Do you have a political point of view? If so, what and why?
Yes, I have a specific point of view politically. It is the politics of
Objectivism, the philosophy of Ayn Rand.
Objectivism advocates capitalism
in politics, capitalism being the political system based on the principle
of individual rights, where all property is owned privately. Under capitalism,
the government exists only to secure individual rights, and nothing
more.
For me to explain why capitalism is the proper political system
would take volumes, but the short answer is that it is the kind of system
appropriate to man's nature. It is the only political-economic system that
regards man as a trader - a contractual animal - not as a sacrificial
animal.
Ayn Rand defined and explained capitalism better than anyone else
in history, so I refer you to her works. The essence of her defense of
capitalism was on moral grounds, not on practical grounds. It is true, however,
that capitalism is also practical; but, this is an effect, not a cause. The
cause is a man's right to live for his own sake, sacrificing neither self nor
others. When markets are free from government interference, most people will
benefit, prosper, grow richer, and have more services available to them. This
phenomenon is true historically. This is not, however, the reason to uphold
capitalism as the proper system. Capitalism should be held up as the proper
system because it is the only moral system of human interaction ever
devised.
The United States of America, in my lifetime, has moved from a
semi-capitalist political state to a fascist state. Fascism is defined as a
political state where the government regulates businesses heavily but claims
that the business is someone's private property. As a physician, I state
without any hesitation that medicine is no longer even semi-private. With the
passage of the new health care bill in March of 2010, the markets in medicine
have been relegated to the status of servants of the State. The prices are
fixed for physicians' services, there are codes of silence that are irrational
(HIPAA) and unintelligible, and there are "official", government sanctioned,
diagnoses that are covered by the CPT codes (Current Procedural Terminology),
the coding system "owned" by the American Medical Association, which is the only
system that the government acknowledges for payments to physicians for Medicare
and Medicaid patients, under fines of thousands of dollars for "wrong"
codes.
Capitalism, properly defined, is a benefit to man as such, as
manifested in each, individual human being. As a system, it can provide a
structure by which government secures rights and makes it possible for
individuals to live in freedom and without fear of the government or from other
men. The fact that we do not live in such a system today in the United States
is pathetic, but it can be changed, provided that individuals in the United
States discover what capitalism is and take action to restore it. That is one
of my tasks for the future.
