Thoughts on Health Care

Some last minute thoughts on Health care....The President apparently has been blasted for things not taking effect immediately, but us being taxed immediately. So to appease the broadest base of constituents, he decided to cover pre-existing conditions for children, up to the age of 26, immediately. I'm not 26. I'm 46. I have children under the age of 26 and I don't mind insuring them. Actually, I have a handicapped child who is on SSI, so he's covered by Medicaid (he would be covered by Tricare Prime if he weren't) and a 10 year old who would be covered by our Tricare prime for at least 8 more years, longer if he went to school. That's not the problem.

Consider this. Now insurance companies are told who they can insure and who they can't. This is socialism. They (I believe, as it was in the Senate bill and I haven't read this version) are also being told they can't raise their rates. If you go into a venture knowing it's high risk, do you expect to get it for free? Or do you expect to have to pay a little more? When my son was born we knew there would be health risks involved. We had a choice between Tricare Prime and Tricare Standard. With Tricare Standard, there is no yearly fee. It's practically free. It sounded great to the average person. You only pay 20% of your office visit. And there's a catastrophic cap. So, if something severe happens, to the average person, you're covered. You may not be covered for something chronic, but you are for something catastrophic. So, if you only go to the doctor once a year for a physical, it's great. But we knew there would be associated health risks with Down Syndrome. That's the definition of chronic....ongoing...life long. We knew that 50% of Down syndrome children have a heart condition. We also knew that we would be getting older, even though we were only 26 when he was born. Wow, if this bill had been instituted at the time my son was born, we could have been on my parents insurance. But I digress.

We did something rare and novel....we PLANNED OUR FUTURE. Do young people do that these days? We took the Cadillac plan. It was more expensive in the beginning, but it's paying off now. My son had 3 heart surgeries. Now I've been through breast cancer, epilepsy, high blood pressure, and let's say I have more than just a yearly physical. I have another son with ADHD. He has more than a yearly physical. It's been great up to now, with President Obama. I had a scare 6 months ago, thinking my breast cancer came back after 5 years. My government health care disallowed my digital MRI. They said it was experimental. My surgeon said it's been out for years, and isn't experimental and didn't charge me. How rare is that? My surgeon said every doctor in the United States should take Tricare Prime, for our veterans. But they don't. I know why. They now reimburse at 28%. Take heed, that's what it's going to be like if we get single payer. The doctors will be quitting in floods. And no one will be going to college for doctors. Those that want to work for the government already are. Those who go into the military as doctors either are very patriotic, or do to get their education in order to get out and go into private practice.

The president wants to start the "you can't be turned away for an existing condition for under 26" immediately. But, no one else gets health care right away. And they are still going to start the taxes right away. Let me ask you this: with this Congress that has had to be bribed for the past year to get this bill passed, do you really think this money will be there in 4-6 years? Where do you think your tax money will go? To study the tse-tse fly? To see if we can use bees to send messages to somebody?

And how are they going to get votes for it? Are they going to withhold water from someone else besides California? I heard about that one, too. What is this? Iraq? Do we have a dictator society?

I've told this story before, but I'm going to put it on the record here on my blog. I was a dispatcher for 911 in the Chicago area. When I got hired, I heard a story that was told, and I admit it could be urban legend, about how Chicago police deal with their own. It was told by a fellow dispatcher who had someone transfer to a suburb from Chicago and tried their tactics on a smaller scale and it didn't turn out so well. Apparently, when an officer gets out of line and does something the other officers don't like, they take care of it by themselves. It could be anything, snitching, not doing something, doing something they don't like, whatever. Any time the offending officer comes on the air, the other officers click their mics on, and basically walk on the offending officer's transmission. Dispatch can't hear him. They do this EVERY time he comes on the air, to come on duty, to eat, to make a traffic stop, whatever he does. This sends the signal that if he were to need help, dispatch wouldn't be able to hear him. Dispatch has to ask him to repeat a lot.

Well, apparently when they tried it right before I got hired, it backfired. A shot got fired over the air. The dispatcher had to do a roll call and see if all her officers were OK. From the story I heard one of the officers who clicked his mic in order to discipline the offending officer was doing a traffic stop and the person he stopped fired at him. He was doing a foot chase. Luckily no one was hurt, but that ended the Chicago tactics in that suburb. I never actually witnessed it because authorities got involved (according to the story) and told them not to do it.

THIS story is why I believe in the strong arm tactics that I hear. This was told to me in 1993. So it had to have happened prior to that. I don't believe they are above anything, any threats, any bribes, any dirty deeds to get what they want. These are radicals from the 1960's who decided they couldn't destroy American government from the outside so decided to play the game until they could get inside the government and destroy it from within. And now they are in the very top.


And one more point my husband noticed. They want to tax those who make $200,000 if they're single, and $250,000 if they're married. Why aren't the feminists all up in arms? Apparently a woman is only worth $50,000! Who is the most likely to be a single wage earner making $200,000? A man, or a woman? Aren't the feminists proclaiming that men make more than women and complaining about the difference in wages? Do they figure once they get married, she'll quit and start pumping out babies? So she's only worth $50,000? And what are the gays going to do if they're both men and they both make $200,000? I guess the marriage penalty goes into affect. So this bill is anti-marriage. It's cheaper to stay single.

We can not let up. Don't let them stop you by telling you that they have the numbers. Don't stop calling. Don't stop emailing. Don't stop visiting. Don't stop blogging. The battle is not over. This is not the only marathon. If this bill gets passed, we will have socialism in America. There will be no turning back. Don't let them tell you that we can lose this battle and still win the war. It will take a miracle to will if this piece of legislation passes. Of course, it might be for just such a thing that God has planned. Oh what a wicked generation that desires to see such a miracle in order to believe in God. But to have the faith and not see.......I would rather know my God exists and save us from the jaws of death and be called a doomsayer and know that it was my God who saved me, than to have that act seen.....

Lori Ann Smith