Health care the capitalist way: Part 3

In an arrogant display on Christmas Eve morning, the U.S. Senate gave the American people a big, dark piece of coal when it passed a massive health care package that simply does not address the primary problem with our system: skyrocketing costs. According to the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office, premiums would rise by as much as $2,000 for a family policy. The government’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services assert a 5.1 percent increase in healthcare-to-GDP spending (to 21.1 percent, currently 16 percent) with reform compared to a 4.8 percent increase by doing nothing. And for those under 30, premiums could rise by 50 or 60 percent, according to Robert Zirkelbach of America’s Health Insurance Plans.

Congress should just scrap their big-government healthcare schemes and instead adopt the “Capitalist Manifesto for Healthcare Reform,” several specific, free-market fixes for healthcare. Previously in the series, I proposed several cost-cutting initiatives: increasing competition for individual consumers and permitting it across state lines, decreasing pharmeceutical regulation and permitting the importation of prescription drugs.

Now, in the final installment, we will examine lowering costs by freeing up medical malpractice, the regulatory system and Medicare and Medicaid, all critical reform components.

Reforming Medical Malpractice: If you’re a doctor, you better have malpractice insurance. Otherwise, you’re taking a huge risk. No matter what happens, even if a doctor does her job right and everything turns out well, you’re in danger of a class action lawsuit, known as “tort.”

According to Dr. Russell Turk, “[A] September survey of more than 5,000 obstetricians/gynecologists conducted by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists' (ACOG) [found that] in Florida, the state with the highest premiums, ob/gyns pay an average of $195,000 annually…The ACOG survey found that 63 percent of ob/gyns report making changes to their practice due to the fear of liability claims or litigation. In addition, 8 percent said they had stopped practicing obstetrics altogether.”

Doctors across the country are in such risk of getting hit with a massive lawsuit that their costs in malpractice insurance are astronomical. I agree with Dr. Turk when he says, “I fully support the idea of doctors being penalized and disciplined when they have been negligent. But you can do everything right and still get sued for a poor outcome.” As he notes, this also affects how doctors practice medicine, like what risks they’re willing to take to save lives.

Medical malpractice concerns also encourage greater use of defensive medicine, meaning doctors conduct tests they wouldn’t otherwise do to prevent lawsuits. In fact, defensive medicine costs the system an estimated $70 billion a year. Doctors should neither be prevented from doing what is necessary to serve their patients, nor forced into doing what is unnecessary and costly, just to protect themselves.

Tort reform, therefore, is absolutely essential for doctors, which will in turn pass on lower costs to consumers and insurance companies. It is imperative that punitive awards for medical malpractice be capped. In addition, those things for which one can go to court to seek damages should be reexamined and limited somewhat to prevent the application of inappropriate pressure on doctors from doing what may really be necessary to serve the needs of their patients.

However, the reforms that are necessary to lower costs and doctors’ concerns cannot all be undertaken at the federal level, due to federalism. Therefore, there are actions that must be taken at the federal and state levels, and the feds should perhaps consider providing incentives to states to do their part. It is imperative that, as part of a comprehensive healthcare reform package, both levels of government begin taking steps to reform the oppressive tort laws that are strangling the nation’s medical practitioners and pushing costs up.

Don’t Hate; Deregulate: I know what you’re thinking. Deregulation…isn’t that what got us into financial crisis in the first place? In fact, as economist Walter Williams points out, “In the banking and finance industries [from which the crisis stems], regulatory spending between 1980 and 2007 almost tripled, rising from $725 million to $2.07 billion.”

Economist Jeffrey Friedman noted, “The financial crisis was caused by the complex, constantly growing web of regulations designed to constrain and redirect modern capitalism. This complexity made investors, bankers and perhaps regulators themselves ignorant of regulations previously promulgated across decades and in different ‘fields’ of regulation.”

Deregulation was not the real cause of the financial crisis; regulation was. Furthermore, the healthcare and financial sectors are entirely different in nature, and the fact of the matter is, healthcare is one of the most heavily regulated industries in the country. According to Duke University’s Chris Conover, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, the net cost of health regulation is $169 billion a year, after subtracting beneficial regulatory costs. As with any industry, in order to pay for the dictates of the government, institutions of health are forced to raise costs, which extends to consumers in the form of higher prices—a whopping $1,500 per household in this case.

Bear in mind that the regulations I’m talking about are not your essential safety regulations, but $169 billion in excessive, burdensome regulations, like the tort system, FDA regulations like those addressed in Column #2 and regulation of health facilities.

