In contrast, during the six years of this past decade in which our friends in the Republican party controlled the government, they barely mentioned healthcare reform. And in the decade's waning years they moved (or were pushed) entirely to the sidelines, to mutter amongst themselves, rising up every now and then to shout an epithet or slogan. Sometimes these loud ejaculations have been aimed at convincing us that, if we were to just give the insurance industry a free hand, that industry (being private enterprise) would figure out how to fix things in a jiffy. (The Republicans seem to disremember that the insurance industry has already had 15 years of a pretty-much free hand to do as they wanted; and that the industry failed miserably, and is entirely bereft of ideas. When the Republican leadership says such things, the typical insurance executive probably just shakes his head sadly - removing it from his hands momentarily to do so.)
But more often, the sporadic public utterances of the now-largely-idle Republicans have been aimed at convincing us that, should the Democrats have their way with our immaculate healthcare system, the next thing you know we'll have rationing.
This statement, if they really believe it, betrays an utterly distressing lack of understanding about our healthcare system, and really ought to disqualify them from running it.
For, we're already rationing, albeit covertly. In fact, covert rationing is the central fact that drives our healthcare system.
Let DrRich explain.
None of the pools of money we have created (or ever could create) to pay for our healthcare - whether those pools of money reside with the insurance companies or the government or both - can possibly buy all the healthcare that might benefit all Americans. This means we have to ration healthcare (i.e., intentionally withhold at least some beneficial healthcare from at least some of the people who would benefit from it). But because we’re Americans and rationing is not something Americans do, we (and in particular, our political leaders) are unable to address this need to ration openly and forthrightly. Therefore, the unavoidable rationing is being conducted covertly.
For the past 15 years, we've assigned the task of covert rationing to the insurance industry. Indeed, from the very beginning rationing was the primary purpose of modern health insurance companies, as determined by Congress itself when it legislated the formation of HMOs. (See the ruling of the U.S. Supreme Court in Pegram et al. v. Herdrich (98-1949), 530 US 211, 2000.) So, when the insurance companies behave in all manner of reprehensible ways to separate Americans from the healthcare they need, they are not really being evil. They are only carrying out the job that has been assigned to them by our society. Covert rationing is a dirty, thankless job, but somebody’s got to do it.
What we are witnessing today, with our efforts at healthcare reform, is merely a rather messy changing of the guard. The primary responsibility for covert healthcare rationing is apparently going to shift from the health insurers to the government.
So, it would be fine for Republicans to argue that the brand of covert rationing we'll get from the government will turn out to be even less kind and gentle than the rationing we're used to from private insurers, since the government can behave extremely ruthlessly, and has the legal authority (unlike insurance companies) to exert violence as needed to achieve the cooperation it desires.
While that may or may not turn out be true, at least it's a reasonable argument.
But, please! To complain that the Democrat's healthcare reform will lead to rationing is to complain that jumping from the frying pan into the fire will cause you to become overheated. It displays either complete incompetence or complete disingenuousness.
