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GEORGE TEMPLETON COMMENTARY
By George TempletonGazette ColumnistHealthyFor man that is born of woman is of few days, and full oftrouble. He flees like a shadow, and continues not.
When Adam and Eve ate from the tree of knowledge they violatedthe one prohibition that God had given them, giving birth to sin, the curse ofconscious perplexity, suffering, and death.
Science claims that there was a time before death. Death did not appear simultaneously with life and is not prerequisite for it. The cells that make up our body are the result of a billion years or more ofevolution leading to sex, obligatory DNA programmed aging and unavoidable death.
Religion simplifies illness as demonic possession, testifyingto the power of our inner self while retreating to antiquity. Science narrowsillness by reducing it to our worn-out parts. Bill Moyer’s book Healing and The Mind seems forgotten ordiscredited. We yearn for the simplicity of a time gone past and avoidunpleasant realities. Regardless, aging and death will not be denied.
TogetherThe Affordable Care Act (ACA) concerns everyone, not justindividuals, but also our nation’s productivity and economiccompetitiveness. It helps the sick and infirm and is the mark of a moralcivilization. Will we be a country where we accept that uninsuredmillions are subject to devastating economic and health risks? Can unfetteredfree enterprise alone solve complexity and confusion, a lack of performance benchmarks,costly inaccurate paperwork, and a system that manages disease instead ofpromoting health?
They say the government is the problem, but it is us and theyare wrong. They say that business greed is the problem, but Americamust make instead of take. When government and business work together, onlythen will the whole be greater than the sum of its parts.
DivisiveHow can hunger justify government crop insurance when healthcare is divisive? Divisiveness is more than rhetoric. It is notsimple, certain, or safe, but embraces our innermost being. Conflict fromdiverse opinion must be welcome, not feared. The politics of envy shouldbe feared, not supported.
Slippery The ACA is friendly to the market. It is not socializedmedicine or a “one size fits all” plan. It does not disregardfree market competition and individual choice. The insurance plans thatare offered are all private. There is no public option. Thegovernment does not own or operate the hospitals and their equipment, or hirethe doctors, nurses, and technicians. The ACA uses private contractorsand the same providers, doctors, nurses, specialists, laboratories, andinsurers that now exist. The ACA won’t take your doctor away. It’s like the health care provided for Congress.
When an uninsured person is billed ten times the cost for thesame medical procedure, it is not free enterprise. Our insurance premiumscarry the costs of poverty and lack of preventative care. This extortioncould be stopped by denying service to those who can’t pay, leaving themto die on the steps of the emergency room.
RealityThere is no youthful demographic to help with the inevitableillness of baby boomers. There is no way to pay-off our incurred debtswithout more from the wealthy and middle class. That’s why both theACA and Paul Ryan’s plan include the same 716 billion dollars of costreduction. They are not Medicare benefit cuts. Hospitals andinsurance companies will be asked to be more efficient and results oriented. We can help by adopting a healthier lifestyle.
AffordabilityWhen Republicans say that America has the best health care inthe world they mean for the wealthy. When parameters like cost, preventable death,infant mortality, life expectancy, and end of life counseling are considered wedo not fare so well. The individual “tax” mandate and reduced spendingwill shrink our national debt. Standardization of electronic records willimprove accuracy, reducing fraud and waste. Already, the law has improvedefficiency, generating more than $1.1 billion in refunds because it requiresmore than 80% of your premium to be used for you instead of profits andpromotion.
Our transition over the last forty years to a minimum wage,part-time, service economy has left many without benefits. When companiesprovide health insurance, they advise that there is no guarantee that they willcontinue to do so in the future. Secure portable insurance will increaseemployee mobility helping employers to hire the people with the skills theyneed. Isn’t it good that the ACA will allow pre-existingconditions and provide health coverage for 50 million uninsured Americans? Manypoor people who would drift into poverty and Medicaid will be covered.
The cost of small company insurance is related to businesssize and whether any employees have an expensive illness. Management pressureto encourage the voluntary separation of employees with costly chronic healthconditions can be avoided. The ACA spreads costs over a larger typicallyhealthy population, eliminating the choice between competitive insurance costand just treatment of the employee.
If you don’t have a pre-existing condition, aging willgive you one. New DNA bio-technology could reveal pleasant truths aboutyour destiny. You can keep your record clean by refusing treatment, butfor how long? Our current health care system denies insurance to thosewho need it the most. Premiums jump thirty to fifty percent. Peopleare charged more than they can afford.