In fact, Conover’s research has shown that while roughly 18,000 Americans die from lack of health insurance, 22,000 die due to health services regulation, and seven million uninsured owe their state to excessive regulation. Cutting back on those unnecessary and cumbersome, but targeted and non-essential requirements/restrictions at both the federal and state levels would free up the market and enable health providers to lower costs.

Fixing Medicare and Medicaid: Medicare and Medicaid are the two most prominent government-run healthcare programs currently on the books. Medicare provides medical insurance for the elderly, and Medicaid is a massive federal-state partnership affording healthcare to the poor and indigent. While both of these programs are well-intentioned, they are financially unsustainable and require updates for application in a 21st century world.

Medicaid is a drain on federal and state budgets. To help control costs, states should be given near-absolute flexibility in determining how Medicaid is to be doled out—not more money. In fact, how Medicaid funding is given to the states encourages fraud and waste. And both Medicaid and Medicare reimburse doctors at as much as 30 percent below the normal rate—meaning costs are distributed to others. Fraud, abuse, waste and inefficiency need to be identified and cut from both of these programs. Fund distribution methods must be altered, and we must reexamine who is allowed to benefit from them, particularly from Medicare.

We need to start taming the Medicare leviathan, which has $89.3 trillion in unfunded liabilities. The layman’s solution to Medicare lies in allowing qualified individuals to opt out of the program if they so choose; slapping a grandfather clause on the 2003 Medicare Part D prescription drug benefit, meaning that those who are not currently on the program will not receive expansionist Part D benefits; and making Medicare means-tested, meaning that folks like Bill Gates would be ineligible for benefits.

Whether or not a person qualifies for Medicare benefits should rely on several factors, principally income level but perhaps also including yearly expenses, savings and the number of dependents. The switch to a means-tested structure should pertain solely to those who are currently under the age of 50 or 55; that way, all who are already anticipating on entering the Medicare program soon will be able to. The program will slowly work its way down, and the increased cost burden it shifts to the private healthcare industry will shrink as a result.

By taking these three critical steps toward reforming what we've got right now and thereby expanding freedom in the marketplace, we will undoubtedly be able to pull the brakes on skyrocketing healthcare costs as our system speeds on its way to the cliff of no return.

Health care the capitalist way - 2

As Reagan said, “Individual freedom and ingenuity are at the core of everything we’ve accomplished.” All that has made America great has come from empowering the people, including and especially when it comes to the market. Capitalism has been the engine of prosperity for this country going back to its founding. As such, I am now proposing that Congress and the President consider the “Capitalist Manifesto for Healthcare Reform,” several specific, free-market fixes for the healthcare problem. In the first article of this series, I examined the importance of breaking down two critical barriers to competition: the third-party based system that sets consumers apart from paying and decision-making and state laws prohibiting insurance purchases across state lines. Cost and affordability, not quality of care, are the key issues with our healthcare system. So let’s look at another way in which we can directly empower the individual beyond increased choice and expand affordability—by adjusting policies surrounding the importation of cheaper prescription drugs.

High Costs: Prescription drug costs often contribute greatly to higher healthcare costs. According to the Kaiser Family Foundation, the number of prescriptions purchased in the U.S. between 1994 and 2004 was a whopping 68 percent, with prices averaging increases of 8.3 percent yearly during that period. “Although still only a modest part of total health care spending in the U.S (11 percent),” they note, “with so many people relying on prescriptions, the cost implications loom large for the American public, health insurers, and government payers.” The problems lie in Research and Development spending—specifically, patents and FDA regulations—and the fact that importing prescription drugs is illegal under current U.S. law.

Patents: Both patents and FDA regulations are significant contributors to $800 million in costs to launch a single new pharmaceutical product—costs which result in higher prices for consumers. First, patents are designed to give a company temporary monopoly on the product so that they can recover their R&D spending. A patent lasts 20 years, yet as the CATO Institute’s Roger Pilon points out, “the effective life for drug patents is about nine years.” Logically, the shorter the time, the higher companies must charge per unit during that time to make up for the costs. This process must be changed to permit the same amount of patent time that other products have.

FDA Regulations: Then there are regulations. Today, according to PHRMA, the process of discovery to FDA approval takes an average of 12 to 15 years. As such, many people who would accept the risks involved suffer during this time. As economist Milton Friedman suggested, “[T]he one big development you could make would be to go back [to the situation where you have] the FDA certify safety…but not efficacy, and let the market itself work in determining efficacy.”

