Health Care Scummit

Ya see what I did there? With "Scummit"?. Man am I creative/funny/brilliant. Anywho. The big meeting on health care is today, and I am avoiding it all costs, not that it is hard seeing as how I am work all day. I typically call myself a democrat, even though I find myself disagreeing with the party often. I voted for Obama and I stand by that decision and would do it again (for many reasons, but that is a whole post in itself). But this health care crap is starting to piss me off! It seems as though everyone on the "health care for everyone even the illegals and the lazy people who refuse to contribute to this country" bandwagon are the extreme left democrats. And they are hurting the reputation of the regular middle o' the road democrats. Like yours truly. And it doesn't take a Rhodes Scholar to realize that the majority of people in this country are against this plan. The democrats in Washington need to abandon their personal agendas and actually listen to the people that elected them to office.

I've kept from writing this post for a while because a) I know how controversial it is and I wasn't mentally prepared for the backlash and b) I was still trying to figure out what I really thought of the whole thing. So to those of you who will disagree with me, that's fine. You have your opinions and I respect that, but if you want to share them, well, get your own blog.

Here is what I think. The health care system does need an overhaul, HOWEVER, it shouldn't start by providing coverage to every single person in the country. Insurance premiums are outrageous so many employers are choosing not to offer benefits simply because they cannot afford it. I don't work for any insurance companies, so I don't know what their processes are or what their profits are, but what I do know is that it costs a crap ton of money to get medical care. And that, my friends, starts with the medical industry. Most people know that insurance companies have contracts with doctors and hospitals, etc that give them big discounts off the total price of care that they have to pay for. I think that is a little fishy but that isn't what surprises me. I had a c-section in August and was in the hospital for 3 days after. My portion of the bill was $1600, my insurance company's portion was almost $8000, and that was after their discount. What, pray tell, cost $10,000?? For the nurse to ignore me for 3 hours while I nearly scratched my skin off? Or was it the cafeteria food that was cold by the time it made it to my room? I bet it was that little tube of toothpaste that I never used since I brought my own from home. I looked at that bill; $11 for one single 800mg ibuprofen. Screw that, I'll buy a whole bottle of the regular strength for $6 and just take 4 of them. Can anyone say price-gouging? Maybe if the medical industry wasn't allowed to charge out the ass for ridiculous things then insurance companies wouldn't have to pass that along to us. If insurance companies could keep their prices down then more employers could provide that benefit to their employees and self employed people could afford to purchase it for themselves. Then the number of uninsured people would be lower and the cost of the socialist health care plan, Obama care, coverage for every single person in the whole world to cover the uninsured would be lower. It may not solve all of the problems, but I think it's a pretty good place to start.

I have a strong opinion on providing coverage to every single person in the country too, but I think this post is getting a little long, so I'll let you chew on this a while before I throw more at you.