[T]he Soviet health system [considers] health [as] a [human] right. … All health activities are directed by central bodies, the People’s Commissariats of Health [so that] health can be planned on a large scale. … [making] health accessible to all free of charge.
From Henry E. Sigerist, Socialized Medicine in the Soviet Union, W.W. Norton and Co., 1937
[A]t every turn, Democrats’ efforts to guarantee [universal] health coverage have been met by obstruction and opposition from the Republican Party.
Democrat Party Platform, ACHIEVING UNIVERSAL, AFFORDABLE, QUALITY HEALTH CARE
[Since] healthcare should be a human right, not a privilege for the wealthy, congresswoman Ocasio-Cortez proudly supports H.R.1976: Medicare for All Act of 2021, which creates a single-payer system that guarantees healthcare for all, regardless of income or employment status, while eliminating copays and premiums.
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Position on Healthcare
The average Soviet lives about 10 years less than the average American (62 for males and 69 for females, vs. 71 and 78 in the U.S.). In certain regions, life expectancy for males is 20 years less than in the U. S. (49 for males, 58 for females). In some rural areas, the life expectancy for males as low as 45 years. … The Soviet infant mortality rate—24.5 per 1,000—is 2.6 times [higher than] the U.S.’s & more than five times [higher than] Japan’s. … In the rural regions … and in the Central Asia [republics], the infant mortality rate is above 100 per 1,000 births [comparable with] Burkina Faso, Chad, and Bangladesh.
Yuri N. Maltsev, former member of economics team working on President Gorbachev’s perestroika reforms package, Mises Institute, 1990
The Deepest Problem of all: Democrats think they are God
Tulsi Gabbard, March 5, 2023
Like the old Soviet communists, AOC and the Democrats support universal guaranteed health care. AOC’s Facebook page states that she supports many other guaranteed rights as well, a living wage, parental Leave, Affordable Housing, Universal Childcare, etc. Criticizing Trump’s VP choice, J.D. Vance, she suggests that since Vance “is so fixated on kids, he must support pro-family policies, right?” before finishing, sarcastically, “Oh right, he doesn’t. He just wants an excuse to surveil and subjugate women”. It can’t be that Vance has a different view of how to solve the problem but that he is a meanie who just doesn’t care for woman (although his wife, a Yale J.D., and little girl haven’t, apparently, noticed this).
In fact, the Soviet Union had a list of guaranteed human rights similar to the list comrade Cortez’ posts on her Facebook page, including:
“… the right to work; … the right to social security and social insurance; the right of pregnant women, recent mothers, and children to special protection from economic exploitation, the right to adequate food, clothing, housing, and health care.”
The Democrat’s view that guaranteed universal health care is a human right, like the right to social security, adequate housing, etc., are often stated, just as they were in the old Soviet Union, as if this is obvious. But is it? One would think that the fact that the Soviet Union isn’t there anymore, and left so many dead people in its wake, might have generated some self-reflection in Democrats but, it seems, nothing is capable of doing that anymore.
Unfortunately, universal guaranteed health care cannot be a human right (certainly not now). Since “Ought implies can,” that is, since it makes no sense to say that some entity ought do something (e.g., provide universal guaranteed health care), and since it is not possible (certainly at present), to do so, it cannot be true that any government or an individual can be obligated to provide it, e.g., since it does not even make sense to say that everyone is guaranteed their own Ferrari, it cannot be a human right to have a Ferrari. The Soviet Union tried to guarantee certain impossible “rights” but learned the hard way, with lots of corpses, that one cannot do it.
The Soviet/Democrat claim that guaranteed universal health care is a human right sounds wonderful in Sociology 101, but it collides with this thing called “Reality”. One person who grew up in the Soviet Union described his experience with its health care system,
[Since the evil capitalist profit motive was outlawed] there was very little incentive within the official system for the doctors to provide better care for their patients as it did not affect their pay in any way. All health care was [theoretically] free, but it was customary to bring something for the doctor: chocolates, gifts, etc. To get better, prompter care, and referred to a better specialist required more valuable “gifts” [i.e., bribes].
As usual in socialistic and communist systems, there were shortages, long lines and waiting lists because when everything is free the system quickly becomes overwhelmed.
Of course, top Communist Party and government officials had their own Ministry of Health hospitals [with] full access to specialized medical care on the level of Western countries, free of charge. Wait! Aren’t communism and socialism supposed to eliminate such hierarchies?
Since communist and socialist ideas like guaranteed universal health care simply don’t work in reality, one needs a different perspective (even if the Central Committee of the Party forbids this). AOC, like communists/socialists, asks the wrong question: “Why can’t we have universal guaranteed health care, affordable housing, etc? The correct question is: “What system can be selected that provides the best possible health care, affordable housing, etc., to the most people possible?”
Even Karl Marx, in a remarkable passage in the Communist Manifesto, celebrates the enormous unparalleled productive power of capitalism:
“The bourgeoisie [capitalist] … has accomplished wonders, far surpassing Egyptian Pyramids, Roman aqueducts, and Gothic Cathedrals… [D]uring its rule of scarce of one hundred years, [it] has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than… all preceding generations together… [W]hat earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the lap of social labor?“
Yes, in a competitive capitalist system, some people will fall through the cracks, but it will generate so much wealth that, absent government waste (boondoggles like Solyndra), these unfortunate people can be covered by religious organizations, charities and even carefully targeted government programs.
Some people, blinded by a utopian ideology, never manage to come up against this thing called “Reality,” despite the fact that it is there in front of one’s nose all the time.
If one tries to do the impossible, one ends up with lots of corpses. The Democrats, like the Soviets, thought that, like God, they could say, “Let there be universal guaranteed health care,” and there would miraculously arise universal guaranteed health care. Unfortunately, one must deal with the reality one is given, not one’s imagination. If one is realistic, one can actually do a much better job of getting better health care to more people.
It turns out that Vance doesn’t want to “surveil and subjugate women.” He just has a different “philosophy” about how to get the job done.
Imagine that! Despite the discredited Marxist idea of the “class struggle”, not every problem is caused by a bogyman! Some people just have a different one of these things called “ideas” about how to solve it. Not everything has to be turned into hate for an election campaign!
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