Saturday, August 08, 2009

Can we get past our fear of change and come together to get this done?

While we're waiting for Kathie to get over her jet lag and show us some pics from walking the Western Highlands of Scotland, I'm going to throw myself into the healthcare reform debate. Having witnessed firsthand the inner workings of a Medicaid HMO, I can tell you that people are already making a LOT of money rationing healthcare.

So what got me going this morning? Like everyone else, I've been thinking about it for a while. On Facebook, I see several of my coworkers bashing Obama and his healthcare reform and I'm not clear on what their objections are. I love them all but - as women and mothers and nurses - how can they not want this system fixed? (Of course, that last assumes that the current proposal can fix this mess - a big assumption, I grant you.)

This morning, I found a link on Janet's kitties blog to a Washington Post editorial that makes sense to me. Here are the last two paragraphs from the editorial...

"Can there be anyone more two-faced than the Republican leaders who in one breath rail against the evils of government-run health care and in another propose a government-subsidized high-risk pool for people with chronic illness, government-subsidized community health centers for the uninsured, and opening up Medicare to people at age 55?

"Health reform is a test of whether this country can function once again as a civil society -- whether we can trust ourselves to embrace the big, important changes that require everyone to give up something in order to make everyone better off. Republican leaders are eager to see us fail that test. We need to show them that no matter how many lies they tell or how many scare tactics they concoct, Americans will come together and get this done."

OK, gloves off. I gotta go walk the mall.

2 comments:

Joan said...

We need to get above Democrats hating every thing Republicans stand for and the other way around. This country needs health care reform. Let's argue about the best way to do it, not whether it needs to be done or not. It is currently run by for profit insurance companies who don't want to include anyone who is sick. Does that make any sense? Lord have mercy.

Kappa no He said...

When I talk to my parents once a week they fill me in about all that's going on. I think if I were there my head would explode.

I have been going to dentist for over two months to get a lot of dental work done (I was afraid to go for many, many years). All my old mercury-laden fillings needed to be replaced, plus a few new cavities needed to be filled. The cost of the entire thing (all dental work, X-rays, tooth-colored fillings), all visits, probably came out to less that thirty bucks.

I have friends who won't return to the States because of the outrageous expenses. I so hope this gets fixed. It's crazy how people can't even agree on that.