Indeed, the FDA should test only for safety and allow doctors and consumers to judge efficacy, which would decrease costs substantially and thus allow for cheaper medications. By altering the regulatory process, more innovation and development will result in addition to lower prices.

Prescription Drug Importation: Finally, current law makes it illegal for prescription drugs to come to the U.S. from anyone other than the American producer. As of now, they must be approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for importation. Consequently, competition between prescription drug providers is stifled, as U.S. manufacturers lack the incentive to cut prices to beat out lower-priced contenders. But individuals, states and cities are already beginning to avoid these laws and import drugs from other countries. This should be made official: by permitting the importation of lower-cost prescription drugs from countries like Canada, consumers will have a larger list of affordable, cheaper medications to choose from.

Of course, we do have a right to know if what we’re buying hasn’t been FDA, so what’s to say that the government can’t mandate that imported prescription drugs say “NOT APPROVED BY FDA” in big, bold letters and be placed in sections stating “NOT APPROVED BY FDA” in the pharmacy? Leave it up to me and my doctor, not big brother Sam, to decide whether or not I want to buy a cheaper drug from Canada, approved by their version of the FDA, instead of the more expensive product from Georgia.

There are other concerns as well. The Heritage Foundation’s Nina Owcharenko, for instance, makes a good point: prescription drugs in other, Westernized countries are fixed in accordance with price controls, which would distort the international market and advantage foreign manufacturers.

However, we must recognize that the vast majority of R&D costs are being paid for by the Americans, with other countries essentially getting a free pass. The U.S. is the only nation where market dynamics of supply and demand play out in pharmaceuticals—and with good reason. Price controls in other countries, as Owcharenko points out, reduce R&D spending (not costs) for new drugs by as much as $5 to $8 billion each year and trials for new medical compounds by as much as 50-60 percent.

But as long as the ban on importation is in effect, American drug manufacturers are going to recoup their R&D costs here instead of pushing supply and demand principles on other countries—meaning higher prices for us. Essentially, prices are set differently in the U.S. from other countries, meaning the U.S. shoulders the cost burden.

By eliminating the importation ban, other countries will have no choice but to react to supply and demand principles, as American manufacturers will find it necessary to cut prices at home and raise them abroad. Thus, other countries will have to share in R&D costs, which is long overdue.

As Roger Pilon notes, pharmaceuticals can use contractual agreements (to do such things as restrict drug resale), limits on supply, and export pressures, among other things, to help ensure that foreign countries are not undercutting the company. In effect, American manufacturers will be encouraged to do whatever they can to discourage importation in order to maintain their market share, which can be done by lowering prices here and raising prices elsewhere.

Should the U.S. government repair the patent process, refocus FDA regulations and permit the importation of prescription drugs, Americans of all stripes will surely benefit from a noticeable reduction of healthcare expenses.

This is the second of four columns proposing specific, free-market alternatives for healthcare. The next will center on expanding access to Health Savings Accounts as the free-market way to insure the uninsured.

Jimmy Sengenberger hosts Regis’s weekly Seng Center radio talk show every Thursday night from 6pm to 8pm online at krcx.org. The author can be reached at Jimmy@SengCenter.com.

Health care the capitalist way - 1

Obama is right up to a point. The status quo on health care is unacceptable. Too many people are without access to affordable coverage, and millions of people are uninsured through no fault of their own. We need change. But President Obama’s government answer is not the way to go. Capitalism has been the engine of prosperity for this country going back to its founding. As such, I am now proposing that Congress and the President consider the “Capitalist Manifesto for Healthcare Reform,” several specific, free-market fixes for the healthcare problem. The most critical aspect of reform, and the starting point, must be increased competition—something else President Obama claims to favor.

Putting You in Control: There’s a basic principle in economics that isn’t talked about all that much, but it stands true thanks to human nature: If someone else—a middleman—is putting up most of the cash for something people really want—or need—they’re going to get it more. You’re not worried about the cost—someone else is paying. This is exactly what happens with healthcare.

Government regulation and policies have essentially mandated a third party-based system that forces the consumer to work through health insurance companies, HMO's, employers and other middlemen that pay the supplier. 84% of all personal healthcare spending is made through private health insurance, the government or other private expenditures that are not directly from the patient.

