Wednesday, March 3, 2010

A Political Observation about Healthcare and its Treatment

So I recently stumbled on an interesting article from 1964 that caused me to reconsider some of the arguments against Obama's health care that you can hear on Fox News and other conservative mediums. As far as I can tell, Republicans have issued six main criticisms of the current health reform initiative. They are:
  1. It will lead America toward socialism - the federal government will be controlling just one more aspect of your life--your healthcare!
  2. There are not enough doctors -- 30 million new people cant fit into the existing system without causing shortages of doctors for everybody
  3. Rationed healthcare! You wont be able to get the services you want or need!
  4. It will economically cost too much - the economy cannot handle it - our childrens' children will be paying this debt
  5. Its passage via "reconciliation" is a sinister movement
  6. Americans overwhelmingly do not wan it
1. Threat of socialism:
The 1964 article I read was written by Republican Congressman John H. Rousselot. He cited conservative think tanks and policy groups who shared his view that the federal legislation at hand was a communist conspiracy to implant socialism in America. Conservatives across the nation agreed. What was the legislation? Civil rights. One conservative policy center said the legislation was 10% civil rights and 90% socialist efforts to empower the federal government. They really argued that civil rights legislation was bad because it empowered the federal government to control the lives of individuals--where they could eat, sleep, swim, etc. Funny how the old specter of the socialist boogy-man is still a staple of the Republican opposition to anything the democrats want to do. In the case of health care reform, Republicans have argued that the reform will force everyone to use government controlled health care. That just simply is not true. In fact, the bill counts on private insurance because it is funded, in part, by taxing some of those. You see, if all the healthy people jump into an insurance plan and leave the unhealthy behind, the unhealthy will probably go for government health insurance (rather than pay ultra high rates for private as they currently must). To help fund thier access, the government will tax private companies and in that way give everyone--healthy or sick--freedom of choice and access to medical care. The current system only gives freedom of choice to the healthy. So you see, the continuance of private enterprise is an essential part of this plan. This is not socialism. It is an ethical issue though, and Republicans have a proven track record of opposing ethical legislation on trumped up charges that it is a socialist conspiracy.

2. Not enough doctors:
In 1944 Congress passed Public Law 78-346, which included the now famous GI Bill. It allotted tons of cash to WWII veterans to buy houses and go to school. Over the next 20 years over 5 million Americans used the bill. Was anybody concerned that there would not be enough homes? Was anybody concerned that there would not be enough professors to teach them all? Would there be professor shortages and would classroom size swell out of control? No. Why? Because they believed that the market would balance. If you have more demand, more people will build homes or become professors. Why would it be any different with doctors? It wont. In fact, in America we have made education so common place that many pursue more education just because it is available. That is the case for university professors. We now have way too many educated people and not enough jobs for them.

3. Rationed health care:
Okay, so there is an ounce or two of credibility to this one. Yes, if you chose a government health care program then the government bureaucrats running it get to determine what is an acceptable cost and treatment for all sorts of ailments. However, it is exactly the same now when your privately owned health insurance company. No matter who runs it, the guys at the top determine what you can or cannot get. And if you really want more options, you are still free to buy an expensive "Cadillac" plan from a private company. They are not going anywhere. The current legislation does nothing to restrict their ability to market and sell services. In fact, the legislation is depending on them sticking around.

4. Too expensive:
Obama has dressed up the new bill as a cost saving measure and that just is not true (republicans are not the only ones misrepresenting things). However, it is not a massively expensive bill either. It is funded by taxing private insurance companies, medical equipment providers, and re-allocating funds already set aside for medicare. Ultimately, this is not that expensive. The bail out was expensive, and I agree we need to start cutting back costs, but this medical reform is not going to increase the deficit much at all because it has plans built in to fund it. It is a fraction of our military budget, which by the way, is almost exactly 10 times larger than any other country in the world and much more than the rest of the world combined! Just google words like military, budget, and world to see for yourself.

5. Reconciliation is unethical
Reconciliation is a parliamentary procedure to reconcile bills passed by the Senate and by the House so that they match up. It has been used many times in the past, most often by the Republicans. It was used to pass much of the Republican "Contract with America" during the 1990s. It was fine and great when it worked for the Republicans, but now that the Democrats want to use it the Republicans label it sinister-the "nuclear" solution. Isn't that a bit hypocritical? I think so.

6. Americans overwhelmingly rejected it:
Americans are not overwhelming opposed to the legislation. That is a myth. The polls range from 44% opposed to 59% opposed, but most of the credible polls say it is between 50% and 54% opposed. So, half (or slightly more than half) of American oppose the bill. And how many Americans typically vote for Republican candidates in an election? Oh, somewhere around 45-50%. So basically, what we have here is most people who usually like Republicans and don't like Democrats feel as they always do, and a few moderates have joined them. That is not overwhelming opposition. Besides, it is always easier to poison public opinion on an issue than it is to build it, especially when you have the disinformation campaign that I've addressed above. So if you want to claim overwhelming opposition you better post some better stats to prove it. That does not stop Fox News from claiming there is overwhelming resistance.

Fox News and the conservative media outlets just keep claiming the above arguments are true, even though they are not. Why? They figure if they repeat it enough times you'll believe it is true. You see, they are a political entity first and a news reporting entity second. They selectively report on things that they think will strengthen thier cause, and they overlook things that do not. I can give you several examples of this policy.
  1. Remember when they ran repeated stories on Obama's birthplace potentially disqualifying him from the presidency? It wasn't true, but they brought it up over an over again anyway. They also used this to argue (before the election) that he could not even pass the top security test, which has no relevance at all except to cast some sort of illusion that he is a security risk (when they knew full well that his birthplace did not make him a risk). They look for any way to discredit him.
  2. How about when Fox News repeated his full name constantly--Barack Hussein Obama. Who knows George W. Bush's middle name? Clinton's? Bush Sr.'s? Reagan's? Not many people. But we're fighting terrorists from the Middle East so if you oppose Obama it is a good time to make sure everybody knows his middle name.
  3. Fox ran stories about Obama's supposed relationship with Bill Ayers, the Weather Underground terrorist. Of course, he has no real relation --they attended the same conference once--but by portraying them as buddies Fox hoped to convince Americans that he was sympathetic to him and weak on terrorism at a time when the nation is fighting terrorism.
  4. More recently Fox ran stories about Chicago having corrupt politics, and insinuated that Obama and his administration must also be corrupt because they come from Illinois. Do they have any evidence that anybody in the administration has ever done anything questionable? No, but who needs that? In the modern media world you just need accusations to ruin somebody, they hope.
Now, I don't really watch Fox News much (mostly I read Associated Press articles) but these are just things I noticed when I did watch it. I'm sure there are more. This does not mean I am in love with Obama and the Democrats. Heck, I'm not even a Democrat. I have problems with some of thier positions too, but it frustrates me when one group engages in such overt misinformation and obstructionist actions that derail the democratic system. Americans voted for the Democrats last November. They have disgusting majorities in both houses and the presidency, so stop obstructing and misrepresenting everything they do and give them a shot. If they fail, well, we're only a year away from the next election. I just ask that they get a fair chance to do something without Republican politicians and news networks misrepresenting everything to sway public opinion and then justifying obstructionist tactics to slow any progress. Last month Time magazine's cover story discussed this. They pointed out that the new tactic in Washington is for the minority party to derail the majority party and then at elections to point out that the majority party did not accomplish what they promised to do. As Republicans continue to vote no on every measure and threaten to filibuster everything they are not just voting no on the issues, but on the democratic system. If the Democrats do the same thing in the future nothing ever will be accomplished in Washington.