Perhaps the best source of information are books from reputable publishers. As a boy I made extensive use of the public library, where I could access thousands of books for free. Even such books can give a slanted view, making it wise for the reader to read many books. One way to find out what books are fair and accurate is to ask librarians. In most cases they don’t mind being references even if you are not checking out a book from their library. It is also a good idea, when trying to decide how reputable a particular publisher is, to determine the number of books they have in the section of the library that you are interested in. There are numerous small, upstart publishing houses that make claims that cannot be substantiated about the quality of their publications, but if you see their name on numerous titles, it is likely that they are quite reputable and that they engage in due diligence before publishing any work.
Don’t Be Fooled
People who try to manipulate public opinion are much more effective when they appear to present new information to people who should have already known the subject matter. They also like to make accusations against their enemies, repeating them loudly and often with the hope that people will begin to believe them. They know that even though they frequently need to retract these accusations, they can print retractions weeks later on the bottom of page 23 of the newspaper where it is unlikely to be noticed.
In addition, the manipulators in the media intentionally ignore or downplay transgressions and prevarications on behalf of the people they agree with while making an enormous fanfare about any imperfections found in their perceived enemies. The media hated George W. Bush and made a big deal about the victory pose he assumed during the Iraqi war on the deck of a battleship with a sign behind him declaring, “Mission Accomplished.” Of course that war went on for several more years with many casualties and enormous expenditures of taxpayer dollars. The same media has largely ignored the fact that Barack Obama stated that with the death of Osama bin Laden and the drone strikes of several other Al Qaeda leaders that we were winning the war and our enemies were on the run. If anything, Al Qaeda is becoming stronger with many people vying for the leadership role. Also, the same media that portrayed Watergate as the scandal of the century sat quietly by as the current administration proclaimed the IRS harassment of the administration’s enemies “a phony scandal.” By not focusing on the “fast and furious” scandal, the Benghazi debacle, the IRS scandal, the government surveillance revelations, and so on, the hope is that the public will simply forget about these horrendous shortcomings and move on. This will work only if American voters remain uneducated.
What Does a Good Education Look Like?
I recently visited the College of the Ozarks in Branson, Missouri. Like Berea College in Kentucky, they require all students to work at least fifteen hours per week. Their nickname, Hard Work University, is well earned. They are a Christian college that is both true to its convictions and selective—they only accept one out of ten applicants. They are definitely not politically correct and place strong emphasis on the founding principles of our nation and on Christian doctrine. The students, faculty, and administrators are the most courteous and friendly people you could ever hope to meet. One might say these students are being indoctrinated the right way. They are taught fiscal responsibility and all graduate with no debt.
If we don’t start following the College of the Ozarks’ example of teaching our young people about the values and principles that made our nation great, those values and principles will be replaced by something else that is unlikely to be inspiring and elevating. We have to be just as proactive as the secular progressives who have put us in the position we are in now and have been over the last few decades. We must not be ashamed of who we are or what we believe, in fact we should be extremely proud of our historical accomplishments. There is no room for gloating, but we must remember that if we don’t put appropriate facts and people before our young people, someone else will substitute their version of Utopia.
To be successful we must take politics out of education and concentrate on empowering the entire American populace. This is the only way that the people’s will can be ensured so that we can have the kind of nation that was envisioned by our founders. We must take advantage of all the educational tools available to return us to a place where our public education system is the envy of the world. The rapid development of virtual classrooms and smart computers that are able tutors can be a godsend that will be well worth the cost, enabling us to be serious about our obligation to educate people. Part of that education includes preparing people for jobs of the future, which will decrease unemployment and increase fulfillment while brightening future generations’ prospects. Last, we should shine the bright light of truth on the forces of manipulation that run rampant throughout our society today. Improvements in education, combined with wisdom and knowledge, would then turn our country around.
Action Steps
Challenge yourself to learn a new fact about American history each day for one month.
Resolve to replace television and Internet surfing with reading for a month.
Learn the names of your state and federal government representatives and research their voting records.
Cross-reference each use of statistics in a news report to determine whether the reporter is spinning the facts.
WISDOM AND KNOWLEDGE
How much better to get wisdom than gold, and understanding than silver!
PROVERBS 16:16
When I was in medical school, a prized possession was a copy of the last year’s examination in the various courses. Many students would memorize the questions and answers from previous years and feel that they had a significant advantage at exam time only to discover that they answered incorrectly on numerous occasions. They were culling the old exams for knowledge, but not using wisdom in the process.