Encouraging the third-party system are tax exemptions for employer-provided health insurance that the millions of self-employed and small business owners and workers who pay on their own do not receive. Own a big business? Congrats—you get a nice little tax exemption for healthcare! Run that mom-and-pop shop down the street, or your own home-based business? Tough. As Seinfeld’s Soup Nazi would put it, “No tax exclusion for you!”

These government incentives, policies and regulations put in place, in large part by the federal tax code, do nothing more than exacerbate the problem. Because of the third-party-payer system, health providers aren’t competing for individual consumers—they’re contending for large corporations like Target and Cisco. The problem here is that individuals are separated from the cost, driving up prices (premiums), and thus taking away decision-making authority of the patient.

Not a day goes by where we don't see commercials for Geico, AllState and other car insurance companies competing over who provides the best service at the lowest price—competition absent from healthcare because of the third-party system. To fix this, the government must equalize the healthcare tax exemption across the board so that everyone, not just middlemen and big business, will benefit from it. That means small businesses as well as individuals, all of whom will then be far more equipped to go out and find an affordable health insurance plan for themselves, their families, and their employees—plans that are right for them.

We should also examine the other policies and regulations that encourage the third-party system. As a result of both of these decisive actions, costs will go down. Making these adjustments to the current system would open up the market to increased competition by allowing consumers to shop around on their own, decreasing costs substantially while maintaining high quality.

Expand the Sphere of Competition: In his recent speech to Congress on healthcare, President Obama acknowledged the extensive concentration of business in the health insurance industry. As he pointed out, “75 percent of the insurance market is controlled by five or fewer companies. In Alabama, almost 90 percent is controlled by just one company.” While there are some issues with the calculation of these numbers, he is generally correct—the market is highly centralized and void of real competition. Another fundamental reason for this problem is again government-created: the inability to purchase health insurance plans across state lines.

Thanks to the 1945 McCarran-Ferguson Act, which granted states the ability to use licensing laws to prevent trade with insureres in other states, John in Colorado cannot purchase a plan from a company licensed in Arizona; instead, he must buy a plan from a firm in his state. Health insurance is largely regulated by the states, which require that any plan an individual insurance purchaser wishes to buy must comply with all of that state’s regulations. This advantages both insurers and regulators in maintaining psuedo-monolopolies in their respective states, in turn hurting consumers, who have few lower-cost options available to them.

Congress should do what it is granted by the Constitution and mandate that every state recognize insurance licenses of other states. According to the CATO Institute, “Letting individuals and employers purchase health insurance from out of state could reduce the number of uninsured Americans by as many as 17 million, or one-third of the most-cited estimate of the number of uninsured.” An individual state’s regulations, as CATO points out, need not be changed and can be enforced in the other states.

But what about states’ rights, you say? If ever there were an area where the feds can play a legitimate role, it’s this. The Commerce Clause in Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution explicitly grants Congress authority to regulate interstate commerce. What was one of the big reasons they did this? Because each state had its own tariffs between states under the Articles of Confederation—basically the same thing as these obstructionist regulations.

By asserting its rightful authority to break down barriers to insurance purchasing across state lines via repealing McCarran-Ferguson, Congress and the President will strike a considerable blow to insurance market concentration, truly boosting the “choice and competition” that Obama likes to talk up. If done alongside dismantling the third-party system, we will see costs begin to lower for everyone—all without a massive, trillion dollar government overhaul.

Jimmy Sengenberger is a sophomore and conservative student leader at Regis University. This is the first in a series of columns proposing specific, free-market alternatives for healthcare. The next will center on empowering the individual through Health Savings Accounts and prescription drug importation.

More govt. won't fix health care

President Obama wants sweeping “reforms” to the American health care system that will lead down the dark path to socialized medicine. But it's not more government we need to reform health care—it's more freedom. The thought of nationalizing healthcare is tantalizing for many Americans. Yet socialized medicine would cost hundreds of billions of dollars, create lengthy, life-threatening wait lines, push out private industry and result in inferior care. Not to mention that nationalized healthcare is not truly free because somebody is going to pay for it—and that somebody is you, the taxpayer. In order to compensate for the costs, our taxes would have to go up, violating the President's pledge against raising taxes on the middle class.

Consequently, private healthcare operations would be crowded out. Those who are paying for their own health coverage would also be paying for those who are under the new government program, eventually discouraging them from maintaining private coverage and, inversely, encouraging them to switch to the cheaper government program. Additionally, the government could initiate regulations and policies to benefit its program over competitors, and many employers will determine that it is more economical to drop their health insurance plans due to the increased financial strain the new program would force upon them.

