Jimmy Carter may be on to something when he played the race card the other day, suggesting that Joe Wilson's "you lie" outburst and other criticism is race-based. But then again, maybe he's wrong.
It's rarely about just race. America is too complex to be explained so simply. If it were just about race, Clinton wouldn't have had such a rough go. Notwitstanding being named the "first Black president", he was a white guy. Clinton survived because he knew how to play the game better than the right-wingers who were out to get him.
John Kerry, about as white as they come and rich to-boot, wasn't quite so adept. The swiftboaters sunk his candidacy.
Carter, another white dude, faced attacks on both sides of the political aisle.
But political affiliation can't explain it all. It can't explain why only 5 of the 22 children in my 4th grade daughter's class were permitted to watch the president's pep talk to the nation's school children. Political affiliation can't fully explain why so many people who would benefit from health care reform have rejected reform because it is proposed by Obama. What else explains why death threats aimed at Obama have skyrocketed?
Add to the mix the non-stop race baiting by Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck. Video cameras catch black school children laughing while white kids are attacked. According to Rush, that's Obama's America. What? Really? Like the dozens of racially motivated events in the Before-Obama era that any moderately informed person could list off the top of their head? Was that Bush's America or Reagan's America?
I never thought I'd live to see a Black president in theWhite House. Will I live long enough to see the country have an honest dialog on race?
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Wednesday, August 19, 2009
Random thoughts on health care
I admit it: I don't understand most of those who oppose health care reform. Here are my random thoughts on the topic.
1. Every person who shows up in the ER ready to deliver a baby, or in need of an appendectomy, or dropping pints of blood, or having symptoms of any other medical emergency will receive care, regardless of ability to pay, citizenship status, or anything else. That's the law. There's a cost to that care, which we all absorb in one way or another. Health care reform that aims to create a more efficient system for providing preventative care and providing services more efficiently makes utmost sense.
2. If I didn't have employer-sponsored health insurance, I could barely afford to pay for a private plan that would provide substantially less coverage. If I lost my job, paying the COBRA premium would be a stretch. We are (I think) in at least the top 10% of earners. Are the people who are so vociferously protesting more able to pay? Or do they expect that they will have employer-sponsored insurance. Reality check: EAW, or for laypeople, employment at will. Those without a contract are subject to being terminated at any time. Bye-bye health insurance. Nothing requires an employer to provide health insurance.
3. We like to proclaim that we are a Christian nation (or in more inclusive moments) a Judeo-Christian nation. Let's assume that's a true statement. What's our proof? How do we treat the weakest, neediest people in our nation? What's that parable about the Good Samaritan? Or maybe the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes?
4. The richest nation in the world. The most powerful nation on earth. The best nation--love it or leave it. Pile on the superlatives. But whichever superlative you choose, the fact is the "most-est" nation doesn't provide a means for basic health care for all its citizesns. Lots of "lesser" nations somehow manage to do it.
5. Poor insurance companies; they can't compete if health reform includes a public option. What??? Since when have insurance companies been the poster children for protectionist policies. I thought we welcomed competition. Private schools manage to compete with public schools. Cities like New York, Chicago, and Atlanta haven't seen a wholesale loss of car dealers notwithstanding well-developed and utilized public transportation systems. FedEx and UPS seem to do quite fine, notwithstaning a mandated USPS monopoly. I suppose a public option might mean that private insurance companies might have to come up with innovative ways to compete, but if we're the best in the world, seems like they should welcome the challenge.
6. Rationing? The complaint is that health care reform will result in rationing? So what do insurance companies do if not ration? All insurance companies are fundamentally the same: collect premiums and limit the payment of claims, all in a quest for profit. Need to improve the bottom line? Easy! Simply deny or delay pre-treatment approvals for any number of specious reasons--not medically necessary, experimental, insufficient documentation, not a covered benefit, yada, yada, yada. Rationing by any other name. So who's the better gate-keeper? A profit-motivated company or the government? Neither makes me feel good, but rationing is a reality, and at least the government doesn't have a history of paying million-dollar bonuses to top executives.
I don't know that the current proposal is the best that we can do, but I do believe we have some of the best and brightest minds. I also believe that something has gotta give.
1. Every person who shows up in the ER ready to deliver a baby, or in need of an appendectomy, or dropping pints of blood, or having symptoms of any other medical emergency will receive care, regardless of ability to pay, citizenship status, or anything else. That's the law. There's a cost to that care, which we all absorb in one way or another. Health care reform that aims to create a more efficient system for providing preventative care and providing services more efficiently makes utmost sense.
2. If I didn't have employer-sponsored health insurance, I could barely afford to pay for a private plan that would provide substantially less coverage. If I lost my job, paying the COBRA premium would be a stretch. We are (I think) in at least the top 10% of earners. Are the people who are so vociferously protesting more able to pay? Or do they expect that they will have employer-sponsored insurance. Reality check: EAW, or for laypeople, employment at will. Those without a contract are subject to being terminated at any time. Bye-bye health insurance. Nothing requires an employer to provide health insurance.
3. We like to proclaim that we are a Christian nation (or in more inclusive moments) a Judeo-Christian nation. Let's assume that's a true statement. What's our proof? How do we treat the weakest, neediest people in our nation? What's that parable about the Good Samaritan? Or maybe the Miracle of the Loaves and Fishes?
4. The richest nation in the world. The most powerful nation on earth. The best nation--love it or leave it. Pile on the superlatives. But whichever superlative you choose, the fact is the "most-est" nation doesn't provide a means for basic health care for all its citizesns. Lots of "lesser" nations somehow manage to do it.
5. Poor insurance companies; they can't compete if health reform includes a public option. What??? Since when have insurance companies been the poster children for protectionist policies. I thought we welcomed competition. Private schools manage to compete with public schools. Cities like New York, Chicago, and Atlanta haven't seen a wholesale loss of car dealers notwithstanding well-developed and utilized public transportation systems. FedEx and UPS seem to do quite fine, notwithstaning a mandated USPS monopoly. I suppose a public option might mean that private insurance companies might have to come up with innovative ways to compete, but if we're the best in the world, seems like they should welcome the challenge.
6. Rationing? The complaint is that health care reform will result in rationing? So what do insurance companies do if not ration? All insurance companies are fundamentally the same: collect premiums and limit the payment of claims, all in a quest for profit. Need to improve the bottom line? Easy! Simply deny or delay pre-treatment approvals for any number of specious reasons--not medically necessary, experimental, insufficient documentation, not a covered benefit, yada, yada, yada. Rationing by any other name. So who's the better gate-keeper? A profit-motivated company or the government? Neither makes me feel good, but rationing is a reality, and at least the government doesn't have a history of paying million-dollar bonuses to top executives.
I don't know that the current proposal is the best that we can do, but I do believe we have some of the best and brightest minds. I also believe that something has gotta give.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)