The President vetoed a thing last week. I wasn’t paying attention. He doesn’t veto much, but when he does I can usually assume he shouldn’t have done it. This time around he vetoed a bill that would have guaranteed health care to children whose parents could not afford insurance, but were not poor enough to qualify for Medicaid. The cost of the program, from what I understand, is about the same as the cost of two weeks in Iraq. But the President vetoed it because he saw it as a step toward Socialism.
I’m a firm believer in the idea that most things are the way they are in this country because it makes the most money that way. Cigarettes and alcohol are legal and marijuana is illegal because they make the most money that way. That story about finding a way to ignite salt water fizzled into the background because keeping the populace stressed out about oil prices makes more money. If the powers that be can find a way to make more money on water-based fuel or legalized marijuana you will see a paradigm shift.
The rule applies to health care, obviously. There is a consensus that the current system is totally jacked. Everyone running for an office of any kind is espousing some sort of “new” plan. Conservatives lean toward more of a free-market plan, while liberals push for more government control of the system, usually offering to pay for it with higher taxes on Things That Are Bad For You But Still Legal.
I have no idea how to fix a broken health care system. I just know that when I am standing in my doctor’s office and my doctor has to consult a chart to figure out what drugs she is allowed to prescribe to me, something is very, very wrong.
I am fortunate enough to have health insurance through my employer. It came in handy a few years ago when I developed a kidney stone. I ran into a little trouble, though, because I neglected to call my doctor and ask her permission before I went to the emergency room. It must have slipped my mind while I was vomiting from the pain. Anyhoo, I received a bill from the hospital which I gratefully passed on to my insurance company. I remember that one of the tests cost twelve hundred dollars. That was on top of the seven hundred dollars just for walking in the door. I don’t have nineteen hundred dollars. If I didn’t have insurance I would not have been able to pay the bill, and I would now have collection agencies hounding me and screwing up my credit report even worse than it already is.
But here’s what really worries me: I read once, a long time ago, that car companies deliberately build cars so they start to wear out just after the warranty expires. They could, if they wanted to, build cars that lasted longer, but this way customers are forced to go back and spend large sums of money on repairs or replacements. It seems to me the same might be true in a free-market health care system. See, there is one thing the health care industry must have in order to make money: sick people. It is in the industry’s best interest to make sure there is a market for their product. It would not be cost-effective for them to, say, cure cancer, when there is so much money to be made from people who are suffering from it.
I’d like to think that a move toward Socialized medicine would negate that possibility. If the government had to pay for our health care, it would find ways to keep us from getting sick right quick, wouldn’t they? Or would they just come up with a new definition of “sick,” and give you so much paperwork to fill out just to prove you are sick that you’d rather just ride it out, even if “it” is a life-threatening tumor.
Sorry. I watched Children of Men a few weeks ago and I can’t shake the feeling that we are all pretty much fucked.
On the energy front I have a good pal from Iowa City with his PhD in electrical engineering. He’s a total conspiracy nut. Not happy with the direction of the country.
And yet, when it comes to electricity and energy, he has this irritating habit of insisting and lamenting that oil and coal are pretty much the only things that can feasibly sustain our lifestyles. As a dude with profound expertise in the area, I always concede his point…there’s no get out of jail free card. We’ve become dependent on a costly substance whose energy yeild is unmatched in the world. The only way to get around that is to Need Less Energy. A LOT less energy.
I believe if we COULD use salt water we would use saltwater. And, I also believe that if we COULD use saltwater, THEY would STILL find a way to make us pay through the nose for it. Consider radio waves…they’re free! They’re everywhere! And yet, the FCC regulates them and makes you buy a high priced license to use them for broadcasting purposes. THEY are quite indidious.
I totally agree with you that our health care system is shit, but I do believe that preventative care is slowly going to become more dominant. Just look at the new vaccine against cervical cancer. That’s a definite step in the right direction. The problem is that a lot of people can’t afford to have these procedures.
I think where the bigger problem lies is with food manufacturers. They keep putting all this nasty shit in our everyday food (including things like milk) that over time will make us very sick. In order to buy food that doesn’t contain all those chemicals, you have to pay through the nose. I can’t afford most of that stuff, so I’m supposed to just suck it up and get cancer or diabetes or whatever later on in life? I think that’s where the true racket with the health care system might be….
Need Less Energy? How much less? How do I know if I’m using too much? There are certain things I’m simply not willing to give up; they are, in fact, the reasons I go to the job I dislike. I am unwilling to give up the ability to keep my apartment’s temperature in the low 70s all year round. I am unwilling to give up daily hot showers. I am unwilling to give up the ability to read into the wee morning hours by the light of an electric lamp. I am unwilling to give up my DVD collection, and if I have a DVD collection, I better be able to watch them whenever I please. I am unwilling to give up using the Internet. I am unwilling to give up watching football on Sundays.
I live in a society that can make these things available to everyone with relative ease. For the most part I follow the rules. I have a full-time job. I pay bills and taxes. I feel entitled to these things.
I even feel that I help out. I do not own a car. I ride a bicycle everywhere I go. When a bicycle is unfeasible I walk or use public transportation. I don’t own a dishwasher. I use those expensive florescent light bulbs. I try not to leave lights on, and I try to unplug appliances and chargers when they are not in use.
I am willing to make sacrifices up to a point. But beyond that I have to ask, why bother? What am I working for, if I have to keep giving up the things I want? Or maybe I should just chuck it all and figure out how to run a self-sustaining farm on solar energy, or something like that.
YEAH! I frickin’ hate the health care thing. That’s a crazy raw nerve. And I think you’re absolutely right…THEY don’t solve it because there’s more money in the problem than there is in the solution. The one trillion dollar health insurance industry is really the only winner in our health care system, and what political person has the balls to say we have to dismantle a 1 trillion dollar a year industry?
You’re right. All policy seems to be dictated by the amount of money there is to be found there. It’s almost like our votes don’t much matter anymore when compared to the contributions of lobbyists.
All we can really do with our votes is try to constantly sever the longstanding relationships between lobbyists and elected officials by flushing out the incumbents every year.
See…I wonder the same thing. How can I possibly use less energy? Where am I using it all? At least you don’t use a car. I totally use a car. I use a little car built in 1998. But I still use a car at all.
But we totally do use a ton of it. More per capita than everybody in the world. I think that’s why we’re we’re addicted. We don’t even KNOW what it’s like with substantially less energy. We love it. I love it. You love it. We all love it. Without it, I wouldn’t have a job. I work from my computer.
Every once in a while I start to look up how to make a wind generator. It gets all exciting until I see how much power one generates. Oh boy…with my wind generator I MIGHT be able to power a light bulb and a radio for an hour…if the wind keeps up.
The point is…I think we’re totally stuck with coal and oil. Dammit.
OH! But there is one really cool thing called the Wind Chimney. http://alt-e.blogspot.com/2005/02/site-agreed-for-australian-solar-tower.html
That’s pretty sweet.