As with the U.S. Postal Service, any entity run by the government has a striking advantage over private industry. The USPS posted a record-breaking loss in the second quarter of this year of 10.5%, or $1.9 billion—the largest drop in 38 years. Assume for the moment they were to lose more and more money over the course of this year as they lose business, and assume that the very same thing is happening to competitors such as FedEx. USPS, unlike FedEx, has the benefit of taxpayer money to back it up. This has the potential to stifle competition significantly were this hypothetical to play out.

Take Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. While it was never written down on paper, everyone understood that should something happen to either financial institution, the government would be there to back it up. As these examples prove, government programs and government-sponsored enterprises have a unique advantage over their private sector counterparts that, as inefficient as they may be, allows them to continue irrespective of the negative results of their activities. There is no risk when the government is backing you up.

And as the CATO Institute’s Michael Tanner put it, “Government would compel Americans to purchase health insurance, controlling its content, how much we pay, and the relationships between insurers, doctors, and patients. Government bureaucrats would determine whether Americans received certain medical services.”

To the President’s argument that the program would serve as a sort-of support system only for those who can’t afford it, look at Social Security. When FDR began that program in the 1930s, it was intended as a supplement to personal retirement plans, not the primary source of retirement income that it is today. In this case, a program meant as only a support system has grown to be the primary source for retirement funds.

But it doesn’t have to be this way. The United States' healthcare system contains the greatest innovations, the highest-quality care and some of the best doctors in the world. The problem with our healthcare system is the disparity between those who can afford it and those who cannot.

President Obama is right that we need reform. The status quo is unacceptable. But his nationalization answer to “cutting costs” does not address the fundamental reasons healthcare outlays are so great. The plan will do little more than inject more government spending and bureaucracy into the industry. The way to fix this is not with greater government control or a new government program, but through more freedom in the marketplace.

The healthcare industry is one of the most heavily regulated industries in the country, with the net cost of regulation estimated by Duke University Professor Chris Conover to be $169 billion a year. As with any industry, in order to pay for the dictates of the government, institutions of health are forced to raise costs, which extends to consumers in the form of higher prices.

Government regulations and policies have essentially mandated a third party-based system that forces the consumer to work through health insurance companies, HMO's, employers and other middlemen that pay the supplier. 84% of all personal healthcare spending is made through private health insurance, the government or other private expenditures that are not directly from the patient.

Simple human nature tells us that when someone other than the consumer is doing the paying, demand will rise. Why? Because when an individual is separated from the spending and someone else is paying the costs, consumers are encouraged to use the service more as the incentive for individuals to save for themselves diminishes. After all, the mentality goes, if someone else is paying for it, why should I care?

Likewise, basic economics tells us that as demand rises and supply remains stagnant, prices (premiums) will inevitably go up, which in turn disadvantages those who pay directly, such as the self-employed.

Encouraging the third-party system are tax exemptions for employer-provided health insurance that the millions of self-employed and small business owners and workers who pay on their own do not receive. The government incentives, policies and regulations put in place, in large part by the federal tax code, serve to do nothing more than exacerbate the problem.

The layman's prescription for health reform is increased competition and market freedom. Not a day goes by where we don't see commercials for Geico, AllState and other car insurance companies competing over who provides the best service at the lowest price—competition absent from healthcare because of the third-party system. Insurance companies aren’t competing for individual consumers—they’re contending for large corporations.

To fix this, the healthcare tax exemption needs to be equalized across the board so that everyone, not just the middlemen and large corporations, will benefit from it. That means small businesses as well as individuals. Tax-free health savings accounts need to be expanded, thereby helping individuals to purchase their own health insurance or pull from a pool of money when they need to.

Adjusting the policies and regulations perpetuating the third-party system, like the tax exclusion, would increase competition by allowing consumers to shop around on their own, decreasing costs substantially while maintaining high quality. Furthermore, due to the high cost of regulation, deregulation is critical to opening up the market.

Of course these are just a few starting points that only scratch the surface, but one thing is undeniable: The question is not one of government versus status quo or big business versus government, as the President is trying to frame it. It goes well beyond that.

It's not more government we need to solve healthcare—it's more freedom.

Jimmy Sengenberger is a political science student at Regis University in Denver, a 2008 honors graduate of nearby Grandview High School, a national organizer for the Liberty Day movement, online radio host, and a columnist for the Villager suburban weekly. His website is SengCenter.com. He is also College Liaison for BackboneAmerica.net, working through the Backbone Americans group on Facebook.

