No one takes better care of you than you. Look at how well the government runs things now - ever sat in line at the DMV? Now imagine a sole provider of health insurance. Sure, Obama says we can keep the health care we have now if we want it. What he doesn't say is that in his health care bill, private companies have to pay an additional tax for not using the gov't plan, and furthermore, if they do use the gov't plan, they get tax breaks. Therefore, not only is a business being given an incentive to use gov't healthcare, it is penalized if it does not. The gov't doesn't mandate business to use the gov't health care, but it makes it so expensive not to that the business is forced to financially. So no, we don't reasonably have the choice to keep our own healthcare.
Furthermore, as inefficient as private insurance companies may be, what happens when we give the gov't the ability to run things? There is no longer competition. Don't we have anti-monopoly laws for a reason? Compare it to Microsoft about 10 years ago when they were brought to court for making Windows incompatible with anything not microsoft manufactured. The gov't has rule making capability with this system. They choose who we see, when we see them, and how much it costs. And no one can tell them no.
Now imagine that your an 80 year old with a pace maker, diabetic, and all of a sudden have kidney failure. You need to go on dialysis, which runs an average of $35,000+ a month. Sure, Medicare covers it now. But let's put the whole nation in Medicare, which is essentially what we're doing here. How efficient is medicare? Not very. Who pays for it? The Chinese pay for most everything here, look at the national debt after all. So we end up with a choice: Either rob our kids to pay for an extra 5 years of life, or the gov't, being the heartless machine it is, says look 80 yr old, you're a drain on the system. You get Social Security, Medicare, and don't pay taxes. Gov't isn't going to cover you. Good luck. What average joe can cover that? Sure, we did alright before we had big gov't. That person would have died, and no one have been the wiser, because the technology wasn't there to support the medicine. People used to die of the common cold and influenza in WWI too.
Financially, medical care is a huge burden. But we have two options: Either keep it privatized and do the best we can to spread out the burden via group rates and justified medicine, or give it to the gov't who dictates care, and essentially has the right to play God by denying a person care. Maybe a little extreme as an example, but watch it happen. True, letting people die will lower health care costs, but is your Grandma dying worth having a little bit lower tax bill? That's how the gov't is going to justify it - either taxes will be through the roof - which they will be anyway after cap and trade passes - or people will be told, sorry, can't afford you, go out back and die.
We're slowly moving to a gov't that will have cradle to grave socialism. It has never worked in practice, but sounds great in theory. This is the same president who said that with the stimulus bill unemployment would never pass 8%. Where is it now? 9.4% and climbing? Oh yeah, we just forgot about that little tid bit. And what about the trillion dollars? Did they solve anything? Is the economy a bit better? Not noticeably. Now we're just sitting back and waiting for double digit inflation to kick in.
Why should we trust the gov't? What have they done for you? What incentive do you have to use a gov't program? What happened to free enterprise, personal responsibility, and "Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country"? This attitude that the gov't owes us anything is lie. Gov't exists to protect our sovereignty, protect the state, and keep order. Not to provide every nickel dime and penny to the people by borrowing it from other countries.
Common sense tells us that we can't get out of debt by going further in debt. But what are we doing? And how much further in debt are we going with nationalized health care? If for no other reason than that, we need to keep it with private insurance. At least with them we aren't asking China and Japan to cover our bills.
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