Health Care: A (Very Simplified) Fairy Tale

One day...

The Democrats told the American people, "We want to make your health care affordable." And they all cheered with their rally cry, "Yes we can!" But the Republicans said, "Hell no, you can't! You will pass the cost off to our children and that's un-American." So the Democrats sent their ideas to the wizards of the Congressional Budget Office. The wizards used their time honored magic and saw that reforming health care would reduce the deficit and our children would be in better financial shape, not worse. The Democrats shouted, "Yes we can!"

So the Democrats wrote a bill and said to the American people, "We want to make your health care affordable." And they all cheered with their rally cry, "Yes we can!" But the Republicans said, "Hell no, you can't! This is a government take over of health care. That's socialism and socialism is un-American." So the Democrats removed the public option and put in a mystical Republican idea called 'individual mandate' that preserves the health insurance industry as a profit-driven enterprise, regulated though it may be. And the Democrats said, "You see? You can be for individual liberty, capitalism, AND for affordable health insurance. They are not incompatible, unless you have an agenda," the Democrats shouted, "Yes we can!"

The Democrats wanted to vote on their new bill. So they told the American people, "We want to make your health care more affordable." And they all cheered with their rally cry, "Yes we can!" But the Republicans said, "Hell no, you can't! We will use procedural blocks and exploit the handful of Democrats who are on our side and wave bloody fetuses to tell the American people that this bill will cause federally funded abortions and federally funded abortions are un-American." The Democrats worked deep into the night, but found deeply hidden paths around the procedural blocks and made unprecedented parliamentary maneuvers to escape them. Then Bart Stupak's heart grew three sizes and even he realized that existing federal law, called the Hyde Amendment, already prevents federally funded abortions except in cases of rape, incest or danger to the life of the mother. So Bart Stupak spoke to the American people, saying, "We want to make your health care affordable." And some asshole called him a babykiller.

The Democrats had the votes and narrowly had the votes on the reconciliation. They made health care more affordable, but the Republicans still said, "Hell no, you can't! We will continue to tell the American people that what you did was wrong and they will vote us into power in the midterm elections. Once we have the power, we will REPEAL your new law making health care affordable for every American." But the Democrats said, "Oh really? You want to make health care UN-affordable again. Wouldn't that be UN-American?" So the Republicans said, "Well, what we meant was... repeal and replace!" The Democrats replied, "Replace with what?" and the Republicans said, "er... ...um ..." And the Democrats said, "Thought so."

The moral of the story is, don't let the Republicans fool you. They have no plan to make health care affordable. They could care less about your insurance costs. They didn't participate in the crafting of a sound bill in the first place and have no business trying to remove the protections of the American consumer now in place. Health care is a right of every American and as a right government has a responsibility to protect the American people from exploitation at the hands of profiteers. Cost should never be an issue when we are talking about lives. We still may not have health care for all Americans, but we've taken a huge step in that direction. Will we ever have a single payer system or at least a robust public option that restores the insurance industry to a not for profit, consumer-driven state? I'd like to hope some people will keep working on it and keep the rally cry in the backs their minds. Yes we can!