Health Care Reform

Dear Friends,

It seems to me that if I were to be president, (God forbid), and I wanted to make health care reform my priority I would publicly adopt a three or four year plan.

The first year I would announce the initiative and ask for public input from the other side. After a reasonable time getting options from all sides I would then set down with the leaders of the legislature and discuss what might be the best and where we should point the debate.

The second year would be devoted to public debate. Put a generic one page bill on the table. Then debate in the open, fairly, and with all points offered. I would then get some money from congress to have a poll. Get the opinion of the American people. Having a year to debate and crush the vitriol from the issue would tire some of the partisan rhetoric. Taking a year or two to debate a bill of such magnitude would be simply common sense.

The third year would be writing the bill. More debate would follow. I would insist the bill be no more than one hundred typed pages. If it needs to be longer than that it is overreaching. Publish the bill in major news outlets and have the final debate then vote.

Of course this description belies my, (blissful) ignorance of the sausage making that is… modern legislation. The quality of which we all see.

When government takes on a Herculean task as reforming something, as complex and affecting every citizen, like the American health care system, it should act slowly, openly, and deliberately. Debate should be public and one goal should be front and center. “The interests of the American people come first.” In this way the president would get the people on his side.

The American people are not stupid despite what our leaders think. We make cunning decisions every day. It is the nature of the capitalist system we live in. We have to be sly enough to detect a scam. Or else we learn to be. We have to be cagy about our work and investments. If we are entrepreneurs we have to be amoral with our employees. (In the case of having to lay someone off to sustain the business). People who live in a capitalist system are naturally sly when it comes to being horn swaggled.

Being naturally cagy Americans are also busy people. We have a hundred irons in the fire. Days and nights filled with active production American people’s time is limited and valuable. Politics takes time. Americans would rather the government just went on and didn’t interfere with their lives too much. But are too busy to get involved. Nothing gets an American’s ire like having his wealth taken. In this way people are people. As were the people in Machiavelli’s Florence, people loath loosing wealth, especially to a scam. And nothing gets the attention of an American quicker than a scam he detects threatening his wealth (or health).

Like, why does this legislation have to be passed in the dark of night, as fast as possible? Thousands of pages no one has read and yet there is negotiations about the content? Why does it need to be thousands of pages? Why do the taxes kick in immediately and the benefits later? Is it wise to raise taxes in recession? Why all the scare tactics? Apparently if government doesn’t take on this giant entitlement the US will go bankrupt? Is it thousands of pages to guarantee no one will read it… American’s see the inept slight of hand.

So, by acting like a shifty eyed car sales man, the government is getting exactly what it seeks to avoid… attention. The government wants the American people to just go on about their lives and ignorantly let their liberty be stolen. But in it’s zeal to grab power the progressives have overreached. The American people are awake. If this leviathan of a bill passes there will be hell to pay at the ballot box.

Hell… there probably already will be.