A pungent little factoid coming out of the Democrat's debacle in Massachusetts was surfaced today in a small article buried deep in the WaPo. The election is being either trumpeted or lamented as a referendum on health care reform. The people of America do not want reform. Populist anger is rising up against health care being provided by the state. This represents an unacceptable infringement on our freedoms. Specifically, our freedom to have our health care claims rejected by faceless corporate bureaucrats so that our insurance provider can make it's quarterly earnings numbers. It also impinges deeply on our fundamental right to live in our parent's basement after we're forced into bankruptcy following the surgery for little Tyler's heart condition. It's all about liberty.
What's interesting about the Massachusetts election was what Senator-Elect Brown actually had to say about health care reform when he was on the stump. Massachusetts, you see, has already enacted health care reform. It's not perfect, but it works, and is reasonably popular in the state. So when Senator-Elect Brown actually talked about the national level efforts to provide what the citizens of his state already have, he said things like this:
We have insurance here in Massachusetts. I'm not going to be subsidizing for the next three, five years, pick a number, subsidizing what other states have failed to do.
and this:
There are some very good things in the national plan that's being proposed, but if you look at --and really in almost a parochial manner -- we need to look out for Massachusetts first....the thing I'm hearing throughout the state is, 'What about us?'
So the core of the message is not one of principled resistance to state-provided universal health care. It just ain't. It's simple self-interest. A national level plan is not in the financial interest of the people of Massachusetts, because they'd be required to provide support for people living in other states. That's clearly unacceptable.
E pluribus unum is for suckers.
Posts
