The Inaugural Post

My wife and my friend Kimberly are making me start this blog. Well, maybe there wasn't much coercion is involved. Just some garden variety nagging. My wife would like me to stop pissing off bosses and potential employers (hers, not mine) by talking politics at cocktail parties, so she figured this would be a good outlet. Kimberly seems to think I should be writing for a living. That would be nice, but I think I'm a long way from that at the moment. As for myself, I have been reluctant to start writing again due to a fear that it won't be quite perfect. Something you would think I would be over after about 9 years of ballet. Also, despite the fact the impetus for this was politics, I realized I had a lot of gratuitous opinions about a variety things. Religion, football, food. Basically all the things people seem to like to kill each other over, so I wasn't exactly sure how to start.

Since I have been in the middle of various posts on facebook to various people about the health care legislation, I figure that would be a good place to start. I've been kind of immersed in this for a couple months now and have even attempted to read parts of H.R.3200. I'd like to get through the whole thing, but since it isn't going to be the final product and Pelosi may not let anyone see the finished product before it is voted on(We'll just have to take their word), I'm not sure how productive that would be. I've watched a few of the town hall meetings( Ben Cardin, Hometown boy Steny Hoyer, Arlen Specter) only to find there was a lot less drama than reported and a lot of fairly clueless democrats. Although I have to say, Steny, number 2 in the house, and representing my place of birth, Lexington Park, MD is pretty freakin' slick. I couldn't help liking the guy. I would never vote for him, but would certainly crack crabs and have beers if I ever got the chance. I also watched Obama's speech and was screaming"liar!" at the TV long before Joe Wilson decided to weigh in.

I have to admit, the idea of not having to pay for health care seems pretty attractive. I went through all of my twenties and half my thirties without insurance. Now I pay out of pocket every month for a policy that covers the bare minimum. While a seemingly convenient solution, I have little faith in our government, actually, no faith in our government to produce the result they are promising in an efficient and cost effective manner. To jump to the center of Obama's speech, he claimed we would be able to partially pay for his "plan" by reducing waste and fraud in the medicaid and medicare system. (The same medicaid which illegal aliens seem to have no problem accessing). Of all the czars Obama has appointed that are completely superfluous, why not appoint someone to ferret out corruption and fraud in the bureaucracy as it stands. We could start with, I don't know, ACORN. If they can't clean up the system now, what makes this administration think they can clean it up after they make it bigger and includes more people who could potentially commit fraud?

One of the main problems I have with Obama is that he has been completely disingenuous and dishonest about trying for and wanting bipartisan support. It wasn't the Republicans who stopped 3200 from being voted on before the August recess, it was the conservative(ish) people in his own party. The Republicans can't stop this. They don't have the votes. Not only that, they submitted H.R.3400 which contained things like tort reform, portability across state lines, and establishing health savings accounts. Supposedly, the senate committee is trying to frame a bill that contains some of these ideas, but I guess we'll just have to wait and see. Pelosi saw fit to bury 3400 as long as she thought 3200 might get through relatively close to its original form. Or at least until they can come up with a public option trojan horse that will keep democrats in their seats come 2010 and have a few Republicans on board to blame when the whole thing blows up. So when Obama says he will listen to ideas, but, according to him, his opponents don't have any, he is lying. Then again, Obama has always had a bit of an aversion to the democratic process. He won his first senate seat in Illinois by getting all of his opponents disqualified. (I want to make another crack about ACORN right here, but it just isn't flowing. Darn.) He also had to get a hand from the super delegates in the Democrat primary. For all the change he wants to affect, he certainly doesn't seem to want to own it. He couldn't help himself from throwing in a jab at the "previous administration" in his speech or blaming other people for lying about his plan.

After all the accusations about disinformation, Obama hasn't really addressed the primary flaws in the plan, namely, what is the exact purpose of requiring everyone to purchase health insurance,(Or, if I decide not to carry health insurance and pay for my expenses out of pocket, why do I have to pay a penalty? Penalize people who walk on their bills) how much is it really going to cost, how is it going to be paid for, and how do you foster true healthy competition by introducing a scheme that doesn't have to make money and can take it from whoever they please, and if it still isn't enough, can arbitrarily print more despite not having anything to back the paper? It is foolishness to give the government this much control. The main enforcer of this law will be the I.R.S and someone referred to as "the Secratary". This is ten times more intrusive than the Patriot Act ever was, and less beneficial. We need reform, but not like this.

Finally, a word on compassion. A lot of my liberal friends and most democrats site compassion as the motivation for passing sweeping social reform, especially like this. After all, it can't be wrong to provide health care for people who can't afford it (which the government already does). What was the post? No one should die because the can't get treatment and no one should go broke because they get sick? While no one would disagree with that, when Democrats start talking about "fairness" and "compassion", hide your money and load your gun. The plan to pay for health care reform is simple. Tax the rich. The problem with that is taking from one man what he has earned and giving it to someone who hasn't, no matter what the reason, isn't compassion. Its stealing. Compassion is one human being, motivated by something in their soul, be it God, or ethics, or pathos, or empathy, to help someone else, whether they can afford to or not. The same people who don't want morality legislated have no problem legislating their idea of compassion.

The hour is late. I want to talk more about the role of organized religion in health care, but it may need to wait for a later post. I believe the Church should be playing an active role in the act of compassion and care that is defined by helping people heal. And in a lot of places it is. But I think more could still be done.