Deceiving Ourselves About Healthcare Reform

By Jill Chapin

November 13, 2009

Washington’s track record of doing anything fiscally responsible is pretty dismal. That they can get away with this time after time by explaining there were unforeseeable factors speaks more to the gullibility and/or ignorance of the American public than it does to the disingenuous ways of our elected officials. Candidly speaking, our current healthcare mess can be attributed to corruption or ineptness; most likely it is the collusion of both. Worse, the American public is culpable as well, for not paying attention to what is right before their eyes.

Consider the following:

How can anyone say with a straight face that this trillion dollar solution will trim our health care costs? What kind of mad logic is being applied to this nonsensical math?

How far have our standards dropped when we are pushing for passage of a nearly 2000 page tome that most likely has been read in its entirety by – no one? Why would anyone want a plan that is literally unreadable, and therefore, unknowable?

Why would we entrust Washington with a trillion dollar healthcare overhaul and feel confident that the money will be used wisely in view of the fact that government-run Medicare and Medicaid are rampant with fraud and waste?

Why do Americans feel that this healthcare reform proposal is meant to lessen their financial burden when Washington made a deal with the pharmaceutical industry not to wield their mighty purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices for us?

Why are we not outraged at the devious ways this healthcare proposal speaks to both sides of an argument? For example, it included language specifically stating that illegal immigrants would not be allowed to participate in the public option. Yet other language stated that it would be forbidden to screen for one’s legal status. So would illegal immigrants be able to participate or not?

Why are we so gullible as to really believe that if we like our current plan, we can keep it? Apparently the Law of Unintended Consequences has led Congress to include language specifically exempting themselves from ever having to use the public option. Why then isn’t there language like that to include us ordinary citizens too?

It’s a false argument to imply that our healthcare costs will skyrocket without this healthcare reform; this is just an either/or scare tactic, denying the possibility of other options. Their fear-inducing panic is designed to make us feel we must do something right now. Indeed we should. But that something does not have to be a trillion dollar farce riddled with all sorts of devils-in-the-details that could derail what you think the document means.

Actually, we can do something right now, with just the stroke of a presidential pen. And it won’t cost taxpayers one penny. In fact, here are three things we can do immediately:

–Allow Americans to purchase insurance across state lines to stimulate private sector competition

–Forbid insurance companies from denying coverage for pre-existing conditions

–Use our government’s enormous purchasing power to negotiate lower drug prices

This puzzling ability of Americans to be blind to the obvious deceit being perpetrated upon them seems eerily similar to those whose spouse is cheating, and the clues are obvious to all except the betrayed. That’s because we come into a marriage with trust and high expectations of fidelity; with a breach of that trust, the victims are the last to recognize it because to do so would necessitate a U-turn on the trajectory of our life’s plan.

This analogy must be why we are so reluctant to rein in our initial support of healthcare reform even as more facts and truths unfold before our eyes. To feel betrayed would force us to do or believe something other than what we had counted on. It would take effort to ferret out truth from fiction. It would require us to reassess those in whom we had placed our trust.

We need to get our heads out of the sand and face the stark reality that current proposals are designed for special interests, and sadly, we ordinary citizens are not special enough.

Whoever said that we should leave the facts out of the discussion because they make it that much harder to delude ourselves surely had proponents of this healthcare reform in mind.

Jill Chapin

Jill Chapin has been a guest writer and columnist in several Los Angeles area papers for over fifteen years. She has written a bilingual parenting book titled, "If You Have Kids, Then Be a Parent!" and a children's book entitled, "My Magic Bubble."

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