'Corporatocracy' bashed at Regis

John Perkins, far-left author of the book Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, came to Regis University this week to discuss topics ranging from what he calls a “corporatocracy” and greedy executives to remarkable accomplishments of the likes of Rosa Parks and Barack Obama and the importance of following your passions. Beyond the rhetorical flare of some of the core values that each and every one of us share, the topics John (as he insisted he be called) discussed, his approach to those subjects and his rhetoric raise questions given Regis’s status as an academic institution. Take a look at some of the things he said at this meeting, which was attended by roughly 450 people—so many that they overflowed into another room to watch a live stream:

“Many executives are like thieves, rapists and villains.” “Corporations are here to serve us, not a few executives who make sickening amounts of money.” “Milton Friedman was wrong” about giving executives “free rein and they’ll do the right thing.” “I don’t think the Founding Fathers envisioned strict borders.” And, of course, there is his argument that corporations have to pledge to be sustainable, just and serve common interests (whatever those are) in order to renew their charter.

Never mind the broad brush of the word “many” in that first sentence, or the fact that corporations are here to serve their shareholders, not us and not executives. Nor that Milton Friedman in fact argued that individuals should be granted free reign in a competitive marketplace to make the best of their lives—not just executives, but everyone.

We can also ignore the inaccuracies of his argument that the Founding Fathers did not intend to have strict borders. And that John made the statement that executives are making “sickening amounts of money” without defining what he means or answering a question to that effect.

Moreover, we can ignore the fact that the United States is operated under the rule of law—something called the “Constitution”—and nowhere is the government granted to right to alter the terms of an agreement—a company’s charter—simply because they want to impose a new set of values.

The issue at hand is not whether John Perkins was right or wrong in his analysis, or if his points were reasonable. The issue at hand is whether or not the approach of and the circumstances surrounding the speaker are appropriate.

Regis University is an academic institution. Students have a reasonable right to expect that a widely-publicized event would involve the dissemination of more than just feelings and emotions, but also facts upon which to base one’s opinions.

Many students were either required to watch or given extra credit to listen to a speaker arguing from a viewpoint that is, by any reasonable perspective, rather far to the left. In the case of the former, they had no choice; in the case of the latter, they had a choice, but it was a confined choice.

In the speech, Perkins presented a lot of arguments that could hold merit—if they were backed by facts and not pure conjecture. Take his statement that there is “no question” that less money spent on military and police spending results in less violence. “We know that,” he affirmed. But how do we know that? He gave no factual support for his claim.

One student told me it was a “rah rah” for Obama supporters and liberals—and she was right. The only time an alternative viewpoint was presented was when I stood and asked two questions, one of which was entirely passed over. Other than that, it was corporation-bashing, executive-bashing and so forth, on the whole.

That’s not to say that there was no value in what he said or good points that everyone can rally behind. For instance, Perkins is right: If you have an issue you’re passionate about, you have an obligation to stand up and do something about it; you cannot just sit idly by and expect others to bring about change. If closing down sweatshops is your issue, for instance, you better believe you should start sending letters to companies letting them know that you are boycotting their products until they change their ways. Alternatively, if supporting free market reforms to fix our healthcare crisis is your passion, go for that, too.

It is especially important, as he said, for young people to step out to the forefront and help shape their future, for the world we create now is the world we will inherit tomorrow. And indeed, as Rosa Parks proves, one person can rise from menial jobs in a restaurant to becoming a famous civil rights leader making a huge difference. President Obama also shows how, with hard work and determination, anyone can go from being entirely unrecognized to becoming President of the United States. These are indeed prime examples for the community.

But when students are required or incentivized to go and we are at an academic institution, don’t we have the right to expect that there will at the very least be facts to back up the assertions and help form judgments instead of having to read his book in order to get it? That other viewpoints will be encouraged and brought into the conversation, their questions answered? That, yes, the speaker may bring in strong viewpoints, but the dialogue qualities universities like Regis espouse are actually put into practice?

This is my disappointment and frustration. Regis University is an educational establishment. Education is about the acclamation of different facts and ideas in order to form independent judgments. But if no facts are given to support arguments and no variety of viewpoints exists, that mission is not accomplished.

Jimmy Sengenberger is a political science student at Regis University in Denver, a 2008 honors graduate of nearby Grandview High School, a national organizer for the Liberty Day movement, online radio host, and a columnist for the Villager suburban weekly. He is also College Liaison for BackboneAmerica.net, working through the Backbone Americans group on Facebook.