‘Health Care is a Privilege’ says GOP Congressman Well, there we have it. The GOP is throwing down the gauntlet with this pronouncement. When asked for whom it is privilege, the congressman replied that ½ (50%) of the currently uninsured Americans are uninsured by choice. So the plan of the GOP to keep any reform from happening is to claim that any universal health care is somehow bad because those who are uninsured by choice need to be protected from mandatory insurance. Is it just me or is this the most asinine argument I have ever heard.
He went on to say that it was these deliberately uninsured (he refers to it as ‘going naked’) were the reason for so many ER visits by the uninsured. To me that is all the more reason to have a universal health care system, as it removed that option to be electively uninsured.
The GOP is just so lost. They are stumbling around like a punch drunk prizefighter, out classed and dazed, but has not yet fallen down. They have no options, just swinging widely in the vain hope that something will land and give them a respite on the way to the canvas.
I have said for some time, this might be the end of the GOP as a national party. Their last stronghold is the South, and historically (prior to the Civil Rights movement) it was pure democratic country. As the older generation of residents in these states move on to the next phase (whatever that is) the Democratic Party will start to turn the color on even these diehard states.
Unfortunately that leaves a void. If the Democratic Party gets much stronger, we can expect another party to emerge. Nature abhors a vacuum, and so humans. So if you (like me) are still a little right of the current Democratic Party, we will find the further left shift of the Dems more and more unacceptable. I see only 2 options (assuming the GOP dies further).
- A new ‘Right Leaning’ party emerges and draws off a lot of independents and right of left leaning voters. (I hope this is NOT the way it goes)
- The Dems are forced to move right, and alienate the liberal wing of the party who would then move to the Liberal Party, elevating that party to a national status. (I prefer this one as it does not create a new party)
Some say, no the Republicans could never die off, I have to point to the Wiggs, which was the party the republicans replaced on the issue of slavery expansion in the union. So we have national precedence for just such a shift.
The US seems to undergo a transformation every generation. The transition of the Baby Boomers into the retirement system had to have a more dramatic effect then previous generations, just as it has for every transition this group has had. (If you remember the 60’s you weren’t there). Like Kennedy said in the 1960 inauguration speech, ‘The torch has passed to a new generation…’. This is the first president in my lifetime that is younger than me. Time for us in the BB generation to turn over the keys and trust that they will do the best they can, offer to help where we can, but we need to let the next generation reshape the country to their ‘American Dream’ even if it is/was not ours.