Obama's Assaults on Liberty Proceed Unabated

Obama's Assaults on Liberty Proceed Unabated
David Limbaugh
Tuesday, June 15, 2010

I cannot be the only one who feels as if every new day brings a new assault on this nation and its people by this administration. Indeed, many people I know say they can't even watch the news anymore because it's so depressing. And it is.

Some of these assaults occur under the radar, and others are right out in the open. As an example of the former, last week, President Obama issued an executive order "Establishing the National Prevention, Health Promotion, and Public Health Council," which will focus on "lifestyle behavior modification (including smoking cessation, proper nutrition, appropriate exercise, mental health, behavioral health, substance-use disorder, and domestic violence screenings)." It will even recommend changes in federal policy to reduce "sedentary behavior."

The order also creates an advisory group within the Department of Health and Human Services that will answer to the surgeon general, who will serve as the chairwoman of the council.

In case you're wondering what authority the president launched this program under, he covers that in the first paragraph of the executive order: "By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 4001 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Public Law 111-148), it is hereby ordered..."

In other words, "I am the president, and the Constitution and Obamacare let me do anything I want to."

The socialized medicine nightmare is already beginning. Many of us warned that Obamacare would serve as an all-purpose justification for government intervention in every aspect of our lives. Have we become so far removed from our founding principles that we don't grasp the perniciousness of such government encroachments into our private lives and personal liberties?

You must read the executive order: http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/executive-order-establishing-national-prevention-health-promotion-and-public-health. Then you'll understand that the council and "Advisory Group" it establishes will not be merely advisory. The provisions of this "order" underscore the disturbing extent to which Obama and his band of authoritarians intend to control our lives.

The "Advisory Group," in consultation with the council, must submit, by March 23, 2011, a "national strategy" to "set specific goals and objectives for improving the health of the United States through federally supported prevention, health promotion, and public health programs, consistent with ongoing goal setting efforts conducted by specific agencies."

The council, among other things, will "develop, after obtaining input from relevant stakeholders," a strategy to promote health and prevent disease. Relevant stakeholders?

Under this administration -- and every administration that follows, now that socialized medicine has enveloped our society -- will everything be reduced to a calculation of dollars and cents? Will we tolerate any manner of government control over the most minute aspects of our lives under the rationale that we have to improve our lifestyles to get healthier so that health care costs don't bankrupt us? Does liberty mean nothing to us anymore?

If the abstract concept of liberty doesn't rock your boat, how about a little common sense? If Obama had been primarily interested in reducing health care costs, he would have introduced market solutions instead of a bill guaranteed to add enormously to the national debt -- about which this administration egregiously and repeatedly lied. More information is surfacing every day proving that the bill will cost billions more than Obama claimed. He may end up imposing cost controls under Obamacare, but if he does, you can be assured that they will be at the expense of quality care, especially for seniors.

Lifestyle behavior modification is none of the government's business, but it is even less the prerogative of a renegade, unaccountable executive acting outside the law through unconstitutional executive orders. On that point, by the way, please check out Section 3G, which provides that the council will "carry out such other activities as are determined appropriate by the President." No limitations, just whatever this omniscient president determines is appropriate.

There is no excuse -- none -- for any existing or prospective congressman to fail to comprehend the magnitude of the revolution that is now occurring inside our government. Any candidate who downplays or whitewashes the gravity of the ongoing assaults against our liberties must be defeated. Any congressman who suggests we can just tinker around at the edges of Obamacare and strip away its most noxious provisions -- as opposed to "repeal and replace" -- must be defeated.

In the meantime, in full view of the radar, Obama is now demanding another $80 billion stimulus plan, as well as $50 billion more in deficit spending to bail out state and local governments, $23 billion of which will be earmarked for government teachers unions.

This is mind-boggling. Nothing will deter this man's thirst to radically change America, including controlling every aspect of our lives and redistributing money to his friends and preferred recipients.