health care debate returns

This is part of a response I posted on The Vermont Tiger (http://www.vermonttiger.com/content/2010/01/the-message-for-montpelier.html)

Food is a need. I can grow my own. Shelter is a need. I can build my own. Health care is a need. I cannot cure sickness. I hear the criticisms of gov’t run anything, but the fact of the matter is that my father recently walked into the VA hospital in White River and described it as the best hospital experience he’s personally experienced and my mother recently completed successful lung cancer surgery (she’s a non-smoker, by the way) with the benefit of Medicaid. I would hate to think of what the experience would have been like if she had only the health insurance she could afford at 70 years of age with her earnings from her self-employed full time housecleaning work. Now, while I’m not a big fan of anecdotes to prove a point, these personal experiences do color my beliefs. The gov’t system worked. No generality can change that experience. Frankly, I would rather entrust my health care to a system that is designed to be “of the people, by the people and for the people” than to greedy capitalists who are only in it for the buck. Face up to it; insurance companies sacrifice people’s lives to save money. One of the ironies of our national discussion is the Republican fear that our gov’t will ration our care. What they don’t recognize is that insurance companies already do ration our care. But that is a topic for a different time. What we are talking about is the role of the gov’t in our health care system. We define what that role is because it is our gov’t. Does Tom Jefferson’s expression of “inalienable rights endowed by our Creator” only refer to political rights? That is illogical. Our Creator has created more “inalienable rights” than are listed in the Bill of Rights. Our gov’t’s role is to provide protection to the right of equitable access to our modern health care system. Our current system of depending on capitalists is failing in that protection. Too many people go without equitable access. Depending on private industry has failed. It’s time to move on.