Infrastructure or Entitlement?

I listened to some of the health care debate today. Well, actually it’s more of a debate on how we are going to continue to allow the insurance companies to enrich themselves while they do their best to bankrupt the country. I have to say that Obama is one articulate dude, and I have to chuckle every time he slaps down McCain...but that’s not really what I want to talk about. What I want to talk about is this political sound bite I keep hearing:

“It’s nothing but a big entitlement.”

Hmmm…

Entitlement?

So what does that actually mean? Does it mean that Americans AREN’T entitled to healthcare? That’s what it sounds like to me. Apparently the only people in America who are “entitled” to healthcare are those who can afford it…or those lucky enough to qualify for some already existing “entitlement” program that they would get rid of if they could.

Sometimes I think that the powers that be would love it if we could go back to a more medieval type of healthcare system…you know, the sort of system where the rich get house calls from highly trained (and extremely expensive) physicians to treat their ills while everyone else goes to the local healer, shaman, or witch doctor for some folk remedy made of stewed chicken lips and pig feces. It seems strange to me that in this supposedly enlightened age, we can still find areas in which to engage in class struggles.

Anyway, the thing that I keep getting hung up on is this notion that “healthcare” is some sort of product or commodity that the government has no business mucking around with. As if “healthcare” is some sort of widget that is manufactured somewhere to be sold to consumers for their benefit and that market forces and economies of scale are working their magic to make “healthcare” cheaper and better the same way we see our computers and electronic devices get smarter, faster, and smaller for less and less over time. I suppose if “healthcare” evolved, improved, and became more affordable the way our toys and tools do, everyone would be happy and we wouldn’t be having the current debate.

But that is exactly the opposite of what’s happening (the cost of healthcare is increasing at unconscionable rates), and in the end, it’s not analogous. The truth is that if you look between the lines at what is scrawled there in red crayon in big, bold, block letters for everyone to see, you’ll find out that the “debate” isn’t about “healthcare” or the quality of life in America. It is about who controls the trillions of dollars flowing through the healthcare industry. It’s about HEALTH INSURANCE and big, big, big money. That’s all it is about and all it has ever been about, so let’s not kid ourselves into thinking the big players in this debate care about us. Insurance companies are businesses and they are about making money. PERIOD. And the majority of this so called debate is about who controls what is a very big and expensive pie.

Okay, fine…this is all about big empires and a bunch of Snidely Whiplashes twirling their mustaches. So what’s that got to do with the price of tea bags in Alaska?

Well, I would argue that it obscures the real problem and the only sensible solution. We are spending so much time trying to find a compromise that will allow the insurance companies to continue ass-raping the public while also providing for the have-nots, that people fail to consider the facts that (1) our current system is clearly discriminatory in ways we simply DO NOT allow in any other arena and allows for routine discrimination along lines of age, gender, race, and economic class solely to benefit private businesses with NO regard to the public welfare, and (2) our healthcare system should be regarded as part of the infrastructure of our country and as such should be made available to everyone equally in the best interest of the nation.

“But,” some fat, out of touch politician might mutter, “I thought healthcare is just another big entitlement…something that people can do without”

Well…is education an entitlement? How about clean water, roads, sanitation? What about law enforcement and fire departments? I could go on and on, but I’ll just point out that in our history we have had the intelligence and foresight to recognize that eventually it makes sense for the government to take over certain services when it is in the public interest to do so. We have a huge public school system and a well-educated work force that has been crucial to America’s unparalleled success over the past century. Given the hundreds of billions of dollars in lost productivity every year caused by preventable illness in this country, I don’t think that it’s difficult to put the health of the nation in the same category…which, coincidentally, every single industrial nation EXCEPT THE UNITED STATES has already done.

For a smart country, sometimes we are very dumb.

I know it sounds like socialism (a concept that the average American doesn’t really know two shits about, no matter what they might be shouting at political rallies and tractor pulls), but single payer/a national system is the only thing that will ever solve the mess we’re in. But that’s not going to happen because the big players (who are fighting to hold onto their pieces of this multi-trillion dollar cash cow) have too much power at this stage in the game, and their lackeys in the political arena have the American public convinced that these big businesses are looking out for their best interest and are the best people to manage the industry anyway…at least until you get sick and they find a way to drop your policy.

I guess all that I can hope for is that the programs around the 30-45 million person pool that might be created by the current cluster fu…I mean “compromise” might be enough to put a dent in this behemoth economic doomsday machine that’s being fed by big medicine and its special interests. Maybe we can find a way to twist their arms a bit to stop screwing their customers to make a buck, while perhaps demonstrating that there are better options and ideas out there worth pursuing.

But maybe not…people are far too ignorant, lazy, and apathetic it seems…and as they say, “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.”

Wouldn’t it be nice, for once, if that wasn’t true?