TheBanyanTree: screaming at the market (slight. POLITICAL)

[NancyIee at aol.com]

I agree that everyone deserves health care.  I agree that folks should  
work, if they are able, not if they just feel like it, to provide for their  
families and themselves.  I agree, that even if you are homeless, without a  
job, penniless, you should have basic health care.
 
I think where some people differ is what sort of health care? If a child,  
any child, is ill, has a life threatening condition, in injured, or needs 
basic  inoculations and examinations in a wellness sense, they should be  
provided.  What I would NOT want as part of a health care system are  elective 
sorts of treatments or surgery: tummy tucks, face lifts, lipos, or  any  such 
treatment people want that are NOT medically necessary.  A  badly burned or 
deformed person, certainly needs certain repair surgeries in  order to live 
a normal life.  Repairing a cleft palette is not the same as  enhancement 
surgeries. I would that my money be used frugally and judicially in  healing, 
medically needed treatments and surgeries, not the nose job or other  such 
things to make someone "feel better about himself". If someone is plain  
ugly and wants a new nose or permanent eye liner or hair replacement, they  
should pay for it out of pocket.
 
I would hope those debating the health care issue come up with a plan that  
serves the ill and injured in any economic sense, but watch our dollars so 
that  the electives are very carefully scruitinized.  I would gladly help 
out if  you needed a heart transplant or in home nursing care, but I would 
balk if you  wanted a tummy tuck.  That's all.
 
NancyLee
 
 
In a message dated 8/22/2009 5:29:27 P.M. Eastern Daylight Time,  
jateague at indiana.edu writes:

Normal  beautiful day at the farmer's market this morning--very cool for 
late  August, with gray skies, but the abundant produce glowed and 
overflowed  with color.  All of those colors and flavors are so exciting 
to me,  and when the vegetables are all lined up on our kitchen island, 
I love  creating dinner.  What a fortunate life we lead, with money and 
time  and opportunity to buy such delicious food.  We are among the 
blessed  and I feel that as strongly here at the farmer's market as 
anywhere else  on earth.  We wandered through, and at the back of the 
market was a  table for health care issues, anti-Obama, with a middle 
aged woman working  the table.  Husband and I had said many times, while 
watching the  news, that if we were the person facing down an anti Obama 
health plan  screamer, the first question we would want to ask them is, 
"Do YOU have  health care?  Do YOU benefit from medicare?"  Just  
curious.  It's a lot easier to hate something new when you are the  Have 
and not the Have Not.  I mentioned this to the husband, "We  should ask 
her if she has health care."  He say, "Ok, let's go ask  her."  Maybe a 
bad choice for my own health, in hindsight.

But  we did.  Husband asked.  She said yes, she had health care.  I  
said, "But what about those who don't have health care."  She said,  "I 
have health care because I work for it.  If others want health  care, 
they can work for it too."  By this time an older dude and an  older 
couple, also working the table, joined in.  Husband asked the  older 
couple, "But you have medicare, isn't that socialized  medicine?"  They 
said, "WE worked our whole lives and payed for it  ourselves (a running 
theme with these folks)." Husband reminded them that  WE are now paying 
in for THEIR care because the dollars they paid in are  long used up.  
The system is nearly bankrupt.  They didn't pay  in anywhere near the 
amount that they are now getting out.  I said,  "What about those who 
can't work and get healthcare? Doesn't everyone  deserve health care?"  
The first woman chimes in, "No, not everyone  deserves health care.  If 
you don't work, or you smoke those  cigarettes, or you eat bad food, 
then no, you don't deserve health  care!"  Ok, now these people are 
freaking me out.  "What about  children?" I ask, "Did you know that most 
of the uninsured are  children?"  Older dude cannot come up with an 
answer for this and so  he screams at me at this point, "YOU ARE A 
COMMUNIST SOCIALIST LIBERAL DO  NOTHING!  IF YOU WANT HEALTH CARE THEN 
YOU SHOULD GET A JOB AND WORK  FOR IT!"  "Well huh," I tell him, "Matter 
of fact I DO have a  job.  I have had a job since I was 15 years old. 
And guess  what?  I STILL care about OTHER people.  I care that OTHERS  
including many many CHILDREN do not have health care."  He screams at  
me, "THEN WHY DON'T YOU USE YOUR OWN MONEY TO HELP THOSE PEOPLE YOU  
THINK DESERVE HELP."  "Matter of fact, I do, by giving to charities  as 
much as I can, as often as I can," I tell him.  He then screams a  me 
"THEN YOU ARE THE EXCEPTION AMONG LIBERALS WHO DON'T GIVE A PENNY TO  
CHARITIES!"  Um, huh?  Wow.  This man is indeed  crazy.  I picture him 
with a the little Hitler mustache that they've  been putting on Obama.  
Then yet another 65 year old dude starts  screaming at me about what a 
socialist- communist-such-n-such I am.   Husband steps in and repeats 
his question at some point, "Doesn't everyone  deserve basic health 
care?"  "NO," the dude screams at us.  "Not  everyone deserves health 
care!"  Husband is still engaging older  couple in debate, but at this 
point I said, "I'm walking on, I have  nothing to say to that except 
that apparently I care more than that about  my fellow humans."  He 
screamed at me, "WALK ON SOCIALIST LIBERAL  <something I couldn't make 
out> AND KEEP WALKING!"

I went  over and sat down on a wall a little way away.  A little boy,  
mentally and physically handicapped, plopped down next to me, smiled up  
at me and said, "HI! I'm Wyatt!"  I said, "Hi Wyatt, I'm  Julie."  His 
mom asked if he was enjoying the fiddle music behind us,  and yes, he 
was.  I asked him if he'd heard the drum group on the  other side and he 
nodded enthusiastically and started drumming on his  knees.  Wyatt 
started to wander off and his mom had to corral him,  and did so with 
all the patience in the world although you could tell it  was a more 
than full time job.  I was still shaking.  I was  thinking about kids 
like Wyatt.  Is he supposed to work for health  care when he's an adult? 
Women like Wyatt's mom, is she supposed to  work a full time job for 
heath care?   Where does Wyatt go when  she works?  What about people 
who are heavily discriminated against  in the work force?  What about 
the handicapped?  What about  people with chronic illness or disease?  
Everyone, basically, who  didn't win the genetic lottery that the white 
guy who was screaming at me  apparently won (in some respects)...what 
are they supposed to do for  health care?  I don't sleep at night 
thinking about suffering people,  suffering children.  I don't sleep at 
night thinking about the  sanctimonious asses who screamed at me.  I 
don't sleep over a lot of  things.  I'm feeling a lot of people's pain 
right  now.