After promising to “Repeal and Replace” The “Affordable” (cough!) Care Act for seven years, Republicans can’t deliver a bill to the president’s desk. The reason is obvious to me: They can’t tell the American people the truth: that Healthcare is not a “right”.
“WHAT????!!!!!! But healthcare HAS to be a right! Do you want people to DIE???!!!”
Not only is healthcare not a right, it is IMPOSSIBLE for healthcare to be a right. Here’s why.
If you study our founding documents (Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights), you’ll see that “rights” come from God and are things you should be free to do (speak your mind without fear, arm yourself for self defense, gather with like-minded individuals, live in peace without the government breaking into your house, etc.). Healthcare is not something you are free to do. You can’t give yourself an appendectomy, for instance. Healthcare must be provided to you by others.
Those “others”, Medical professionals, have to feed and clothe their families, pay their rent, etc., which means they have to be paid for their services.
“But do you want people to die???????!!!!!!!!!!!”
Of course not. Anyone who thinks Republicans/conservatives/Libertarians want people to die is stupid. Any politician who says that we want people to die knows better and is therefore a liar.
You know who you are.
So take that off the table. The question is: who is going to pay for your healthcare? Somebody has to pay.
In an ideal world, you go to the doctor and you pay for the service out of your pocket. Very clean, a private transaction between just you and your doc, with no insurance or government bureaucrats to muck things up. But if you have a bad accident or a serious illness, you might not be able to afford the care you need; thus the need for Insurance.
For years, the government has been conditioning us to think that somebody ELSE – ANYBODY other we ourselves – is supposed to pay for our health insurance. That’s not the case with any other insurance that we buy. It started with having employers pay for their employees health insurance, but that was always a bad idea because if you lose your job, you lose your health insurance.
Let’s get something else straight: health INSURANCE is not healthCARE. As many people have found out, having insurance is only good when you can find physicians that accept that insurance. The insurance company won’t write you a prescription for antibiotics or set a broken bone. Only a doctor can do that. Obamacare moved a lot of people to Medicaid but when the government lowered the amount it would pay to providers on a given proceedure, a lot of doctors stopped accepting Medicaid, so those people are often out of luck.
So we have to distinguish between health INSURANCE and healthCARE.
Insurance is just a way of saving for a rainy day. You pay your premiums and if, God forbid, you have a catastropic accident or illness, your premiums, plus those of other people who didn’t have a catastrophe, will cover your expenses. So in that scenario, everybody (including you) pays into the system.
The people who passed the Obamacare law didn’t like that system. That was too direct and didn’t give them a cut, so they put the government in between the insurance company and the patient (it was already there to some degree). So now, the government AND the insurance company is between you and your doctor, telling the doctor what he can and cannot do for you; obviously a bad situation.
That’s why so many people were up in arms about Obamacare and wanted it repealed. But now, when the Republicans finally have an opportunity to “Repeal and Replace” like they promised, a lot of people LIKE the freebies in Obamacare and don’t want them taken away, and the Republicans are too cowardly to tell us what we need to understand.
One of the most egregious things about Obamacare is that it FORCES people to buy things they don’t want or need. I’ve had to change insurance plans four times since Obamacare was passed. The first time it was because the plan I had for several years didn’t include maternity care for 60+-year-old men like me! Like HillaryCare before it, Obamacare specifies jail terms for doctors who treat people they aren’t supposed to. That’s why I consider Obamacare immoral.
But Republicans can’t get their act together because they are afraid to speak the truth: that healthcare is not a RIGHT.
If you believe that healthcare is a right, what you are really saying is that someone needs to be working for you without getting paid. Senator Rand Paul (who is a doctor by profession) made this point, and he’s right. You either want the doctors and nurses to work without being paid or you want the government to take your neighbor’s hard-earned money to pay your insurance company so they can pay for your healthcare.
People who work without being able to keep what they earn are slaves. If you want people to work for you without being paid, what are you? A slaveowner, or at least a wannabe slaveowner.
“But without healthcare, you’ll DIE!!!!”
Yes, that’s true, and without food and water you’ll die. And without shelter, you’ll die. And without clothing, you’ll die. But you pay for those things out of your pocket. Those things are not “rights” either.
Another thing that is not a “right”: College tuition.
Sorry. These are all services that have to be provided by other people and those people have to be paid because they have to eat and pay their rent. If you want the services you have to figure out a way to pay for them because, everybody needs those things and everybody needs to pay their own way.
“But it’s HARD!!!!”
So is life, so “suck it up buttercup” and be a responsible adult.
The Republicans won’t figure out what to do about “Repeal and Replace” until they have the courage to tell the American people what I just told you: healthcare is not a right. You have to pay for what you need. Don’t expect the government to put a gun to your neighbor’s head to force them to pay for what you need.
Yes I know, the government put the IRS gun to people’s heads for a lot of things, but that doesn’t make it right.
