You've gotta fight for the rights profits of insurance companies!
Most of you have probably heard of the controversy over SCHIP, or the State Children's Health Insurance Program. This is a program intended to provide medical care for underprivileged children and has become a bone of contention because there is some disagreement between Republicans and Democrats over just who should count as "underprivileged." Democrats think that this definition needs to be expanded to those households that make as much as 300% of the poverty line (i.e. 3 times the poverty amount) while Republicans disagree and wish to see it held down to those at 200% of the poverty line or lower. So, this more or less boils down to a debate over just how poor you have to be before you're eligible for government help in keeping your kids healthy.
Since some studies seem to indicate that for every 100 children enrolled in SCHIP, there is a corresponding loss of 25-50 children covered by private insurers, Republicans fear that the program is some sort of first step towards a dark socialist future for the United States. No, I'm not bloody kidding. Obviously, we don't need to talk about the fact that most of those 100 kids weren't covered by private programs to begin with or that other research shows that children shifted off of SCHIP end up costing the state more money due to the increased use of emergency services. Evidently for some Republicans, keeping 25-50 customers for insurance companies is worth letting 50-75 children suffer with no insurance, and costing the taxpayers money. In other words: Republicans want us to subsidize the profits of insurance companies. As always, the only kind of welfare Republicans like is corporate welfare.
Now, I don't want to get into a gigantic argument about how much we should be willing to pay to protect insurance companies: you can probably roughly guess my views given that I am more sympathetic to capitalism than not. Instead, I want to address claims by some Republicans that Democrats are looking to irresponsibly spend money. Are Democrats looking to waste money? Well, with the aid of a spiffy graphic shamelessly stolen from the excellent Jesus' General, you tell me:
Republicans tell me that if we don't fight terrorists in Iraq we're going to have them here. That's always seemed a little speculative to me- it's not like "teh terrorists" care that much about Iraq. What doesn't seem speculative, however, is that if we don't fight poverty, ignorance, and chronic ill health here in the United States... well... guess what we're going to have?
Since some studies seem to indicate that for every 100 children enrolled in SCHIP, there is a corresponding loss of 25-50 children covered by private insurers, Republicans fear that the program is some sort of first step towards a dark socialist future for the United States. No, I'm not bloody kidding. Obviously, we don't need to talk about the fact that most of those 100 kids weren't covered by private programs to begin with or that other research shows that children shifted off of SCHIP end up costing the state more money due to the increased use of emergency services. Evidently for some Republicans, keeping 25-50 customers for insurance companies is worth letting 50-75 children suffer with no insurance, and costing the taxpayers money. In other words: Republicans want us to subsidize the profits of insurance companies. As always, the only kind of welfare Republicans like is corporate welfare.
Now, I don't want to get into a gigantic argument about how much we should be willing to pay to protect insurance companies: you can probably roughly guess my views given that I am more sympathetic to capitalism than not. Instead, I want to address claims by some Republicans that Democrats are looking to irresponsibly spend money. Are Democrats looking to waste money? Well, with the aid of a spiffy graphic shamelessly stolen from the excellent Jesus' General, you tell me:
Republicans tell me that if we don't fight terrorists in Iraq we're going to have them here. That's always seemed a little speculative to me- it's not like "teh terrorists" care that much about Iraq. What doesn't seem speculative, however, is that if we don't fight poverty, ignorance, and chronic ill health here in the United States... well... guess what we're going to have?
Labels: Democrats, health care, politics, Republicans
posted by Drek | 9:42 AM
2 Comments:
I propose a new Republican motto:
"Utilitarian logic: ignore it and maybe it'll go away!"
(and if we're *really* lucky, maybe it'll take that nasty Drek and his fancy facts, pusillanimous feel-good morality, and condescending "reasons" with it!)
Interesting to know.
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