hey, conservatives...
Look, I know y'all are royally pissed off by this whole healthcare reform thing. I know you're so angry that many of you are not really condemning the people who are throwing bricks through windows and making death threats. But, really, the comparisons to the Kansas-Nebraska Act are just a little over the top, don't you think?
Personally, I'm not entirely thrilled with the reform plan. For one thing, no public option. I've come to believe that a public, single-payer system is the only way to truly reform healthcare in America. For another, the expansion of Medicaid to all people who meet the income requirements (i.e. not just those who meet that and are disabled, blind, pregnant, etc.) doesn't kick in until 2014. That's four years after I could really have used it, guys.
But...this is definitely a step in the right direction, especially the mandated reforms of the insurance industry which, contrary to Republican mantras on the subject, is not some sacred cow of the free market system, inviolate and unassailable. The conservatives would have us believe that suddenly, under the insidious direction of Obama, Pelosi, and Reid, we're moving from a wondrously free and open pure market society into socialism.
The fact is, we've never had a pure market economy. The fact is, there have been incremental encroachments by what might be termed "socialism" for more than a hundred years now. Teddy Roosevelt's trust-busting, organized labor, and the national conservation movement? All direct attacks on the free market, and all things that have been here to stay for a century. Income tax? Socialism at its best: from each according to his means. Need I say anything at all about Social Security, the Civil Rights Movement, or Medicare? All developed, industrialized Western countries have moved on from the laissez-faire Nineteenth Century, including the United States. We've just been going about it slower than, say, Canada.
So, really, conservatives...I know this flies in the face of "small government," that it offends you and your fantasy vision of a happy, free populace unburdened by government (except for, you know, banning gay rights and such), that you are extremely worried about the giant deficit (so where were y'all when Reagan was going nuts on defense spending?), but come on, the crazy hyperbole and apocalyptic imagery serves only to further inflame that section of your base that thinks Glenn Beck is a prophet and Obama is a Muslim.
So, please stow it. Remember how horrified you were by the conduct of some liberals during and after the 2000 and 2004 elections? You're the ones looking foolish now.
Personally, I'm not entirely thrilled with the reform plan. For one thing, no public option. I've come to believe that a public, single-payer system is the only way to truly reform healthcare in America. For another, the expansion of Medicaid to all people who meet the income requirements (i.e. not just those who meet that and are disabled, blind, pregnant, etc.) doesn't kick in until 2014. That's four years after I could really have used it, guys.
But...this is definitely a step in the right direction, especially the mandated reforms of the insurance industry which, contrary to Republican mantras on the subject, is not some sacred cow of the free market system, inviolate and unassailable. The conservatives would have us believe that suddenly, under the insidious direction of Obama, Pelosi, and Reid, we're moving from a wondrously free and open pure market society into socialism.
The fact is, we've never had a pure market economy. The fact is, there have been incremental encroachments by what might be termed "socialism" for more than a hundred years now. Teddy Roosevelt's trust-busting, organized labor, and the national conservation movement? All direct attacks on the free market, and all things that have been here to stay for a century. Income tax? Socialism at its best: from each according to his means. Need I say anything at all about Social Security, the Civil Rights Movement, or Medicare? All developed, industrialized Western countries have moved on from the laissez-faire Nineteenth Century, including the United States. We've just been going about it slower than, say, Canada.
So, really, conservatives...I know this flies in the face of "small government," that it offends you and your fantasy vision of a happy, free populace unburdened by government (except for, you know, banning gay rights and such), that you are extremely worried about the giant deficit (so where were y'all when Reagan was going nuts on defense spending?), but come on, the crazy hyperbole and apocalyptic imagery serves only to further inflame that section of your base that thinks Glenn Beck is a prophet and Obama is a Muslim.
So, please stow it. Remember how horrified you were by the conduct of some liberals during and after the 2000 and 2004 elections? You're the ones looking foolish now.