that parents hire to watch their children while they go and do other things. Nannies can be fired at will by their employer. I am not a child and the government is not my parent. Thus I want to fire the Nanny and tell Mr. Mathias to take his silly pile of contradictory and faulty “liberal” assumptions and piss off.
He just wants the freedom to make you unfree, that’s all. It’s the freedom for you to do whatever he wants you to.
“Journalists,” including editorialists, are the pettiest of tyrants.
Little Master Mathis seems to be suffering from stunted growth…poor thing.