The intensity and venom coming from conservative opponents of health insurance reform is so great that we simply must examine the conservative argument to find out how so many folks could be so adamant and resistant to compromise. The conservative punditocracy and blogosphere has been making the conservative argument for over a year now, but it has only resonated with those predisposed to it. So, what is it? At it's core, opponents of health insurance reform are arguing that any increase in government regulation of the health insurance industry will decrease the individual freedom of Americans. It will decrease the freedom of Americans by imposing conditions on each individuals' decisions regarding health insurance, and it will cost Americans now and in future generations a lot of money that could have been used by individuals for their own purposes. Arguments that it would reduce people's burdens and increase their freedom from the greed and deception of insurance companies or even that it would save money in the long run, get no hearing because they are irrelevant to the principle being defended here.
For ideological conservatives, Freedom from government isn't supposed to be a guarantee of a good deal, or even of fair treatment from other Americans. It's simply the freedom from the government, it's rules, and it's influence. The perils of free competition are beyond the scope of limited government. Neither economic winners or losers should be subjected to government regulation or assistance. Economic winners deserve the fruits of their labors and economic losers deserve the opportunity to aspire to success and to chart their own path thereto. Requiring winners to "help" losers punishes the winners and creates moral hazards for the losers, whose ambition and drive are stunted by un-earned assistance. Civil society, not government, is the appropriate venue for charity and community activism because only there can the incentives of reward and punishment be maintained.
As near as I can tell the entirety of the explanation above satisfies the dictates of logic and is free from "intellectual" inconsistency, primarily because it is a theoretical argument from start to finish. Real life consequences are therefore of necessity beside the point. Frankly, the notion that it takes courage to stand on principle implies a willingness to ignore consequential claims, however compelling, precisely because such claims are not rooted in principle.
Passionate adherence to this view of individual freedom and its implications for health insurance reform represents a strong (if uncompromising) commitment to a principle that every American respects, even if its definition is debatable. The problem with this principled argument is with its proponents, not it's logic. Apocalyptic rhetoric and personal recriminations of those who disagree with this argument distort and discredit it. The hysterical and inarticulate defense of this principled position has the unintended but serious consequence of creating unjust associations between principled arguments and unreasonableness, anger, and even violence. So great was the fear of moral absolutism unleashed on politics that the Framers of the Constitution chose political stability over moral righteousness and side-stepped the greatest moral issue of their time, slavery.
When political leaders and their foot soldiers merely take the righteousness of their cause and its fidelity to our Framers intentions on faith, without clearly articulating their principles and soberly acknowledging the real life implications of those principles, they debase our national institutions and our cherished ideals.
In my opinion, anyone making this principled argument honestly and with unflinching acceptance of its implication in theory and in practice deserves respect and even admiration for playing a crucial role in our national dialogue. It is just such principled stands against reform of any kind that deter over-reaching by zealous reformers and that preserve one of the most American of American values; reasonable suspicion of centralized power, benign or otherwise. If a majority of Americans really sees the health insurance reforms as a step toward excessive government power when the principled and practical consequences are plain, then I cannot quibble with sincere efforts to stop or curb these reforms, even as I argue sincerely FOR them.
From my perspective the only way one side of this historic debate can lose is if the debate ends. The Framers of the Constitution were quite clear about their commitment to a free society and above all about the imperative that such a society can only endure when the competition for power and policy in the public interest is perpetual. Only while Americans, passionate and precise in their cause, can press the their case in the public square with civility and respect, will our cherished freedoms truly be secure.