Healthcare and the Great Republican Listening Tour 2009

First, let it be said that healthcare costs are killing small business. There’s no way small business can manage to cover its employees and make a profit. It simply can’t be done, for the most part, and it’s difficult enough for any small business entrepreneur to cover him or herself and family. If the businessperson happens to be over the age of 50, then the problem is magnified about 10-fold. If the businessperson happens to have one of those ‘pre-existing conditions’ magnify it again.

Because it is unlikely that anyone who is self-employed will be able to qualify for any state-assistance program, that over-50 or pre-existing-conditioned business owner will likely go without health insurance at some point. His or her employees will also go without it, also, because individual policies are obscenely expensive. So we have an entire class of people—small business owners and their employees—that are in chronic jeopardy of being without insurance. They will get sick, however, and will add to the rolls of people who turn up at emergency rooms getting the most expensive type of healthcare that adds to the cost of health insurance for those who DO get insurance through their employers. It’s a circle that has as yet been unbroken by any ‘ideas’ offered by political parties.

Which brings us to the Republican Party and their efforts to provide—or rather not provide—basic healthcare for the American people. If you have observed them as carefully as I have over the years, you can’t help but notice that they are alarmingly cavalier about this issue. Their best effort has been to offer ‘health savings accounts’ which as essentially catastrophic plans with big deductibles that many STILL cannot afford, even though these policies with their big outlay of personal savings for the deductible has contributed mightily to bankruptcies among the middle class. They know this—and still they do nothing. They do worse than nothing—they obstruct those who ARE trying to provide health coverage for Americans. And rest assured, with the big lay-offs this country has seen, even more people are doing without healthcare. As many as 9 million more. That means that these people are also contributing to the high cost of premiums for everyone with their use of emergency room care. Let the circle be unbroken, by and by, Lord.
So now, we see Eric Cantor and the Great Republican Listening Tour 2009 spouting a lot of ‘focus-group-tested’ feel-good words to bamboozle us into thinking they are actually committed to doing something about our healthcare crisis—words like ‘cost savings,’ and ‘keeping your own doctors,’ and ‘our high quality of care’—words that are specifically designed to lead people around emotionally. I’m offended. The time for political manipulation has passed. It worked for Republicans for some time, but it left our country even worse off than before. And I’m holding them accountable for it.