As implementation of the Affordable Health Care Act approaches, Obama-haters are licking their chops, hoping to see it nose-dive.
One of those detractors is our very own Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Stillwater), who delivered recently in the U.S. House of Representatives what may be the most ludicrous speech in recent memory.
“Repeal this failure before it kills women, kills children, kills senior citizens,” she said in her pretend-crisis voice, calling once again for the repeal of ObamaCare. Her soap-opera delivery was such bad acting, I’m surprised lightning didn’t strike. Her, I mean.
Bachmann was the first to submit a bill to repeal ObamaCare years ago. She won’t be the last. The latest spoiler, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), introduced yet another effort to repeal ObamaCare, the 36th time Senate Republicans have tried.
Reasonable opposition to the Affordable Health Care Act is somewhat understandable. Much as I applaud it, I’ve said repeatedly in columns and to anyone who will listen that if ObamaCare does not lower health-care costs and health-care premiums (the two are not always mutually related), Obama had better head back to the drawing board.
There are efforts underway to sabotage Obama’s plan by those guarding extravagant profits made possible by the status-quo system. As many as 40 million good, hard-working Americans still don’t have insurance and can’t afford to get it.
I know all too well, personally, what that can mean. A few years ago, after decades of employer-provided health insurance, I became a freelance writer. Because of a lower income, I was eligible to pay a reasonable monthly premium to MinnesotaCare (a kind of ObamaCare). Thanks to that, I was able to get a test and surgical procedure that saved my life. It was a cancerous tumor on a vocal cord I had no idea was there. Without MinnesotaCare, I would have put off that doctor’s visit, convincing myself that, oh well, it was just a persistent sore throat.
Many others I know – hard-working people – cannot afford health-care insurance. They make too much (in many cases slightly too much) to qualify for MinnesotaCare or they don’t make nearly enough to afford premiums on the open market.
Will ObamaCare change that? Make it better for all? I’ve got my fingers crossed and am hoping it’s a success. However, I actually do consider what opponents of ObamaCare have to say, unless they are histrionic divas like Bachmann who live in dread of any Obama success. The reason I listen is because I believe ObamaCare is not the best solution to lopsided health care. The one-payer system like the rest of the civilized world has is much better, in my opinion. (Oh, my goodness, as I write this, I can just hear the angry letters I will receive: people dying to come to America for health care, people waiting in long lines, death panels in those evil socialist countries.)
Before you write your angry letters, readers, please do some research about just which country’s health care is the best, in delivery and in numbers of people insured. And please do some research into what has been tried before, including the fabled “managed competition,” variations of which are still being trumpeted, uselessly, by those who want to cling to the status quo.
Unlike Bachmann and her Tea Party naysayers, I hope ObamaCare works. It’s better than nothing, and it’s infinitely better than status quo (people dying or going broke without insurance). And most of all, I challenge those who despise ObamaCare to come up with an alternative. Do you have any solutions whatsoever other than the current disgrace under which so many of our fellow Americans are living in anxiety, going broke, suffering or dying because of lack of affordable health care? I await your solutions.
Are you listening, Rep. Bachmann?
