Monday, October 19, 2009

Where is the consensus on healthcare?

I heard report of what President Obama said about insurance companies in his weekly radio address and what the GOP response was, i.e. we would have access to more limited choices and the government would control (meaning constrain) our access to doctors and quality care if the healthcare bill in preparation were to pass.

That really made me angry to be honest with you…
· Angry at both Republicans and Democrats: why is it that I feel like neither Republicans nor Democrats are trying really hard to reach a consensus and come up with a landmark bill that will improve the way healthcare is provided in the US whereas there is a general consensus that the system in this country is not good enough by a long shot?
· Angry at Republicans: How can Republicans use scare tactics again to demean a bill that as far as I have heard is unlikely to bring about anything that the GOP representative mentioned? Well, they know scare tactics works – it has been very effective historically and it is not necessary to go back to the dark days of McCarthyism to realize this. Anyone who was in the US in the couple of years after September 2001 knows it in his/her guts.
· Angry at Democrats: it is easy and it feels good to bash Republicans but is it fair to hold only Republicans responsible for another mostly partisan bill despite its historic significance? Was Ted Kennedy the only one who could do bipartisan politics among Democrats?
· Angry at Obama: wasn’t he supposed to do politics differently? Yes, he is trying and I certainly give him credit for that. But this is not working so far and even though it is not only his or his administration’s fault, at the end of the day history will only remember the outcome of this, thus he has to try harder.

Ok, that is a lot of “politics bashing” but it does bug me that elected officials continuously discredit themselves and in the process make the general public increasingly cynical and distrustful. Or maybe I am being too negative…

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