I’m not ashamed to be a Democrat. I voted for Clinton. Twice. I have never voted for a Republican and so help me, I don’t ever plan on it. I’m a church-going Christian who is pro-choice. Where health care is concerned, I AM OVER THE MOON about this bill being passed.
We pay almost $1000 a month for health care using my COBRA benefits from my last job. We are 2 healthy adults but I have pre-existing conditions, namely migraines, which will make it virtually impossible for me to get coverage after our current benefits are up in December.
The anger, the hyperbole, the “they’re cramming this down our throats” rhetoric that can be best traced back to the lackeys of Fox News make me silently seethe. Why? Because people like Glenn Beck don’t have to worry about not having health coverage. He’s got plenty of money from his form of conservative irritainment. And people like me? People who run a business, who scrape by each month, who can’t afford NOT to have insurance, are left stressing about how to pay insanely high premiums and terrified that one trip to the hospital could mean thousands in medical bills that we cannot pay. The stories of people like me don’t anger people the way Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh want. (When is he leaving the country anyway? I can arrange for some free time to help him pack.)
Don’t get me started on those receiving Medicare and how they want the federal government to leave their Medicare alone. Seriously? I don’t know how many people thought in 1965 that Medicare was the beginning of a communist regime in the US but today, it’s amazing how many people have bought into the bullshit propagated by conservative news and talk radio.
The question I’m left with in response to the hyperbolic vitriol? Why don’t we deserve the same access to quality care without being bankrupted in the process? We contribute. We pay our own way. We own a business. We don’t ask for hand-outs and don’t expect them. But come December, without this new bill, we would be left with no option but to go without health insurance, or at least without dental and vision and somehow deal with the ass rape that would be medical (if I could even get covered).
Having lived for 2 years in the UK where I had coverage for simply holding a visa, I paid nothing for a doctor visit and a whopping £6.50 (about $12) for migraine medication that without insurance costs me $150 (£100). For 6 pills. Yes, you read that right. 6 pills. Yes, people bitch about the NHS, and many with good reason but the bottom line is this. You don’t get denied coverage if you are sick, if you get sick, if you are healthier than a horse, if everyone in your family had cancer or you have some wonky blood vessels in your head that you cannot control for love or money. Yes, there are wait lists for procedures and yes, this royally sucks ass. But you also have the option to have private insurance, either that you pay for out of pocket or that your employer provides. Doesn’t make it a perfect system by any stretch of the imagination but when you consider that in the US, we have over 32 million people who are without adequate health coverage and consider ourselves to be the last great superpower in the world? It’s despicable that we would deny care to those who, through no fault of their own, are without.
So enough with the rhetoric. Enough with the hate speech. Enough with the talk of secession from the union and suing the federal government on my behalf. Please don’t. My health depends on it.