22
Mar

The Great Debate… er, Discussion

   Posted by: Michael Bernier   in Today's Reality

The real hot-button topic today has been the passage of the health care bill last night by the U.S. House of Representatives. Each side in the debate had their reasons for supporting their views, and each delivered a spirited defense. In the end, those in favor of passing it prevailed. Now it is set to become the law of the land, and we all get to find out what it really means for this country’s health care system.

I do not get overly-involved in political issues, mainly because I’m not good at debating the pros and cons of anything. If I were, I probably would’ve been on the debate team in school. As far as my personal political views, I would generally call myself a conservative, but there are some issues where I’m more liberal in my thinking. And, there are still others where I’m squarely on the fence, unsure of which way to go.

With health care, I’m on the fence. There are some provisions in the bill that I like, and some that I don’t like. I’m not going to list them here because my intent is not to start a debate. I don’t do debates very well, remember?

Either way, pro or con, I still have some questions. Maybe you have some as well. Here are my questions:

  • How will the country pay for the new programs, which have been estimated will cost approximately $1T (trillion) dollars over the next decade?
  • Will it really improve the accessibility and affordability of health care to more Americans, as its supporters expect it to do? Or will it be a “black hole” that takes more money away from taxpayers and provides little or nothing in return, as its detractors claim?
  • How does this plan really compare to programs in other countries such as Canada or Great Britain, which parts of it supposedly were modeled after?

No one seems to have a clear answer to any of these questions; both sides in Washington have been saying “trust us – we know what we’re talking about”. Given the general lack of trust in our elected officials (Congress’ approval ratings have been in the cellar for the last few years), I am sure there aren’t many people who are willing to accept “trust us” for very long without seeing some sort of results in return.

What is clear to me is this: the debate over health care is still far from over. And, I still don’t do debates very well.

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This entry was posted on Monday, March 22nd, 2010 at 6:00 pm and is filed under Today's Reality. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 comments so far

Deneen Ansley
 1 

I think that conversation about these types of issues is very important. If we can all remain calm and not get all emotional, we can learn from each other.

I’m finally at a point in my life where I’m interested in the “why” of people’s opinions, and I’ll NEVER understand that without learning that “listening” bit first.

March 23rd, 2010 at 3:31 pm
Julie Carriker
 2 

Very topical! Good for you for jumping into this!

I haven’t kept up with the specifics of the bill lately, but I think I great deal of the money to pay for things is going to come from the tax on those making over $200,000, (personally, I can’t even IMAGINE that much, and if I was making that kind of money each year, I’d certainly be willing to help pay to run things). I think more may also be coming from savings in reducing fraud and waste.

I haven’t had health insurance since 2001, so I could REALLY use some affordable health care. Personally, I don’t think we’ll be finished with this job until we have true universal, government-paid health care, like Canade, the UK, France, etc. THEN the insurance companies, and their inflating of ALL medical costs, will be out of it.

March 23rd, 2010 at 6:52 pm

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