Atlas Will Shrug

So now that our President has signed into law the monstrosity that is ObamaCare, our nation is going to move into the future with great uncertainty facing all of us. I have listened to pundits from both sides argue about the effects this bill will have on our economy. I have heard the arguments about the right to healthcare and the need for all of America's citizens to be insured. I have no idea how this is all going to play out in the long run, but I do know that we have taken a major step towards removing one of our most basic tenets of our American society and culture... the belief that you can achieve through your own means your own life.

This bill represents more than healthcare change. This represents a fundamental and seismic shift in the role our imperial government will play in our everyday lives and decisions. Don't be fooled by the rhetoric that this is about 'helping people in need'. The men and women in Washington are smart enough to understand that handouts = votes, and votes= power. The irony is that the biggest losers in this whole song and dance are going to be the lower class, underemployed workers and laborers. H.R. 4872 states that by 2014, businesses that have employ 50 or more workers will be subject to fines if they do not provide 'affordable' coverage to their employees. Faced with this business decision, a business owner has an easy choice. Don't get bigger. Growing businesses in fast-paced industries will decide to stay small to avoid the fines and bureaucratic red tape that will come with expansion. Inventors, creators, and those that have put the economy on their backs over the past 240 years will choose to harbor their wealth elsewhere. These are smart business decisions, and they have every right to do with THEIR money and resources as they choose. And when they choose to stop producing, our economy, and therefore our culture as we know it, is going to come to a screeching halt.

I recently completed 'Atlas Shrugged' by Ayn Rand. She wrote the book in 1957, but this epic could have been written in 2010. The similarities are beyond eerie, they are absolutely scary. And in this book, the producers of America 'disappear' because they no longer have the opportunity to create. The central government has taxed and cheated and manipulated the laws into such a state that these leaders of industry no longer had reason to take risks and create. The men and women carrying the load of driving growth and innovation simply shrugged that load off.

Rand saw the writing on the wall 53 years ago. Its time we all take a minute to realize where this road is heading. This bill and the policies of this administration are curtailing our rights and limiting the opportunity for America to continue as the world's greatest society. America has been great because we have had the power to succeed or fail by our own merit, not by the redistribution of wealth. And even if you believe that people need help when they are down, this method of redistribution only reinforces their belief that they can't succeed on their own. And on top of that, the cost is unsustainable and too great for our economy to bear.

It will be interesting to see what transpires on the political front over the summer and into the fall election season. I believe this vote has triggered a conservative eye-opening the likes our liberal leaders have never seen. They have no idea the can of worms they have opened.