• “Government should not subsidize health insurance — for the uninsured, the poor, the elderly or anyone else — or regulate health insurance markets.” Here’s why.

• This is what happens to health care when you are not the customer.

• An update on the EU Lisbon Treaty.

• Why Fannie and Freddie mustn’t be left out of reform efforts.

• Skepticism over nuclear diplomacy with Iran. (PDF) Subscribe to the Nuclear Proliferation Update here.

• Podcast: “Obama: Kinder Bud to Federalism?” featuring Aaron Houston of the Marijuana Policy Project.

Weekend Links is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

According to press reports, the most recent opinion poll shows that 65% of Czechs support President Václav Klaus’ refusal to sign the Lisbon Treaty that would take more power from national parliaments and give it to the unelected bureaucracy in Brussels.

Klaus, who has been at the pinnacle of Czech politics for the last 20 years (as minister of finance, prime minister, speaker of the house and now as president), has an unmatched understanding of the Czech people. Clearly, once again, he was able to discern the public mood better than others. That includes his successor as the leader of the center-right Civic Democratic Party (ODS), Mirek Topolanek, who once opposed the Lisbon Treaty but now supports it. It seems that the ODS is in a state of revolt against him and may unseat him at the ODS Party Congress in November.

Klaus will be much encouraged by the above poll. As a consequence, it is less likely that he will give way under pressure and sign the Lisbon Treaty anytime soon. If he can hold out until the likely British referendum on the Lisbon Treaty midway through 2010, he will likely be remembered as the man who put an end to the most ambitious attempt to create a centralized European super-state in modern history.

Czech Support for Klaus at 65% is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog

Daniel Hannan, the British Member of the European Parliament who gained fame with his devastating critique of Gordan Brown, has been equally trenchant in criticizing the excesses of the European Union.  On his blog he explains the latest self-serving intricacies of voting in the upcoming election for the European Parliament:

How many MEPs will be elected a week on Thursday? Wait! Come back! I’m going somewhere with this! I realise the issue might not sound intrinsically sexy but, believe me, it demonstrates everything that’s wrong with the Brussels system. Bear with me and you will see how flagrant is the EU’s contempt for the ballot box — and for its own rule book.

Had the European Constitution Lisbon Treaty been ratified, there would have been 754 MEPs in the next Parliament. But under the existing scheme — that provided for by the Nice Treaty — there are meant to be 736. Three countries have rejected the European Constitution in referendums, and it is not legally in force. So how many MEPs will be elected a week on Thursday?

You don’t need me to tell you, do you? The EU’s primary purpose is to look after its own. Eighteen unconstitutional or “phantom” Euro-MPs will be elected anyway (hat-tip, Bruno), and will draw their full salaries and allowances. The only concession to the letter of law is that they won’t be allowed to vote. In other words — in an almost perfect metaphor for the entire Euro-system — they will be paid without having any function. (Incidentally, a couple of BNP trolls keep posting here to asking when I’m going to publish my expenses. I did so ages ago — see here — and all Conservative MEPs have done the same: our Right to Know forms are available online here.)

The number of Euro-MPs in the chamber might seem a recondite issue, but it goes to the heart of how the EU behaves. Other, more important, parts of the European Constitution have also been implemented, without the tedious process of formal ratification: a European foreign policy, the harmonisation of justice and home affairs, justiciability for the Charter of Fundamental Rights.  These things would have been regularised by the European Constitution, but have been enacted despite its rejection.

It’s almost as good as unconstitutionally giving Washington, D.C. a congressman!

In fact, the attempt to consolidate continental government without giving the European people much say over the political system they live under is even more bizarre than electing MEPs who might never be able to vote.  If implemented, the Lisbon Treaty will reduce the ability of the European people to hold their government accountable, but that’s just the point to the Eurocratic elite actively pushing further centralization of power.  About the only barriers left to the implementation of the Lisbon Treaty are the Irish people and Czech President Vaclav Klaus, as I detail in a recent article on American Spectator online.

You’ve Just Got to Love the Way the European Union Operates is a post from Cato @ Liberty - Cato Institute Blog