The Obama/Roberts Doctrine of Christian Rewards/Punishments

The notion that we are all our brothers' keepers lies at the heart of our Judeo-Christian heritage. It also happens to be one of the fundamental tenets of socialism - which accounts in large parts for that perverse ideology's widespread appeal. Either philosophy can - and has been - used to justify the notion that health care is a "right" rather than a good tradable in the marketplace.

Our nation's Founders, despite their religious backgrounds, rejected this communitarian ethos at the time of the writing of the Constitution. Instead, they placed strict limits on the power and scope of government. These limits were designed to protect the freedom and autonomy of the individual, leaving it up to civil society to promote virtue. However, they have been eroding for eighty years, and are now all but dead.

Looking at the recent Supreme Court's decision upholding Obamacare, I am struck with the notion that it's not the Constitution that served as the controlling authority but, rather, the Bible put in service of a runaway democracy. Viewed this way, it should come as no surprise that a "compassionate conservative" should be the prime enabler of a collectivist agenda for a government takeover of the health care business. After all, the seeds were planted 2,000 years ago.

When Paul of Tarsus launched his mission to bring Jesus's gospel to the gentiles, he replaced the communal view of sin and atonement long practiced by the Jews with an individual standard that tracked each individual's sins and good deeds. The Almighty could then dispense judgment based on an accounting between the two. Lest the irredeemable completely give themselves over to a life of wickedness, confession allowed sinners to periodically wipe the slate clean. Through these methods, the behavior of large numbers of believers could be controlled by promising the appropriate rewards, or punishments, in the afterlife.

The state has long had the power to shower financial benefits on citizens of its choosing as a means to reward political fealty or influence broad classes of behaviors - such as, for example, incentivizing people to buy an electric car that makes no economic sense. The problem with this approach is that not everyone can be bribed. Despite the enormous resources at the government's disposal, its power to spend is insufficient for a task as large as commandeering 16% of the economy. Hence the individual mandate, which the Court's majority tenuously justified as based on the power to tax.

Thanks to his brilliant sophistry, Chief Justice John Roberts has now given the state a stick to complement the carrot, articulating a power to tax the absence of behavior the government deems virtuous. The business model that penalizes a citizen for failure to "do the right thing" - in this case buy health insurance to assure the solvency of the insurance industry - is profoundly Christian in that it is asking an individual to act against what he perceives to be his own self-interest for the greater good of the community.

While socialists and Christians are not often portrayed as bedfellows - the latter are strongly represented among the more conservative elements of the Republican Party - Obama is merely practicing what the early Christians preached. But ponder for a moment, particularly if you are a Democrat celebrating this latest expansion of government power, what happens when Republicans come to office and begin to wield this new power?

What limiting principle will Democrats call on to prevent a Republican majority from taxing, say, the failure of an individual to save for his own retirement? Does it not impose a cost on the whole community if a young person engages in conspicuous consumption only to become a burden on society in old age? What about taxing the failure to get an education or learn a trade? Can this also be justified because of the potential burden the unemployed place on society? How about taxing the failure to get married before having children? Or taxing the failure to take care of elderly parents?

The list of virtues is at least as long as the list of sins. Now that the power to tax the absence of the former has been codified in law, imagine the mischief that an out of control Congress can get into.