I am appending a recent letter concerning your post, "Knowing When To Worry." http://jgcaesarea.blogspot.com/2013/09/gail-collins-knowing-when-to-worry-did.html
Elaboration...
Following the implementation of universal healthcare across Europe between 1883 and 1912, Republican president,Teddy Roosevelt, seized on the idea whose "time had come."
http://www.pnhp.org/facts/a-brief-history-universal-health-care-efforts-in-the-us
Since then, it has been a long slog for supporters of universal care.
Notably, Europeans and Canadians are happier with their healthcare system than Americans are. And if longevity is the measure of success, European and Canadian health systems are more successful than our own. http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/03/national-geographic-chart-of-per-capita.html
Remarkably, a recent poll shows that 61% of Brits are satisfied with The National Health Service, the "ugly duckling" of socialized, not socialist, healthcare that right-wing Americans - and Libertarians - love to hate.
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/09/the-british-are-surprisingly-satisfied.html
I graduated the University of Toronto in 1970 and am aware -- both by statistical measure and personal report -- that Canadians are more satisfied with "single payer" than fellow Americans are with the inefficient, costly, low-return hodge-podge here.
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/03/national-geographic-chart-of-per-capita.html
In the century since Teddy Roosevelt first championed "universal healthcare," America's political process - as it relates to universal care - has bogged down in industrial-strength lobbying and the paralyzing "perfectionism" that besets conservatives and Libertarians alike.
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/09/paul-ryan-tells-truth.html
Not wanting to force single payer healthcare down the nation's throat during his first two years in office when he enjoyed decisive majorities in both houses, the Marxist, Muslim Anti-Christ, Barack HUSSEIN Obama finally reached a compromise to create the ugly political sausage we now have.
Not surprisingly, The Affordable Care Act is riddled with right-wing counter-productivity most of it based on sine qua non belief in "free markets."
If the "free" market was "up to the task" of insuring Americans, why did the United States reach such extremity that the "free" market "system" exhibited 1.) poor coverage, 2.) denied coverage, 3.) deceptive coverage, 4.) unavailable coverage, and 5.) the most astronomically expensive healthcare system on earth - with embarrassingly low longevity?
http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2013/03/national-geographic-chart-of-per-capita.html
If ever there were death panels, they operated under aegis of the private insurance industry.
In any event, Obamacare embodies an approximation of universal healthcare, and what's more, the conservative Supreme Court approved it as Law Of The Land.
Unless and until a law is repealed (or declared unconstitutional) it is every citizen's civic duty to respect the validity and exigency of codified law.
That's how America's constitutional system works.
The job now is to implement the sausage... and then refine it.
American conservatives are keenly aware that delayed implementation would result in such hobbling of "the process" that Obamacare would fail, at which time the nation would regress to the late 19th century, supposedly a "charmed" era in American history - a time which the GOP and Tea Party would like to re-appropriate. (Please keep in mind that until the second half of the 19th century, a typical American lived half her life with toothache. I fail to see "the charm." http://paxonbothhouses.blogspot.com/2012/12/colonial-dentistry-and-george.html)
It is emphatically not the purpose of The Affordable Care Act to produce a health care system that is "perfect" overnight.
In fact, functionality is a distant second to The Establishment Of Principle - to wit; the United States will provide universal healthcare to all citizens.
Once this Principle is established - and no matter how shabbily executed - then we can go about the business of improving the law's performance, knowing that The Principle is secure forevermore.
Lest we forget, a majority of Americans -- despite misgivings (largely based on ignorance) -- do not want Obamacare repealed.
http://news.yahoo.com/poll-most-americans-don-t-want-congress-repeal-220006936.html
http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2013/03/22/poll-most-americans-remain-ignorant-of-obamacare-impacts
The fault line in American politics is the intransigence of contemporary American "conservatives."
The political paralysis arising from such pigheadedness makes it necessary to take legislative "baby steps" -- which nobody really likes, certainly not progressives -- and then proceed along paths of incremental improvement.
Trappist monk, Fr. Thomas Merton, (seemingly with Pope Francis in tow!) described the nub of America's collapsed condition.
"The terrible thing about our time is precisely the ease with which theories can be put into practice. The more perfect, the more idealistic the theories, the more dreadful is their realization. We are at last beginning to rediscover what perhaps men knew better in very ancient times, in primitive times before utopias were thought of: that liberty is bound up with imperfection, and that limitations, imperfections, errors are not only unavoidable but also salutary. The best is not the ideal. Where what is theoretically best is imposed on everyone as the norm, then there is no longer any room even to be good. The best, imposed as a norm, becomes evil.”
"Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander,” by Thomas Merton
Pax on both houses,
Alan (Archibald)
Dear Chuck,
The first hit I opened after googling Collins' article was this one.
The author, "JG Caesarea" (who seems devoted to blogging about NYT articles) is a grumpy guy, but fairly intelligent all the same.
Understandably defensive, he begins his post about Krugman's "The Crazy Party" with these words: "So that there is no misunderstanding: I don't like Republicans. I don't like Democrats. I don't like politicians." http://
So that there is no misunderstanding: I don't much like JG, Caesarea.
However, he has located a large hairball under the carpet.
Obamacare is a huge political sausage from which every choice chunk of meat was left out - except for "no denial of coverage" and 26 year olds remaining on Mom and Pop's insurance policy. These two policy points are central features of Obamacare which "everyone" wants but few American conservatives acknowledge as workable policy without simultaneous legislation of The Mandate and cost-cutting measures to make these two "inclusions" marketplace profitable.
I must say that it is "peculiar" (as I've been "feeling it" in recent days) to spend so much time-and-energy championing the implementation of a bill (which MUST be championed, but) which is parsecs removed from any sort of sensible universal care system, preferably single payer.
In any event, I'll get back to you on Collins.
Pax tecum
Alan
Alan
No comments:
Post a Comment