The Mental Health Punt

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American Greatness

The Mental Health Punt

By Christopher Roach| March 4, 2018

While Hillary Clinton unironically titled her biography Hard Choices, it is exceedingly rare for politicians to make them. More often, we are offered alluring and facile solutions that promise good results without costs or tradeoffs. For example, in the face of a bloated, overreaching federal budget, Donald Trump, like Ronald Reagan before him, promised to cut the deficit by attacking “waste, fraud, and abuse.” Obama said his signature healthcare initiative would expand the ranks of the insured and lower healthcare costs. George W. Bush’s stated belief system was “compassionate conservatism,” to be distinguished from the more hard-headed conservatism of the past, which willingly scrimped on social services.

Real politics involves picking a side, weighing one position and its associated set of risks as more preferable to the alternative. America’s Founders protected free speech, even though much that is false, scandalous, or dispiriting may be uttered. The Constitution protects the criminally accused, even though this means some of the guilty will go free. As with these other rights, the right to bear arms also comes at a price, and that cost has arguably become more pronounced as our society has become more fractured and disorderly.