All of the calls for a national health care system fail to look at the realities of government run services. I took a look at one the other day, government run trash collection, where DC residents were so angry that a government shutdown would leave them wallowing in their own filth that they were able to be manipulated into calls to dump it at John Boehner's residence in Washington DC should one occur. But not only could a government shutdown leave you left in a disease ridden, cesspool of a bio-hazard such as with trash, a government shutdown could kill you.
With Obamacare being forced through congress and signed by the president last year much of the focus was on the costs and the government being in control of who gets what operation, death panels or whether it is fiscally responsible for them to perform an operation on you. Little attention though has been paid - and I have not seen it mentioned in the recent budget debate - that a government shutdown with Obamacare heavily implemented in the future could actually cost you your life.
Imagine waiting for an operation for six months only to have the government go through a shutdown and having your surgery canceled until it is resolved. Imagine being a doctor's office relying on payments from the government to cover your costs. How long could you keep the doors open? How long could you stay alive if your body is failing?
These situations can and will eventually occur in the future if Obamacare is left in place. Those who pushed the bill through congress say they care so much about the poor, but the poor will be left with a false hope that when a service is needed the government will be there to provide it. Nobody can time when they need a service and if it falls within the window of a government shutdown, well, you might be out of luck. The injured human body does not wait for red tape.
You may argue that the government would never allow lapses in health care to occur, but if you believe that you need look no further than our troops. The main purpose of our government is national defense, yet the government was willing to let the pay of our troops fail in the event of a government shutdown. What makes you think that your health is any much more of a concern of theirs when they are debating over their ideological pet project or refuse to pass a budget because the museum that was to be named after them is on the chopping block? Your health will mean little to them while they sit in their office or the chambers of congress and debate such things. In all likelihood they will simply use health care for the poor to push even more ridiculous and expensive things into the budget that serve no purpose to the people of this country, but simply to their upcoming re-election.
Just like the trash haulers, the health care industry should remain in private hands. All the time that the government looked like it was heading for a shutdown those with private trash haulers and private doctors did not have to worry that they would be sitting in a pile of rubbish or left in pain. Meanwhile, those who have given themselves over to government solving all their problems were biting their nails and watching the world crumble around them. They were easily manipulated.
If you were one of those people, now is the time for you to act. Get as many of your services that are government provided out of the grubby, inefficient hands of officials and back into the hands of those who will provide you a service for a reasonable fee. Demand that your trash hauler or other service be opened back up to the market of competition instead of a government forced monopoly where you have no choice. Then the next time a potential government shutdown comes along, you too can sit back and watch those who either gave away - or had taken away - their freedom of choice feed on each other and face the sleepless nights. And you can chuckle at them as I did thinking of them sitting on a pile of decomposing left over food.
The scenario you envision is possible only because the voters and their representatives never have read the constitution.
The problem is that US politicians assume that voters are stupid and uninformed. And they are correct, especially in the case of so-called "independent" (really totally uninterested) voters.
Right now the Republican bags demonstrate the worse hypocrisy. Cantor pretends to worship the Constitution as God and then ignorantly declares that the Congress can pass a law without the approval of the other two branches.
But putting aside the fact that the Teabags seem never to have read the details of the document is their ignoring its most fundamental principle--the need for compromise. Clearly by setting up the three separate branches, the so-called "Founders" demonstrated that they prized compromise before the efficiency of authoritarianism.
Yet the bags in the recent absurd budget debate kept saying, "we were sent here with instructions never to compromise." Well, yes, but you are ignoring the Constitution, which demands compromise. There are two other branches whose members were also sent to not compromise. But because there are three and because of other provsions included to deliberately made legistlation difficult, you must compromise.
Posted by: Jan Rogozinski on April 11, 2011 10:04 AM
I think you are mistaken on one point, Jan. Yes, it is a compromising government, but the founders would be the first to tell you that the individuals sent to congress should stand on principles. And then of course they should go home afterward, not stay there for 50 years.
The Tea Partiers are more mad about those who claim they stand for a certain principle or value and then quickly turn to jello when it is time for them to actually take action on such.
Why is it wrong for them to point to these individuals and say that they should be sent packing? Unless of course you advocate that our congress should always be made up of rubber-spined individuals who do not stand for anything.
Posted by: Digger on April 12, 2011 04:59 AM
Okay, DC residents were upset because their budget is tied to the Federal Budget, so when the Federal Government shuts down, DC shuts down. Trash collection is not in "private hands" in other parts of the nation--though it is often contracted out to private companies, it is paid for by the local governments. If those local governments were to shut down, so too would those local trash collectors. (Yes, even yours Digger, unless you've personally paid for a private company to come pick up your trash?)
So the notion that people in the district were too reliant on their government is ludicrous--they just should not be tied to the federal budget because it allows Congress' games to affect them at a disproportionate rate, relative to the rest of the country. (Hence the argument for D.C. Statehood).
Now, in this overdrawn hypothetical you've created, I have to question your reasoning. The government would NOT shut down medicare, medicaid or social security payments in the event of a shutdown. These program are viewed as essential. So why do you think this logic would not extend to government-run health insurance plans? And even if it were to, do you think that hospitals would NOT perform necessary operations? Unlikely. More plausible is there would be a backlog of paperwork for the government employees responsible for reviewing claims whenever the government started back up again.
I'm not saying Obamacare is the solution, nor am I in favor of politics that end in stand-offs, leading many (including our troops) the victims of self-interested politicians, but that doesn't mean you can so freely purport these nonsensical scenarios and claim them as fact.
Posted by: Steven on April 20, 2011 09:44 AM
Hey, guess what, your assertions are incorrect. We have 5 trash haulers here and they are all private. If one is poor or charges too much, you can cancel and go with another hauler. It's called a free market. Maybe you've been living under tyranny a little to long to realize what a great thing choice is.
...though it is often contracted out to private companies, it is paid for by the local governments.
I'm not sure where you are getting this data. Maybe in the liberal big cities it works this way, but not throughout the country.
As for health care, how long do you think a hospital or a doctor can go while the government has everything in a "backlog". Eventually creditors refuse to extend you additional credit until you get paid.
It is quite simply the poorest example of business management, that the whole of your well being and ability to perform your trade of helping people can be hamstrung at a moments notice by some bureaucrats possibly thousands of miles away. And guess who will pay in the end? Those who need the operations and have to drive further and further to actually find a hospital that is not defunct.
Nothing good can come of this. It is simply Utopian hope and wishful thinking that magically everyone will be covered for hospital visits and there will always be those out there who shell out enough to cover the costs. Apparently critical thinking and long term planning are lost in this country because it's pretty easy to see where this plan will end up. Costing too much and driving good people out of business - and in the end we're all hurt.
Posted by: Digger on April 21, 2011 02:36 PM