Wise persons would understand that the professors knew that students would acquire old exams and try to remember the correct answers. They would also realize that professors tend to be smart people and would likely slip in something that would change the question ever so slightly, requiring a different answer. The wise students really didn’t care very much about the previous year’s answer, but spent a lot of time analyzing the question to determine what body of knowledge they would need to correctly answer such a question. They would then make sure that they had a thorough understanding of that body of information, recognizing that it is important and would be tested for again. Needless to say, those students tended to do very well. Without a doubt, students who did poorly were very knowledgeable and generally had been high achievers throughout their lives, but they were looking for a quick solution without fully understanding and dissecting the questions.
Not Just the Facts
Many people use the terms wisdom and knowledge interchangeably. They are, however, quite different, and having one in no way confers the other. Knowledge is familiarity with facts. The more knowledge one has, the more things one is capable of doing, but only with wisdom is one able to discern which of the many things they are capable of doing should be pursued and in what order.
Wisdom is essentially the same thing as common sense, the slight difference is that common sense provides the ability to react appropriately, while wisdom is frequently more proactive and additionally encourages the shaping of the environment. As such, wisdom is the most important commodity for anyone who is planning to be successful in any endeavor.
Solomon, the son of King David in the Bible, is considered by many to be the wisest man who ever lived. His wisdom led to great wealth and renown. Many will remember that his first challenge as king of Israel was to determine what to do in the case of two women who came before him, both claiming to be the mother of the same baby. Had he based his decision on knowledge alone, King Solomon would have focused on the women’s testimony by interrogating them. Instead, after hearing all the arguments, King Solomon declared that a swordsman should split the baby and give half to each woman.
One of the women thought that was a fair solution and the other was horrified and immediately relinquished her claim on the baby. In his wisdom, he used his knowledge that the real mother would truly love the baby and prefer to give it to the other woman rather than killing it.
You’ve probably noticed that I frequently quote Solomon, the writer of the Book of Proverbs in the Bible. Since the day that I tried to stab another teenager, I have started and ended each day reading from the Book of Proverbs, which was instrumental on that particular day in helping me realize how foolishly I had been acting. I also believe that God has a sense of humor, because he inspired my parents to give me the middle name of Solomon knowing that I would have this great affinity for the Book of Proverbs, one of the greatest repositories of wisdom. Like Solomon, I, too, gained great notoriety as a surgeon who divided babies, who in this case were conjoined at the head.
Even though my mother had very little formal education and thus little knowledge, she was extremely observant and very wise. Since she worked as a domestic in the homes of very successful people, she decided to observe how they managed their lives to achieve success. She compared their actions with those of the many unsuccessful people who populated our surroundings, and after careful analysis concluded that the big difference was reading and studying. Hence her insistence that my brother and I read two books per week. Although this move was quite unpopular, it yielded tremendous results for both my brother, Curtis, and me. My mother’s wisdom prompted her to use the little knowledge she had to greatly benefit her sons.
While wisdom dictates the need for education, education does not necessarily make one wise. I remember a man when I was growing up who was extremely well educated and had two master’s degrees. He could wax eloquently on many subjects but had a very difficult time sustaining himself economically. In fact, he would frequently mooch off of anyone who would take pity on him. On the other hand, many of the greatest achievers in our society never finished college. That includes Bill Gates Jr., Steve Jobs, and Dan Snyder, who is the owner of the Washington Redskins. This does not mean that higher education isn’t highly desirable and beneficial, but it does indicate that the wise use of knowledge is more important than knowledge itself.
As my wife and I traveled around the country over the last few months, we encountered large and enthusiastic crowds, many of whom feel that I should run for public office. I believe what they are really clamoring for is not me per se, but for the return of common sense and intelligible speech to solve our ever-increasing problems.
Many Experts Lack Wisdom
It is always interesting to watch the “experts” expound on various topics from the economy to national defense to social issues, and so on, sometimes presenting a host of statistics and little-known studies as proof of their expertise. They claim that their knowledge and all those letters behind their name give them unquestionable authority to declare truth. Some of these experts continue to claim that our economy remains sluggish because we are not borrowing and spending at a greater rate. They want another stimulus package and if that doesn’t work, I can guarantee you they will want yet another. I will admit that these people are very knowledgeable, but I severely doubt that they possess wisdom. I believe my mother with her third-grade education could come up with a better plan than theirs. When someone does challenge them, they love to say, “That person is not an expert and can’t possibly know what she’s talking about.”
I have to chuckle when some of them say that “Ben Carson is a neurosurgeon and can’t possibly know anything about economics.” Many of these same people were involved in crafting the Affordable Care Act even though their training is not in health care. They say that economic principles have broad application and therefore their recommendations are legitimate. I say that common sense has broad application and can be used in all areas. In fact, I would choose common sense over knowledge in almost every circumstance. I also like to point out that five physicians signed the Declaration of Independence, our founding document, and they certainly were not shy about expressing their views regarding the principles that should govern our nation.
