Healthcare Boiled Over Debate

Anyone with a heartbeat has something to say on healthcare for all Americans or they damn sure as hell should have an opinion. From business owners that have seen the gross profiteering from their health care insurance providers to the employees of those same businesses that have seen their own cost rise but services cut. The only people winning are the mega structures built to provide a new home to the next generation of Robber Barons. And yet an industry that claims that they can police themselves is recording record profits while the rest of America is losing its shirt? Does that make any sense to you?

Teddy Roosevelt was a Republican bastard to industry and that is a political and historical fact. He saw a wrong, it was un-American for the times and he sure as hell fixed it. He carried his big stick and broke up the Robber Barons for a reason, they were killing the American economy. When any industry Robber Baron thinks that they are so powerful that the laws and the liberty of all Americans is no longer of their concern because they believe to have omnipotent power, then it is up to a strong President and Federal Government to protect the American people from them.

Capitalism in America is a funny business, sometimes it serves the many but often it serves the few. There is nothing wrong with any company making a profit to survive. If I were a CEO then that would be my objective one hundred and ten percent. We are talking health care though, not gas, not steel, not oil and things that could be commodity driven. Just health care is being discussed here and frankly I have to agree with Teddy Roosevelt that it is time to take out the federal government big stick and knock the sons of bitches down a notch. As the system stands now, you would have to work for your employer and forsake all of your wages twenty years from now just to see your doctor for the sniffles. Pay your soul to the company store for anything worse than that.

Reality is simple, do the math yourself. The more people without health care means that the cost to you will rise further and higher than it has in the past. People will look back kindly when co-pays only increased twenty percent per year. Health Care CEO’s will take hundred million dollar plus bonuses and wonder how they will increase their pay the next year?

Meanwhile, ten of millions of our fellow Americans will go without regular care, never see a doctor till the cost of care goes into the millions and the sun will shine the next day regardless of political opinion one way or the other. Just make sure you wear your sunglasses as you pass the conglomerate skyscraper HMO built to make sure you get your health care bill emailed, faxed, debited from your checking account, or sent to your cell phone before you even get home from your doctor.

The health care industry is broken. It isn’t the nurses and doctors that give the care fault. It’s the white shirts in a huge glass building hundreds or thousands of miles away from the table that you sit on where they ask you to roll up your sleeve or stick out your tongue. It’s not even the emergency room hospitals fault either. Most hospitals according to some reports have to waive the bills and eat the cost of caring for people without health insurance. Where do you think that cost gets passed on to? That two dollar treatment such as Aspirin or other medication of equal cost ends up costing $250 on an insurance form from the ER.

It is time for a Teddy Roosevelt big stick. Hell yes! President Obama needs to speak softly and carry a big stick when it comes to healthcare reform. Is that not one of the biggest reasons we voted to elect President Obama and a Democrat controlled Congress? I believe we have the votes to get it done so what is the problem? Just get the job done and lets move on to the next issue!

Papamoka

An Indecisive American People

In America today there is a strong and growing movement of people that once thought their voices did not count when it came to the policies of our government. There is some truth to the message that if you do not vote then you do not count but it is not the entire truth. Being an American does not mean that you have to vote, it simply helps the process of putting like minds in the offices you vote for.

Even if you do not vote, your government is still your government as a citizen. Your voice is still very important. Your life and your opinions matter. You are in fact a very important person in the ongoing experiment that is the United States of America. There is only one downfall to our form of government and that is when people believe that our government is not about them. That is the beginning of the end to our democratically elected servants to our republic. Or dare I say the beginning of an elitist government and society led by the needs of the few at the cost of the many.

As Richard Nixon tore down the respect of the political office of the Presidency, so has George W. Bush. Past lessons have been forgotten and the future of being respected as an American President will be up to future office holders to defend. Deciding what laws apply to the President alone when signing laws into effect is wrong and elitist at best. No American is above the law and never should be. We are a land of laws and rules that apply to all. Without them, we have anarchy and that is not a part of the American experiment.

In my mind, the office of President is not just about the power that comes with it. Being the President is about all of the people and sometimes it is about what the people want that is not to your personal liking. Yet it is the people that own the office and not the individual sitting behind the desk. If that was not the case then the descendants of George Washington would be a living and ruling Monarchy today. Am I wrong?

Get off the damn cell phone, computer, email or whatever seems more important and write or email your Representative in Congress on issues you care about. Tell them how you feel about any given issue. Be heard and wash, rinse and repeat.

Not doing that, then yes, special interest will walk away with our nation of laws that only apply to you. They get a waiver and walk away clean as a new born baby.

As an American you need to decide what you want from your leaders and more importantly what you do not want.

Papamoka