A Classical Liberal

Megan McArdle has had two excellent posts on the topic of health so far this year, Don’t Get Sick and Don’t Get Old. Actually, the second one was a repost of a comment someone left on the first post. But both are the kind of sarcastic writing that I like. I’m going to actually stop and be serious for a change. Your health matters, and it’s up to you to take care of it. It’s best to act before the problem gets out of hand, that’s true. But if it’s out of hand already, acting now can still make a difference. There are no easy answers but regular exercise can improve your health. Also, eating healthier can improve your life. They won’t be the easiest thing you’ve ever done, but that doesn’t mean the effort isn’t worth it.

I finally found a link to this video on the health benefits of exercise.

I’m going to make a point to exercise more this year and eat healthier. In the past couple of years, I’ve lost 26 pounds and managed to keep it off. I’d be healthier if I lost another 26 pounds, but I’m going to focus on exercising more and eating a little healthier. If I do these things, I’ll be healthier whether I lose the weight or not.

With all the fight over proposed right to work legislation, I just have to wonder sometimes what the big deal is over. As I think Abdul pointed out, if Unions provide such great services to their members, why would their members not voluntarily pay dues? Are Union leaders upset because they think their members are too cheap to voluntarily pay for the services they provide? Or are they afraid that if they aren’t compelled to pay dues, their members might more closely question where all that money goes?

Is the primary purpose of labor unions today to negotiate a better deal for their employees or to raise funds for the Democratic Party? I think everyone on both sides of the aisle knows the answer to the question, and that’s what is making the issue a must win for the Democrats.

In the past month or so I’ve been watching my eight month daughter. A child is an amazing thing. She now sits up in a high chair when we go out to eat. She also reaches for menus and other things. It’s hilarious when she gets her hands on one of those disposable kiddie menus. She tries to eat it. I’ve patiently tried to explain to her that she isn’t supposed to eat it, but point at what she wants to eat. Of course she doesn’t eat anything on the menu yet. It’s fun to see how curious she is. She’s still young enough that she doesn’t really understand what everything is. In what will seem like a short time she’ll be demanding stuff she’s seen on TV. But for now it’s a blast to see her eyes discover new things she hasn’t seen before.

So it’s the start of another new year. I’m going to make an effort to make our country a better place. In November we will have an important election. The question is not just which man will be our next President, it is to define what the role of the Federal government in our lives. I believe that the role of government should be limited. I believe for every activity our Federal government does, we should ask if the Federal government is the best entity to do it. Can it be done better by state or local government? Can it be done better by a charity, or by a for profit business?

As a classical liberal, I believe that helping others is far too important to leave it to our government. All too often I forget to say this. So this Christmas, I’m asking you to go here and make a donation to support Riley Hospital for Children.

This post will remain on top until Christmas. All new content will appear below this.

Instapundit has a link to an old post of his from 10 years ago, that public health experts are worried about too many in the public health field are European males, and the cycle of violence. At least when they dwell on meaningless bullshit, they aren’t doing harm by talking about the importantance of a low fat diet.

As Walter Willett (European male Chair of the Department of Nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health) says:

One of the problems with a low-fat diet is that it actually drives down the good cholesterol — the HDL — in our blood (and that) … will probably increase the risk of heart disease,

I may well eat too much saturated fat, but I think my health would be helped more by either a thirty minute daily walk, or by cutting back on white flour and sugar in my diet.

At the moment my Internet connection is down, so posts here will be short and sweet until that problem is resolved. As in the only two ways I can post are from my cell phone, or by dragging a laptop down to the library. Neither is very fun.

My wife and I both work full time. We pay Federal income tax. We manage to make our mortgage payment on time every month. Our credit cards aren’t maxed out. We have assets in addition to debts. We’re slowly working on paying the debts off. We bought our house just over two years ago, and we can afford the payments. We might even actually have some equity in our home.

Despite our income and assets, we are not in the top 1%, and never will be. The reason we will never be in the top 1% is not that we are oppressed by the 1%. It is that we have better things to do with our lives. I would like to watch my daughter grow up.

It’s your life, make of it what you will.

Now that the Libyan despot is dead, Kos is tweeting that it now makes the war in Libya justified. (Hat tip to Instapundit.)

Perhaps someone should read the reactions to the death of Saddam Hussein from people at Daily Kos. I’m not saying that Saddam’s trial was without flaw, I’m just saying at least he got a trial. And his sons got to go out fighting.

Via Instapundit and Powerline comes an article in The Hill quoting Harry Reid.

“It’s very clear that private-sector jobs have been doing just fine; it’s the public-sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about,” Reid said on the Senate floor.

Pardon me, but does the Senate Majority leader get out of Washington, DC much? The current unemployment rate is 9.1%, and most of these people are out of work private sector workers looking for new jobs. This doesn’t count the large number of Americans who are working part time and would rather work full time, or the large number of Americans who have given up looking for work. The economy may be creating a few more private sector jobs than are lost every day, but private sector unemployment is still a huge problem. The only lasting solution to private sector unemployment is private sector job creation.

How bad is the private sector problem with unemployment and a lack of job creation? It’s so big that it’s causing tax revenues to cities and states to be depressed. Which is causing the only problem Reid can see, which is the loss of public sector jobs. If the private sector job creation problem were solved, it would provide a huge infusion of tax revenues to state and local governments, and would fix the problem Reid is complaining about.