A Vision for a Wiser Health Care System
As a doctor, I believe I have acquired some wisdom that can be applied to our need for a well-functioning health care system for the nation. The agenda needs to be the health of the people as opposed to a political feather in a cap, and being a doctor, I would make that a priority more naturally than would a politician. Unfortunately, the Affordable Care Act was more of a victory for the Obama administration than for the American people.
In order to have good health care, you need a patient and a health care provider. Originally, the middleman facilitated the relationship between a person and their doctor, but now the middleman is the primary entity, with the health care provider and the patient at his beck and call. The middleman gains financially by denying health care to clients, even when they are supposed to be facilitating the health care process. The whole system is upside down and it is no wonder that it is dysfunctional.
If we are to reform the system, we must know what the overriding goals of reform are. First, not only do we need to stop the rapid rise of health care costs, we need to decrease these costs. Second, we need to make sure that everyone has access to basic health care. Third, we need to restore the doctor-patient relationship and put patients back in charge of their own health. (These are not given in order of importance.)
As I said at the National Prayer Breakfast, I believe everyone should have a health savings account (HSA) and an electronic medical record (EMR) at the time of birth as a first step toward reform. The EMR should only be in the patient’s possession in the form of an electronic chip embedded into a card or device that can be shared with a health care provider at the patient’s discretion. It would not be available to the IRS or any other governmental agency, and the database would of course need to be as secure as possible to protect personal information from hackers. The HSA could be populated with funds supplied by an employer, the owner, relatives, friends, and governmental sources.
Since we already spend twice as much per capita on health care in America as does any other country in the world, even if we put substantial monies in everyone’s HSA, there’s a strong possibility that our shared national health care cost would still decrease. Because there are many responsible individuals and employers who would be willing to contribute to the HSA’s, it would only be necessary for the government to make contributions in the cases of individuals incapable of making a living. In Singapore, the government deducts regular contributions to the medical savings accounts from each worker’s paycheck. Singapore is capable of providing excellent medical care for all citizens for less than a quarter of what we pay.
With each person owning his own HSA in the United States, most people would become interested in saving by shopping for the most cost-effective high-quality health care plans available. This would bring the entire health care industry into the free-market economic model resulting in price transparency and creating a system where services and pricing are more closely related to value. In our current third-party insurance-based health-care payment system, it would not be unusual to find a hospital in one part of town that charges $66,000 for an appendectomy while in the same city another hospital charges only $14,000 for the same operation. Since a third party is responsible for the payments, the patient doesn’t really care which of the two hospitals is used, and spends an unnecessarily large amount of money.
Approximately 80 percent of all encounters between the health care provider and the patient in a system where HSAs are widely used would be covered by the private account with no need to involve a third party. Since most of the relationships would be doctor-patient relationships, the doctors certainly would not order things without regard to price, and patients would not permit excessive depletion of their HSA’s by careless expenditure. With everybody becoming cost conscious, price transparency would be of paramount importance and fair competitio
n would cause prices to be consistent and reasonable.
It is natural to ask what happens if a man needs an operation and does not have enough money in his HSA to cover the cost? The system would be designed in such a way that allows members of his immediate family to shift money from their HSA accounts to his without any penalties. In essence, this would make each family unit its own private health insurance company with no unnecessary middleman increasing costs. I would also make it possible for people to pass the money in their HSAs to family members at the time of their death. This would largely eliminate incentive to spend the money in the account in order not to lose it.
A portion of the money in the account could be used to purchase bridge or catastrophic insurance, which would be relatively inexpensive since it would only be used for those 20 percent of cases too expensive to be covered by the typical HSA account. This would work in a manner similar to homeowners insurance that has a high deductible. If that homeowners insurance was used for every type of repair needed on the home with little or no deduction, the cost would be astronomical. Since it is used only for major and expensive home repairs and because routine repairs are taken care of primarily by the homeowner, the cost is reasonable.
The HSA accounts would only be for bona fide medical purposes and the money could not be borrowed and/or legally used for any other reason. Special precautions would be in place to oversee the accounts of addicts and other people who have proven themselves to be fiscally irresponsible. In the case of individuals who are mentally incapacitated, a trustworthy family member would likely be appointed as guardian of their HSA account. It could also be made possible for any adult to donate up to a certain predetermined amount of money from their account to any other person’s account for charitable reasons. This becomes an easy way for churches and other organizations to provide charity care at their discretion. It also would encourage those people with massive amounts of money in their accounts to think charitably toward others.
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