The loudest voices opposing health care reform howl about how passing the bill currently in Congress (or any bill, really) will usher in a new era of despotic socialism. They warn of the approaching thud of jackbooted feet trampling all over us, poking into every nook and cranny of our lives, requiring us to exchange iceberg lettuce for arugula and buy a $59.95 Michelle Obama Triceps Cruncher.
I got into a scrape on Facebook yesterday with a friend (at least, I hope she's still a friend) who calls the bill "tyranny." She hates everything about it, from the requirement that we carry some form of health insurance to the (minimal) regulation of some of the insurance industry's worst abuses to the fact that the bill even exists, as she claims it to be unconstitutional. Every change to the bill, including the removal of a public option, has been met with the same response: it's tyranny. As she is very politically involved, I asked what I thought to be a reasonable question: since she rejects all proposed reforms, how would she fix the system? After all, having many millions of Americans with no reliable health care combined with medical and insurance costs rising far faster than inflation is a serious problem.
It's a fair question; one cannot say "no" to everything. Simply raging against fictional socialist death panels and demanding that Congress "kill the bill" doesn't fix anything. Proposing an alternative would be nice, especially since the status quo is so unsustainable.
She did not take it well. As we went back and forth, she mostly dodged the question and then eventually blew up, accusing me of presenting my case in "partisan terms." She even posted on her own blog a long screed saying I was a "distraction" using "talking points straight off of Moveon.org's playlist." Neat trick, since I don't follow MoveOn.
Silly me, I thought I was talking about the basic facts of the health care brouhaha: the yanking of insurance on the flimsiest of excuses, the high-deductible coverage which doesn't cover much at all, the penny-pinching, the denial of care, the use of pre-existing conditions, the fact that money spent on health care pays off (and then some) in the form of higher productivity and thus higher tax revenues, the fact that 62% of bankruptcies involve medical debt and that 78% of such bankrupts had insurance which didn't protect them.
It appears not. Despite Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution, which specifically allows Congress to levy taxes in furtherance of the nation's "general welfare," any insurance mandate is apparently unconstitutional and tyrannical control of our lives, and any requirement to treat people who can't afford care is socialist slavery.
This shows an ugly trend in this whole debate: the attitude of "I've got mine, so screw you" on display everywhere. Stories of how people lose their insurance based on made-up excuses are greeted with shrugs. If someone loses their life savings or their home, well, them's the breaks. It's your own fault for getting sick in the first place. Or you should have shopped around to pick the right hospital after your stroke. Being comatose is no excuse.
One particularly sickening video posted yesterday showed a man with Parkinson's disease being harassed by protesters who call him a Communist. One man sneers in his face that "if you're looking for a handout, you're in the wrong end of town." Another scornfully throws a couple of dollar bills at him, shouting, "I'll decide when to give you money!"
Their message is simple: Go ahead and suffer. Go ahead and die. I don't care.
And this illustrates the deep divide between our two philosophies of life. Progressives believe that we are all in this together and that what strengthens the nation as a whole strengthens each of us individually. The teabaggers reject the idea that we, via government, are our brother's keeper and claim that anyone who believes otherwise is an apologist for slavery.
But even if requiring us to carry health insurance is tyranny (and that's a Brobdingnagian if) is it not more tyrannical to live in constant fear of getting sick or injured, not knowing whether your insurance will really protect you? Is it not a form of slavery to be all too aware that should you lose your job, you would be unable to buy coverage on the private market because of a "pre-existing condition" in a loved one? Since the United States is the only developed nation in the world without some form of universal health coverage and where the obscenity of medical bankruptcy is allowed, does that mean we are the only free nation on Earth?
Back during the bad old days of the Cold War, we were told that we had to possess thousands of nuclear weapons because the Soviets had them as well and that our freedom depended upon remaining under the threat of mutual annihilation. Do we now have a 21st-century version of that atomic Sword of Damocles? Can we be free only if we live in perpetual danger of financial ruin for the crime of getting sick?
Not in my America. My America is a nation where we look after each other and where no one is condemned to exist in pain and suffering, or be forced out of their homes, because they can't afford to see a doctor. If others believe that represents tyranny, then so be it. We have to agree to disagree.
6 comments:
In order to fix the "health care problem", one must first identify the cause. Dealing with the symptoms will not make any difference in the long run. The causes are thus:
1. Americans are unhealthy. Human beings have existed in good health for eons on this planet. Only in the last century has there been an avalanche of degenerative disease, for e.g. cancer rates were 1 in 50 in 1910, 1 in 3 today. Only a dramatic change in lifestyle can alter this.
2. The principle of insurance was never intended to pay for everyday occurrences. Insurance is for the highly improbable. What we have today is actually a prepaid plan, which drives up the cost of insurance astronomically.
3. Another cause of high medical cost is the regulatory control of the health care industry by the government. This occurs in the form of the high cost of getting new medical products to market by requiring FDA approval, and also by driving out alternative approaches that are more effective, less costly, have fewer side effects, and more likely to prevent future recurrences.
4. The monetary policy of Keynesian economics and fiat currency naturally causes inflation, which hurts everyone, but especially those on fixed incomes or who have sporadic employment.
Unless these issues are addressed, no amount of forced participation or tax increases or public option will relieve the pain.
Post number 2: You seem to divide the world into progressives and "tea baggers." The Tea Party began as a tax revolt, but has largely been hijacked by the Republican Party. But there is more to this discussion than that. Being a "progressive" sounds like an admirable goal. After all, who doesn't want to make progress. But at their extremes, things often change into their opposites. The liberal ideas of freedom which sparked the American experience have morphed into a "we're all in this together" mentality. Being together is wonderful IF we want to be. Being together is a nightmare for the person who wishes not participate in the activity. Don't we always admonish our children NOT to do something just because everybody else does? Think for yourself. Use your own judgment. Voluntary cooperation is the ideal. Forced cooperation is the nightmare. Am I my brother's keeper? Sometimes yes, sometimes no. But it is for me to decide, not someone else.
Progressives are hardly monolithic any more than teabaggers are. Doubtless there are some progressives who claim everyone should think alike, act alike, etc, but they betray the movement's general belief in individual freedom. The trick in any political belief is not to take it to extremes. Ironclad groupthink doesn't work any better than everyone-for-themselves anarchy. But we are one nation, and we have to understand that a nation as a whole cannot progress if large swaths of the population are left behind.
Oh yes, and I was not saying that the only philosophies in the world are progressivism and teabagger-ism. Those are just the two I was comparing.
Mark said, "But we are one nation, and we have to understand that a nation as a whole cannot progress if large swaths of the population are left behind." It is better NOT to progress, than to force others along against their will, (provided, of course, that their will is not the infringement of other's rights.) Forcing those who are resistant to go along will not result in progress, but ultimately in destruction.
By "left behind" I mean people left behind in poverty and sickness, not people who disagree. What kind of society enjoys such wealth and yet allows people to lose their homes because they get sick? It's obscene.
A society based on fraudulent currency that benefits the rich and powerful bankers, leaves those at the lower end of the economic spectrum in destruction, then blames the people themselves for their plight because they are not "brotherly".
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