Government Health Care In A Nutshell
Posted: Friday, August 07, 2009
by Michael Ramzy
delusionthread.com
Imagine this:
A man gets a phone call from his doctor. "Geez, I've been trying
to get hold of you," the doctor says.
"Here I am," the man says. "What's up?"
"I have bad news and I have really bad news."
"Okay," the man says. "Fire away."
"Well," the doctor says, "You only have 24 hours to live."
"Oh No!" the man exclaims. "That's terrible!"
After a few moments, the man says this into the phone: "What's the really bad news?"
"I've been trying to get hold of you since yesterday."
There has been so much written and talked about the government's attempt to overhaul the healthcare in this country, I thought it would be interesting to note a few things:
1) How much does it cost?
No one has an answer for this question, regardless of where you go for the answer. I have heard numbers ranging from 0 to 4 trillion dollars. No one knows, yet we are supposed to be confident the government knows how to spend this money.
2) Can we afford it?
Obviously not, yet we can't afford anything these days, so healthcare shouldn't take a beating. We couldn't afford any of the programs (bailouts, stimulus packages, etc.) coming from Washington for awhile now, so no one is really worried about this one. In the words of many politicians, 'we'll figure it out'.
3) Will I be forced to give up the insurance I have now?
Again, no one knows for sure. I have been told both yes and no, but there is no answer yet because there is no 'plan' yet. The left says not to worry, everything will be fine. The right says we'll have to goosestep into lines at doctor's offices around the country. Both are wrong since, as with pretty much everything about the healthcare plan, no one knows.
4) Why is the government doing this now?
That is a good question. Mr. Obama campaigned on health care reform, so that might be one reason. Another is that many on the far-left seem addicted to the idea of government-run entities, so it's no wonder healthcare is on the agenda. Others, mostly from the right, seem to think this is yet another example of the Obama administration grabbing control of the individual freedoms of Americans.
So. We don't know, they don't know, and yet the airwaves are humming with all kinds of opinions, denials, accusations, and the like. To find out more, ask your elected representative: that's right, email him or her (or them) to see what it's all about. I did that and received the response that 'health care should be, and will be, affordable for all Americans'. That's nice, but that doesn't answer any of the four questions above.
Rushing to judgement is something we Americans have perfected, yet in this case we should get the facts first. And yes, it's hard to get the facts when even those talking about healthcare don't know the plan yet.
And that, my friends, is healthcare in a nutshell. Not much there, is there?
After all, how much can you fit into a nutshell?
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Top-level comments on this article: (4 total)hi michael,since my divorce in dec., i have not had health insurance. i have had to get medications from the internet, wal-mart, a pharmacy, and bombay! in order to afford them.i don't know what's going to happen, but i ain't got nothin' now:)my best regards,sueI know many who have no insurance and are wondering how the government-run one (or 'option') will affect them. I wish I knew, for their (and your) sake. Thanks for reading and commenting. Hang in there.
Great article. Well done.I have a rough formula to work out the cost: the population of the US divided by the population of the UK, multiplied by the cost of the NHS.I work that out at about: £459,000,000,000= 765,893,542,466.21 USDI know it is very rough and misses out lots of details but that will give you an idea of cost and I must say its possible for the US to afford it.That's an excellent point. We can afford anything since we own all of the printing presses. I wonder why the environmentalists aren't screaming about all of the trees we're having to zap for all of this money we're printing?Thanks for the input.Printing money does not work. As, the more money you print the less money is worth.For example if there was 1 dollar in the whole of the US just think what you could buy with on cent. Whereas if we printed one billion trillion dollars how much would that one cent be worth then?I know. I was being facetious. I wonder if those in Washington realize how devalued the dollar is getting and will get if they continue this spending spree. Lately they've been acting like a college kid with his first credit card. Don't they realize someone has to pay for all of this sooner or later?I see.
My response in a nutshell- Anything the government tries to run goes to crap.They have a dismal record at best: the DMV, Post Office, Medicare, Medicaid, you name it. This time it'll be different, we're told, and there are actually people out there - intelligent people - who believe it. I am stunned by that, to be honest.I would like to think this administration has our best interest in mind, yet when I see the lack of honesty and facts coming out of Washington, it makes me wonder what they're up to. Surely they're up to something, and I still can't help thinking if you substitute Mr. Bush for Mr. Obama, the screaming would never end. Are people that blind?Thanks for the input, Ken.
Come on now, let's have a serious discussion. Every old person in my family and those that have passed are/were on Medicare and it's just fine, no complaints from any of them about it and it's a public program folks. The fact that crooks are ripping off the system is a regulation problem, not a healthcare problem. My cousin in Canada tells me that any politician in Canada who suggested ending their health care system would be committing political suicide. He said it's not perfect but the fact that nobody would want to get rid of it should tell us a lot. The real reason that health care is being addressed now is that as our population ages, and as more and more people without insurance flood the hospitals, the hospitals are going to be BROKE. So Obama sees, and the Republicans see, that continuing the status quo isn't an option, we will all go broke. I agree that we need details, we need both sides to participate in the debate and to be able to offer suggestions. But face it, the system stinks and it's going to break us if we don't DO something now. Can we for the love of God get beyond the Jackass and the Elephant, it's so, so, SO, tiresome.Missing LinkYou raise a good point, yet your comment about Medicare's woes being one of regulation and not healthcare is splitting hairs, at best. The government regulates Medicare, and the government sets the prices and determines who gets what.Any time a government entity has run something in this country, the amount of fraud and waste is many times that of privately-run entities. I bring up Medicare, yet think of everything else run by the government: the post office, which runs at a loss; Amtrak, which runs at a loss - both of which are subsidized by taxpayers at prohibitive cost. It is impossible for the government to run the single-payer option without waste and fraud as waste is inherent in the system. It's not really the fraud and abuse (and subjective care) that bothers me, it's the money. This is not mailing a letter or running a train in the northeast, this is providing single-payer option for every American.Having said that, there is nothing wrong objectively with universal or single-payer care, and those in Canada and the UK probably have no problems with it. Sure, we hear horror stories, yet for every horror story there is probably a success story as well.The lack of facts (from both sides) and / or misinformation tells me there is not going to be a serious discussion about this issue any time soon, that both sides are using fear to distort and get their point across. It would be nice to get beyond the elephant and the donkey, of course: on that I agree. Yet they both must stop acting like horses' arses for that to happen.Thanks for reading and commenting. I appreciate it.
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