RationingHealth care is not like recreational shopping. Doctorsdefine the treatments we should have. The ACA does not create a board ofbureaucrats to ration health care or a “death panel”. It setsstandards to reduce confusion and the sparring between doctors and insurancecompanies. For example, insurance sold in the exchanges have to provide equal pricesfor women and men. HMO’s and insurance companies, or the governorin the case of Medicaid, can deny coverage or funding. De facto rationingresults from the inability of people to pay. The ACA will reducethis by spreading costs over a larger population.
Fifty-four percent of youth aged 18 to 26 are unemployed. The ACA lets them have coverage under their parent’s insurance until age26. The assertion that the ACA favors the poor at the expense of themiddle class and the old at the expense of the young is wrong.
MandateThe sixteenth amendment to the Constitution implementedwealth redistribution. Taxes take our money and give it to others forservices deemed essential to a healthy society. Voluntary individualityis too capricious to sustain the job that is needed.The requirement for individuals to purchase health careinsurance came from a conservative think tank and was endorsed by Republicanrepresentatives and senators who called it individual responsibility, aresponsibility that was not person to person, much bigger, and for the good ofall. Mitt Romney implemented an individual mandate. Now he calls itsocialism and government overreach.
The purpose of the individual mandate was to protect theprivate insurance companies, who would be required to cover people withpre-existing conditions. People who can afford to buy insurance, butdon’t, are the only ones who will have to pay a fine. There will behelp with insurance cost by tax credits scaled according to income. Healthy young people will have to buy insurance to fund coverage for the illand elderly. Even healthy young people need insurance, because accidentscan permanently change lives.
ReligiousMarket values are not the only morality. Ethics springsfrom the subconscious self, not politics. The inner world is more importantthan outer rationalization. Politics inflames intolerance and incitesenvy when it fibs that birth control will be free under the ACA because thereis no copayment.
The bumper sticker reads “God said it, no furtherdiscussion allowed”. Arguing that divine inspiration directs us,the preacher warns his followers not to associate with or listen to anyopposing views that might lead one astray from God’s will. Christiansoldiers, marching in a culture war, do not act in a spirit of love andhumility. They incorrectly argue that “biblical law” requiresthe overthrow of the ACA because it confiscates wealth and redistributes it.
The culture of life is more than opposition to abortion andbirth control. It is more than punishment, coercion, and trying to forcean absolute morality that lacks empathy and understanding of the individualsituation. It recognizes the efficiency of preventative medicine,pre-natal care, the reality of sexually transmitted diseases, and domesticviolence.
Unfortunately the morning after pill works identically toprescription birth control. So now, birth control and abortion havemerged. Birth control has become a wedge strategy to destroy the ACA, inspite of the fact that no one forces anyone to take it. Insurance companieshave offered to make it free to their beneficiaries, eliminating employersubsidization. This is not sufficient when freedom means forcing valueson others. The solution is to legally define “personhood” atthe moment of conception and to deny abortion unless rape was “legitimateand forcible”. This language reveals suspicion that some girl, who shouldbecome a mother, might game the system and get away with it.
Mark Rubio’s religious freedom bill would hampergovernment’s compelling interest to reduce abortion by supportingwoman’s health, birth control, and counseling. This is divisive! Whatis not divisive is the ACA’s requirement that every state must offer atleast one health exchange plan that does not cover abortion. Principledindividuals can buy from it.
Republicans should be flattered that the ACA mirrors RomneyCare. Massachusetts,the Romney Care state, requires insurance to cover abortion, but law prohibits federalcoverage except in cases of rape, incest, and threat to the mother’slife. The ACA does not preempt state law. Many states will prohibitabortion coverage.
Does religious freedom go beyond churches to include “forprofit” businesses and individual citizens? Should we be requiredto pay taxes when we do not agree with our government? Did we exemptthose who disagreed with war from the draft?
OnlyThe religious right claims that only voluntary one-on-one charityis dignified, liberating, and moral, and that only they are personal andcaring. Does their absolute prohibition of abortion and birth controlreveal their respect and empathy for others?
JungCarl Jung said, “Where love rules, there is no will topower, and where power predominates, love is lacking. The one is theshadow of the other”. A communal illness springs from the denial ofour God given instincts. Lost innocence abandons subconscious intuitionand morality to the world of conscious politics reflecting our materialisticculture and our economic and spiritual distress. Envy, pride and greedmust be overruled by kindness, humility, and charity.
[Payson resident George Templeton writes a regular column for the Rim Country Gazette Blog.]
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