Terrified Yet?

I toyed with several different titles for this post. Included on that list were "Lies My Government Told Me." "'I Am Not A Socialist.'" and "Get It While You Can." But none of these seemed to do justice to the gravity of the situation facing our nation.

I apologize for the large delay between posts. Vacation. Spending time outside. Other unforeseen obstacles. That and I have several posts in progress, but this one simply could NOT wait.

You may have heard that Obama's "Healthcare" plan is most likely going to be rubber stamped through "Congress." Let's take a look at some of the details of this program:

Where to start. Well, I want to begin by saying that this is not the healthcare that the Senators have. I seem to remember that being a campaign promise. I'm pretty sure President Obama said in more than one debate that he'd make available the health plan that Congress has. What happened there?

Under this plan, the President states that you can keep your old healthcare program if you want to. You'd be considered "grandfathered" and you would not have to take the government's healthcare. Of course, you'd still be paying for the government's plan in your taxes, you just don't have to use it. You can keep your own private healthcare company. *Phew* that's a relief. That is, of course, until employers begin to realize that they don't have to offer healthcare anymore. What a major savings! What a great way to increase the bottom line! So, if this passes, we can expect employers of non-unionized employees to no longer offer healthcare. Why should they? The government can take care of those people now.

Besides, there is a clause in this bill that says that you cannot transfer your private healthcare coverage. Bet you didn't know that, huh? What does that mean? It means that if you switch jobs then you cannot: A)Bring your healthcare with you or B)get healthcare from your new job. They cannot offer it to you. Period. If you switch jobs you are also switching to the Federal Healthcare Program. So, what's to stop companies from no longer offering healthcare coverage? They can't offer it to new people, why should they continue to offer it to their tenured employees?

What's the end result of these two inevitable results of President Obama's plan? Private Healthcare companies will be forced to shut down. Without new people coming in, and with so many companies no longer offering the coverage, these companies will have to close their doors. They will have to tell those few companies that are still offering healthcare that they can no longer provide it. When all is said and done, everyone will be part of the government's program and thousands of people will be out of work due to the collapse of the private healthcare industry.

Is that how you planned on creating jobs, Mr. President? By choking every private health insurance company out of business? What are all of those people going to do? Who are they going to work for? Nothing like stimulating the economy by forcing people out of work.

Oh, and don't grow old! That's for sure. One of the ways this plan is going to "keep costs low" (You know, less that $1 trillion per year) is by limiting end-of-life care. That's right, when it comes to old folks under Obama's plan the slogan is "let 'em die. It's cheaper that way."

The best part about this program? Reporters are asking the members of Congress if they would sign up for this healthcare program. I've yet to hear one of them answer "yes."

But, to be honest, here is the most terrifying part of this plan. While most things that a President does can be undone by the next administration, (Obama was an excellent example of that principle!) this can not simply be undone by our next President. If this passes ~ that's it: the government will have yet another massive huge bureaucratic monstrosity that we can never get rid of (See: Medicare, Social Security, Homeland Security, IRS, Medicaid, Welfare, etc). All of the results I've explained above are inevitable: Once companies stop offering healthcare as a benefit which will lead to the slow strangulation death of all private healthcare companies there will be too many Americans relying on this terrible program for it to be ended. Where would they go? There is no way the existing private healthcare companies (if there are any) would be able to withstand an influx of insureds in the numbers that would suddenly find themselves uninsured. Not to mention the numbers that would be considered uninsurable, or people with "pre-existing conditions." Once we have started down this spiralling path, anyone who tries to right the ship would be seen as either heartless or stupid.

Oh, and let's not forget that the plan also has that incredibly sensible aspect that fines you if you don't have healthcare. So if you can't afford healthcare, you have to pay more for not having it. What I want to know is, will the President's plan cover me as I recover from starvation because I can't afford my food and my taxes to cover my new "affordable" healthcare plan?

Now, indulge me as we go one more speculative step forward. Without much difficulty, one can envision the government trying to lower costs by regulating what doctors can charge. This could cause the good doctors to decide that either they don't really want to practice medicine anymore, or they just don't want to practice it here. And let's not forget the complaints from countries that have socialized medicine: it takes forever to get anything done. The only country without that complaint is Germany and that country is going bankrupt. Granted, this paragraph is not as likely to happen as the rest of the post. But it is, by no means, out of the question!

In the end, either the President is incredibly short-sighted and can't foresee these obvious inevitable results or he is incredibly devious, recognizes that these things will happen but hopes he can pretend they were unintended and his dream of taking another step towards a socialist society will be complete.

Either way, that's not the type of leadership I'm looking for from the Oval Office. Please, write to your congressman or congresswoman. Tell them to vote NO on this bill. Let's leave Obama's plan where we left Hillary's: In the waiting room where it belongs. You know, that place we'll end up if this thing passes!