Public Option

Health Care Reform-- The very words make insurance companies shudder. Let's face some cold hard facts:

1. Health Insurance Companies are businesses. Businesses are focused on selling goods or services and through that process realizing profits.

2. Government provided health care would cut into the profit margins of the insurers. That is a fact.

3. Health insurers are happy with the status quo, which is to collect premiums and be very stingy when it comes to handing out benefits.

So... Is there a solution? Yes.

The United States is the Land of Opportunity. Nothing stands in your way except air and opportunity. For every person out there who says that America is slanted against the people who are wage earners, there is a counter story of a person who came here with nothing and is now extremely successful. Hard work does pay off. It's that individualist spirit that played a large and vital part in building this nation.

But we are also a collection of people who know how to work together for the common good. A shining example is our space program. In 1958, NASA didn't exist. 11 years later we walked on the moon. Raytheon, Grumman, North American Aviation, Lockheed, and McDonnell-Douglas just to name a few got us there. That is just one instance of America's ability to do what it wants when it puts its mind to it.

So why can't we get it together when it comes to providing a basic social service such as health care? The answer depends on whether you consider health care a commodity, to be sold at a market price, or a right.

I consider health care to be a right. I don't think that a citizen of this country should have to choose between paying monthly bills such as rent and electricity, or going to the doctor.

I think that there should be a combination of ideas to provide quality affordable health coverage to all American citizens. Tax incentives to insurance companies to provide care to high risk patients combined with an option for those who can't otherwise find coverage to be able to buy in at a low price would go a long way to alleviating the problems we face on this issue.

To those who would scream "socialism" I would ask this:

If one of your loved ones became seriously infirmed and the only available solution was public assistance, would you turn it down based on you principles of "less government?" I would hope that your answer is a resounding "no."