Risk Management

Mark Steyn's "Happy Warrior" column in a recent issue of National Review was a humorous retelling of a personal encounter with English pallbearers who were not allowed to bear palls. Seems the British have a Health & Safety bureaucracy and nanny-state politicians who forbid anything from garden gnomes to fire extinguishers on the grounds that they present safety risks. (The home owner might trip on her gnomes while fleeing her home in the event it caught fire, and the fire extinguishers might cause someone to fight a fire instead of running for safety. Both of these offending items were removed by government mandate.) Even though pallbearers had been carrying coffins into this particular church for more than 1,000 years, the Health & Safety authorities had decided to require the use of a cart -- in case someone tripped on the uneven path or flagstones.

The cart was unacceptable to the family (of which Mr. Steyn was a member), who determined to carry the deceased into the worship service themselves. In the end the pallbearers agreed to bear the coffin on the condition that the family members help out -- not because they needed help, but because they wanted to be able to tell the tinpot bureaucrats in a plausible fashion that the family forced them to violate regulations. Mr. Steyn concluded the column saying that assessing risks and making decisions on how to address them is an integral part of being human. The government cannot ensure our safety by legislating risk out of existence, but they can and will destroy huge swaths of personal freedom in the effort.

To be sure, this is the greatest problem with the Democrats' proposed government intervention in health care. As the state more and more fully assumes the right to pay for your health care from cradle to grave, it will inevitably assume more and more responsibility for telling you how you must manage life's daily risks.