Taxation without representation is tyranny...

So said James Otis, an American patriot whose views helped shape the views of a new nation in the 1770s. It was no less true then as it is now. Our "representatives" in Washington, DC have seen fit to levy all sorts of taxes on us regardless of how we feel. This is certainly nothing new, but this latest debacle takes the cake. It is obvious to any literate American that takes the time to read the various polls that the majority of Americans are opposed to Barack Obama's version of "health care reform". So deep was the discontent that the seat held by Ted Kennedy, the leading champion of this issue, was won by a Republican who campaigned, in large part, on ensuring that this travesty of a bill would never become law.

This presented all members of Congress, Democrat and Republican alike, the perfect chance to do the right thing - to gather around a table, start from scratch, take ideas from both sides, and craft truly meaningful reform, rather than an ill-advised takeover of 1/6th of the nation's economy.

Did they do that? No, my friends, they did not. They resorted to the basest chicanery and parliamentary gimmickry to ram this thing down our collective throats. We didn't want this bill. We don't want the taxes that it imposes. I think most of us agree that reform is necessary, but this isn't it. Genuine tort reform, selling insurance across state lines to increase competition and thereby lower costs, providing government oversight to ensure that insurance companies can't raise rates arbitrarily, exclude for pre-existing conditions, and drop you when you are sick - this is the list of things that would truly create reform. It is, coincidentally, the laundry list of Republican ideas, most of which were discarded out of hand.

This, my friends, is taxation without representation. It is, as was observed by Mr. Otis, lo these many years ago, tyranny.