The Motion of the Ocean

Preface

I had every intention to write my next blogggggggg on health care. It morphed into explaining why I’m pro-socialist, anti-fascist. And an organ donor. Well, maybe not the last part. I love America. I love America so much I would put lipstick on it and spank its butt. That’s how much I love America. I never imagined that when I became old enough to care about watching the news and reading the newspapers that I would be bombarded with sludge. As a child, my grandparents watched the evening news every night. I didn’t care much about politics in those days but I could tell that what was going was important and mattered. Growing up I tried to be as open minded to everyone’s points of view and tried to see that if they believed in their p.o.v. there must be a seed of truth in it. In forming my own beliefs, I found it was impossible to be both pro-choice and pro-life. Imagine that! If you want your own identity you have to pick, and hopefully have a good reason why. Although, I have found, this isn’t a prerequisite. Chapter II will focus on what changes should be made in America’s health care system. Chapter Uno starts now:

Chapter Uno

At first appearance, health care is a large immovable beast. A closer look will reveal small legs that cannot support the weight of its body. The more you observe it the larger it grows. And what appears to be a simple problem can become a task that seems endless.

In tackling the health care problem of America, you are in fact, attacking the idea of America. In questioning if government should cover every American, you are questioning the idea of America. It isn’t a medical problem as much as it is an ideological civil war.

In these times, with these questions being asked, it is a reminder of how young of a nation we are and how far we still have to go. The same questions we are struggling with today are the same questions we had when we were constructing our idea of government after the American Revolution. There appears to be only two parties standing: those who want government as far away as possible and those that want government to be a collective body that can act better than any individual could alone. The pendulum seems swing back and forth whenever one has more political power than the other.

It is an illusion to think that it is a battle between the two major political parties: the Democrats and the Republicans. Behind the scenes lurks the almighty dollar: mightier than the church, mightier than the government. Its influence leaves a trail wherever it’s been. In the case of health care it is no different. Ideas are great, but money is real. The lines are drawn in this battle, not between Democrats and Republicans, but between Business and the People. The strength of people is its numbers. The strength of business is its finance. Both are very powerful. It is an ideological belief to say that true power lies in the People, but the battlefield is littered with those who have fallen by the power of finance.

Almost a page has been written, and I’ve barely mentioned the subject: health care. It is impossible to tackle the idea of health care without confronting head on the differences between the political parties in America. Still, it would be a simpleton’s error to say that the Republican Party is the Business party and the Democrats are the People's Party. With the recent election of Senator Brown in the Massachusetts, the political tides have turned. As often they do once one political party has had the upper hand. What seems lost in this change in power appears to be the “Obama Plan.” (http://www.whitehouse.gov/issues/health-care/plan.) The President has been in office for over a year and his Plan has been his Marching Song. From Joe Wilson’s “you lie” outburst during a speech President Obama gave to Congress; to the Massachusetts woman that compared the Plan to Nazi policies, the health care debate has been a lively one.

57% of America believes that health care should be the President’s top priority according to Pew Research. Health Care is behind, in order: Economy (83% believe this should be the President’s top priority), Jobs (umm..), Terrorism, Social Security, Education, Medicare (this is health care-63%), and finally, deficit reduction.

The last time there was an attempt to reform health care in America was in 1993 when President Clinton took office. The failure to pass universal health care in his first year led to the “Republican Revolution,” the first time the Republicans gained control of both the House and Senate since 1953. In retrospect, the people spoke out against “big government.”

Big! Scary! Government! It seems like such a rallying cry these days. Why is it so big, bad and scary? Ooooooooh! Just saying “big government,” I half expect ghosts to come out from behind me. In addition to the ghosts of big government, I have already seen two bumper stickers describing the United States as a socialist/communist country because of the push for universal health care.

And why is there fear? When we hear “big government,” maybe we think of Jimmy Carter. When we hear socialist/communist maybe we think of the Cold War, the U.S.S.R., East Germany, Stalin, government control, etc.

I guess when I hear “big government” I think of the New Deal. I think about government’s intervention in ending slavery, ending Jim Crow laws and making it mandatory to provide free education to its citizens. When I hear the fears of Communism I wonder why I don’t hear about the fears of fascism. Fascism is the far right of the political spectrum. (Left wing=liberals, socialists, communists; Right wing: conservative, monarchists, fascists.) In monarchy, the people were loyal to its king. In fascism, the people are loyal to business, aka profit. If “big government” gets in the way of profit, then “big government” needs to get out of the way. Government only works when it works to make more money for the few, higher income people, not the many, lower income people.

In recent times, the government has been criticized for bailing out Wall Street and not helping Main Street. I hope that the consensus of this recent collapse in the economy was due to the lack of regulation by the government. In other words, government was too small. It was kept small because the belief was that the market should have regulated itself. It didn’t. Alan Greenspan testified to Congress in 2008 following the recent economic collapse, “I made a mistake in presuming that the self-interest of organizations, specifically banks and others, were such that they were best capable of protecting their own shareholders and the equity in the firms.” Without government intervention, most economists agree that we would currently be in the Great Depression part Deux.

In President Obama’s inauguration speech he said, “The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works.” There are in fact times that a government take a larger role (Troubled Asset Relief Program). There are times that the government should take a lesser role (prosecuting marijuana anyone?). It gives new meaning to the saying, "It is not the size of the ship, but the motion of the ocean."

I believe it is right for government to take on health care. In my next chapter, I hope to show how. Whether it passes now isn't important, because it won't. The question is: Should it?