As the health care reform bill makes its way through the legislative process, Americans aren’t getting more comfortable with or optimistic about it. They remain firmly against a public option, and most people are satisfied with the current health care system we have in America. While no one can deny that change is needed, the kind of change that Obama and the Democrats are proposing isn’t the kind of change the majority of Americans want. Tort reform, for example, is grossly needed and would alleviate some of the costs associated with health care, but Democrats aren’t interested in tort reform -- that would anger their lawyer benefactors, after all. What Democrats are interested in is taking the first step towards a single-payer system, and multiple Democrat politicians have admitted that a plan like Obama’s health care reform plan would be the best way to achieve a single-payer health care system. Does it matter that Americans are ardently against it? Probably not.
The newest Rasmussen polling data shows that Americans are really starting to worry. 63% of voters think that the guarantee of no one being forced to change their health care is more important than a public option. And while liberals, of course, disagree, moderates and conservatives are united on this topic.
Most liberal voters say giving people the choice of a public option is more important. But most moderates put guaranteeing that no one is forced to change their health insurance first, and conservatives overwhelmingly agree with them.
Currently, 53% of insured voters say it’s likely they would have to change their health insurance coverage if the health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and congressional Democrats becomes law. That helps explain why 54% of voters believe that the health care system needs major changes, but just 41% support the comprehensive reform proposed by the president.
A public option wouldn’t automatically mean that citizens would be forced to change their health care. It’s not necessarily that nefarious. The public option would, however, give employers incentive to drop private coverage for their employees and just go with the cheaper government option. With all the taxes already forced onto small business owners, raising the cost of providing private health care to employees won’t give business owners much of a choice.
With Americans so disenfranchised over Obama’s government run health care plan, what will Democrats do? It’s entirely likely that they’ll try to just sneak the public option in there. The bill will probably be around 1,000 pages long, filled with incomprehensible and often contradictory legal jargon that even lawmakers don’t understand. And considering that many politicians flat out admit that they won’t even bother to read the bill, slipping some kind of public option into the bill without anyone noticing probably wouldn’t even be that hard.
Of course, some people might wonder why a public option would be that bad. It’s hard to tell what’s so worrying about a government run health care plan. But you need look no further than Canada or Cuba to see what’s so scary about it -- or to Oregon, where the government wouldn’t approve one Oregon woman’s cancer treatments but instead offered doctor-assisted suicide. Similarly, a July 2009 directive forces all VA physicians to give a pamphlet titled “Your Life, Your Choices” and to discuss end-of-life counseling with VA patients. It seems innocent, but when you dig deeper it becomes more disturbing. Veterans returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan can be physically and/or emotionally wounded. Yet they’re coming home to doctors who are being told to tell our veterans that it’s OK to wonder if their life is worth living. They can just sign a will to let a doctor terminate their lives if, for example, they’re in a wheelchair, are depressed, or are a financial or emotional burden on their family. Don’t our veterans deserve better?
The callousness of the Oregon Health Care Plan and “Your Life, Your Choices” should be worrying. These are two examples of what happens when the government controls health care on a relatively small scale. Do we really want this kind of system implemented nationwide? It’s no wonder that so many Americans are against a public option. Nationalized health care has never been successful in any country that practices it, so why in the world would it suddenly be efficient and cost-saving here?
Cassy Fiano's Bio
Cassy Fiano is a sports journalist turned political blogger ( www.cassyfiano.com ). She's a twenty-something opinionated conservative who has worked on a presidential campaign, campaigned for George W. Bush in 2004, and served on the planning committee for the Jacksonville Tax Day Tea Party.
Posted
10-05-2009 12:01 AM
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