Healthcare and Our Fall from Grace

“The Path to Prosperity.” This is the cover page to the GOP budget proposal proudly displayed by Rep. Paul Ryan and John Boehner. Prosperity for who? I recently read an interesting article on the Huffington Post about what the budget proposal would do to our already strained healthcare system and it isn’t good. You can read the article here: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/05/10/gop-budget-uninsured_n_860032.html
Basically it would decimate Medicaid, and millions more would be left uninsured. Medicaid currently covers some 60 million people and it is estimated to cover 76 million by 2021. Under the plan by the GOP the Kaiser Foundation estimates that 30-40 million people will lose coverage. Of course this plan doesn’t have a chance of being passed in the senate or by the President but it illustrates what can only be described as an all out war on the lower middle class and poor in this country not to mention that if we don’t get healthcare under control we are going to continue to decimate our economy and guess what tax payers, you are going to continue to pay the price of covering costly ER visits and skyrocketing premiums. All these items could and should start to be resolved through the Affordable Care Act passed last year. Weak as it is, it is a step in the right direction in starting to rein in the out of control fees associated with healthcare, unless of course it is repelled or stripped down.

Now let me paint you a different picture, one closer to home for most of you. I have a friend who works hard, has 2 kids, and has come upon some very difficult times. We will call my friend Ted. Ted and his family are in the real estate business so let’s just say his regular income has been decimated by the crash. His wife went back to work but can’t find a job with health insurance and his office doesn’t offer coverage and they lost their private insurance because they couldn’t afford it. Just recently Ted had an accident where he slipped and fell on his driveway and busted his elbow. It is not broken but it is hurt and he can’t use it or straighten it out. He isn’t sure what he did to his elbow but he isn’t going to have it looked at because he is afraid of the cost and doesn’t have health insurance. If he lived in Europe he could walk into any hospital and be treated. I am sure he can do the same thing here, except here it will cost him thousands of dollars for an x-ray, or an MRI plus treatment and can you imagine if he needed surgery? I know there are programs in place to help the poor but Ted is not poor, he just can’t afford his insurance and still put food on the table. Ted is just like you, but has fallen on some hard times and could possibly face being crippled because he can’t get care. It sounds like the dark ages but this is happening in 2011.

There are probably thousands of people out there just like Ted and as a nation what message are we sending to these people? Sorry, we are going to take Medicaid and other programs meant to act as a safety net away and you will just have to figure it out. Meanwhile insurance companies keep making profits hand over fist, the defense budget grows, education is slashed and the wealthy get wealthier. What does this say about our society? Are our values so shallow that we only care about the wealthy, warfare and corporate profits? We are supposedly to some, most definitely not me, a Christian nation. Well what would Jesus say about this nation today? Shouldn’t we care about our citizens, all of them, even the ones that we so often say are lazy and take advantage of the system? Those losers let them suffer and be miserable but it is okay because I am fine. Hmmm, not very Christian is it? There are for sure those that take advantage but more than not there are just a lot of hard working people with limited opportunities due to an ever increasing population that is slipping further and further into an abyss and that abyss is getting larger and larger and more and more are succumbing to its pull. If I could illustrate it with paint and a canvas perhaps it would be a modern day painting of “The Garden of Earthly Delights” a truly frightening painting from about the 1500’s that in some scholar’s minds displays the moral decay of the time or a warning of what will happen when morality declines.

Finally, what boggles my mind the most is this whole notion of small government and what is truly constitutional. When the government first formed we were a tiny country in our infancy. We are now a population of over 300 million. You can’t shrink the government and still care for a population of this size. This isn’t the 1700’s any more. In the 1700’s if you got sick you went and saw a doctor and you paid him with eggs or a chicken and a nice dinner. But as society grows you/we/the whole have to grow and change with it. We have to move forward and our thinking has to evolve with the times, which is what the Framers had in mind when they created the constitution. We can take care of our people, provide affordable care and not be communist/socialist and still have the American dream of LIFE, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. This dream is going to die hard for millions of people if we don’t stand up to the Tea Party and the GOP and say enough is enough. Healthcare is not a privilege in an advanced society it’s a right. In today’s world no one should suffer from a fall and face being crippled for life because they came upon hard times. They should be able to go into a hospital, get treatment and walk out with their dignity. There is a war brewing out there and it’s time for every day people to stand up and start talking, I fear if we don’t then more and more of the middle class is going to be chipped away and eventually it will be to late to save this country.  Like the third panel in the painting of “The Garden of Earthly Delights," America will be in an abyss, a dark black hole looking up at the light of the developing world and as we tumble further into the abyss and the light slowly fades to black we will truly fall from grace. The death of the American dream will be complete. This might not happen next year or even in ten years, but if we continue on this path it’s the future I see.