Jeff Takada, Central California, 11th Congressional District

Events

Tea Parties: The Key to America`s Freedom

Tuesday February 9, 2010, 10:37 pm

I think the Tea Party movement is one of the seminal moments in American political history.  There is nothing more fundamentally American than individuals finding common cause in the reinvigoration of the founding principles that made our country a true beacon in history – limited government, a firm commitment to the strength of the working man`s dollar, and that a nation need not be built on greed or fear or violence, but on the simple principle that a government`s purpose is to protect the natural rights of its citizenry.

I guess I was spoiled growing up.  I knew nothing about the foibles of Nixon and the malaise of Carter.  My baptism into the world of global politics was the so-called Miracle on Ice – the crushing by an upstart collection of American amateurs of the most formidable hockey team in the world, the Soviet Union.  My dad explained (as best he could to a toddler) the complexities of the Cold War and the constant threat that lay implicitly over the people of the US and the USSR.  I distinctly remember wondering what it would be like when – not if, when – I heard a loud crack and looked out my window to see a mushroom cloud billowing out from behind Mt. Diablo, having consumed San Francisco.  In this very uneasy state, I began to watch Ronald Reagan on the television and he struck me (I was a child, mind you) as a kindly, grandfatherly figure.  His tone, his mannerisms, and his actions reassured me that my worst fears would not come true.  Not because he would prevent it but because WE would prevent it.  Being American, standing up for freedom, protecting our allies and friends was a job we could all do; not a job that a president could solve, if only the government had a bit more money or if the people would stop clinging to their rights.  Being American was a mindset and Reagan, to my young mind, seemed to be calling us forth to act on the better angels of our nature, not the fears that drove them away.

Since Reagan passed from the political scene, very few men and women in politics have impacted me in the same way.  I look for leaders and I see followers.  I look for humility and I see hubris.  I look for honesty and I see deceit.  I look for resolve and I find cowardice.  That is why I have stopped looking for direction from a fossilized political elite and see that the answers to the problems we have allowed our leaders to foist upon us can be solved by the same juggernaught that willed the Soviet Union to its knees – Ronald Reagan`s WE.  Us.  The individual American citizen.  We are the posterity for whom the Founding Fathers sought to secure the blessings of liberty and all we have to do is join our voices to those of our neighbors, friends, co-workers, and family and say we want our country back.

This is what the Tea Party movement is all about.  The American system of government inherently empowers the citizen by enumerating and offering protections for our natural rights, but there is a growing dread that we have outsourced those protections to a disinterested plutocracy – Wall Street versus Main Street.  The power of momentum that the Tea Party movement generates may be enough to allow for a new birth of freedom.

I have said that a major catalyst to me joining the race to become the U.S. Representative from District 11 was a tea party rally held in Modesto in 2009.  I watched radio hosts Dave Diamond and Rusty Humphries exhort the crowd not to let the momentum, the energy, the passion of that day die when the crowd dispersed.  I wondered who would take them at their word and challenge the political elite with the ideas common to the Tea Party movement – limited government, slashed taxes, a return to Constitutional values, and a retreat of Washington, D.C. out of the storerooms, classrooms, and boardrooms or America.  It appears I am the only one – in District 11 anyway.  It is a lonely fight.  At times it takes me away from my classroom, my family, and thrusts me into the oozing, gaseous realm so comfortable to our grasping political class.  Then I think about Reagan and all he meant to me as a youth.  He was someone working on my side, with me for a world where self-determination and freedom from fear and oppression were the order of the day.  I am no Ronald Reagan, but I have taken a stand and am asking what we together can do to turn this nation back towards the sun and forge a better future for our posterity as the Founding Fathers and Reagan did for theirs.

It’s about health care

Wednesday February 3, 2010, 1:12 pm

At a recent forum in San Ramon, I was asked a question by a member of the audience what was to be done about the health care crisis.  Something about that phrase leapt out at me and I had to reevaluate what I was going to say.  My response could be summed up in the following paragraph.

The word crisis conjures up images of doctors not doctoring, nurses not nursing, patients going untreated – like a medieval sanatorium.  We do not have this condition in America.  Almost 300 million people in this country have available to them the finest medical establishment in the history of the world.  The crisis is not in health care – the crisis is in the cost of health care and the two responsible maladies are both directly attributable to the federal government and Congress in particular.

HMOs are roundly criticized today as being the evil, soulless bureaucracies that prevent egalitarian medical treatment of all, but you must remember that Congress itself created the HMO system we know today with the HMO Act of 1973.  Prior to that, medical practice was still very market oriented, because the free market over the course of our Republic had set it up that way.  Doctors made house calls and took on charity and hardship cases, religious and humanitarian groups built and managed hospitals (it’s not a mystery why so many have religious names), and costs were managed by the simple fact that if one provider charged you too much, you simply went to his competitor.  HMOs do prevent many of these workable facets of our former system from functioning today, but it must be understood that Congress’ initial meddling was what has gotten us into “crisis” mode.

The second reason for skyrocketing health care is inflation.  Prices have been inflating, at a faster or slower rate for 100 years.  The dollar is now only worth five percent of what it was when the Federal Reserve willed itself into existence on the pretext of preventing inflation.  They have failed in their mission and we are paying the cost – in increasingly worthless dollars.  This overall economic trend will necessarily have a negative effect on the cost of medical services and pharmaceuticals.  By refusing to reign in the Federal Reserve and its inflationary practices, by fostering runaway government spending, which facilitates the spread of those inflated dollars into the marketplace, and by basing our national ledger on debt and borrowing rather than on wealth and industry, Congress has created a perfect storm.

The climax of this tragi-comedy is that culprit that created this storm is now selflessly preaching to the people that only it can save them – if only they surrender their free market principles, rights to privacy, and their quaint desire not to be treated in the ER or the obstetrics wing as they are at the DMV.

As if it weren’t bad enough that our pilots seem intent on wrecking the ship of our medical establishment on the shoals of big government, there are sharks in the water too – I’m talking about trial lawyers.  Why don’t doctors take on charity cases in the US anymore?  Because they could be ruined by the first grifter that came along.  How effective can a surgeon be when he must glance over his proverbial shoulder to see if an attorney is wagging his finger at him?

I want to conclude by saying that the problem we face is a major one with no quick fixes – at least not when the fix is in from Washington.  But when I take your message to Capitol Hill, I will work hard to see that all medical expenses are tax deductible, Health Savings Accounts are available to all Americans should they so choose, and that employers can deduct contributions to your health plans from their taxes.

In the future, I would like very much to continue this discussion about the dangerous and un-Constitutional nature of government run health care, especially a conversation I had with a student recently on the subject.  Please let me know what you think.  I look forward to hearing from you.