America's Left Is Attacking Free Enterprise

It’s becoming clearer by the day that the “public option” for health care is just rhetorical cover for kicking out free enterprise.
The latest evidence is the strategy to attack and condemn private insurance. Speaker Nancy Pelosi calls the industry “immoral villains.” President Obama told the press, “If you take some of the profit motive out . . . you can get an even better deal.” He also told NBC, “People are having bad experiences because they know that recommendations are coming from people who have a profit motive.”
The head of the House’s ultra-liberal 80-member Progressive Caucus, Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA), told reporters that the number of uninsured is a symptom that private insurance is a failure and must be replaced with a single-payer government system.
How absurd. Why blame companies because not everybody has bought their product? Why not blame government for passing the laws and the over-regulation that designed our current flawed system?
Pelosi and friends also claim insurance companies are out of control because they’re too big. Their answer? Something even bigger and less accountable—a government-run plan.
The new strategy of the left is actually an echo of what then-First Lady Hillary Clinton told an audience when pushing HillaryCare. She proclaimed that it’s wrong for anyone to make a profit by treating or insuring the sick.
So is it also evil to make money by providing necessities like food, clothing, and a place to live? Is it only acceptable to make a profit if you’re selling whatever government deems is okay?
And if health insurance is immoral, what about life insurance, auto insurance, property insurance, etc.? Will government also “help us” by taking them over to drive out the evil profit motive?
The Left has launched a dangerous debate on health care, but it’s actually an extension of their attacks on Wall Street, banking, mortgage brokers, and others. They believe the bad mistakes made by business are an opportunity for more government control, which means more power for the political elite.
Yes, we have problems in health care and in other areas, too. But the proposed cures are worse than the disease. Besides, free enterprise has created an American standard of living that’s still the envy of the world. Fixing its problems is no excuse to tarnish its successes.

From "The Foundry" at www.heritage.org.