Robert Jones

The bottom line is, WHO WILL PAY FOR THIS? I suggest that we get our house in order first. NOT SPEND, SPEND, AND SPEND. As far as “Chump Change” is concerned, we have a war to win. This is a war on terror and it will not ( Too bad) just go away.

With respect,

Robert Jones
Blue Dog Democrat

You’re trolling - but I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and answer why food isn’t free and why some people have kids who can’t afford their health care.

First, food production in the U.S. is heavily subsidized via our taxes (e.g. see corn, soybeans) and via importation tariffs against foreign producers (e.g. see sugar). The costs in each case are born by, respectively, taxpayers and consumers (including low-income Americans who still pay taxes - often disproportionately high ones compared to their income).

While food, nonetheless, isn’t free, your analogy works to some extent because SCHIP is subsidized health care that involves (depending on the state - and I’m far from an expert on each state’s version) premiums, annual fees, and co-payments for health coverage/care - so it too is not free.

I suspect your racist comment is crap and certainly don’t view it as the “liberal view” - but I will respond to your question ‘why do people have kids if they can’t afford them?’ with a simple observation. Even wealthy people can’t afford health care in this country if their kids (or they themselves) end up with something catastrophic, like cancer or brain damage from a car accident, without having major employer-based health care (and sometimes not even then). Others have been priced out by extreme price increases over the years that have overwhelmed not only individuals, but American businesses (which is why fewer and fewer businesses provide health care). To deny affordable health care security in this country, when almost every other major country in the world provides it for their own people, isn’t the fault of individual Americans and their families - but the fault of the American health care system and its poor design. To use your “Bentley” example - what if you put the key in the ignition and the car exploded - is it your fault you tried to start the car - or Bentley’s fault for making a car that explodes on ignition. The issue is should something work the way it was intended to work - whether it’s a car or a health care system designed for Americans (and largely paid for by their government through their taxes). We should fix America’s health care system - not say that 80% or more of our population should not have children because only the wealthiest among us can reasonably afford health care in a broken system.

Lemme see if I have this straight. People have kids, then complain because they can’t afford health care for them. To me, this is just a matter of poor planning. Before having kids, the couple should sit down and ask whether they can afford to have a child or not. If they can’t they shouldn’t get preggo.

To me, it’s like me going out and buying a Bentley, then complaining that I can’t afford insurance, gasoline and maintenance, and thus expecting, no demanding, that the taxpayers subsidize me.

The liberal view on socialized medicine was best explained to me by a woman in my office this week. She said that high health care costs have their basis in racism. In response to my bewildered, “huh?” she responded that health care costs prevent minority parents from acquiring the things their kids need to help them “keep up with the White kids.”

A bit dumbstruck, I asked, “What things?”

“X-box, the Internet and iPods,” was her response.

My eyes glazed over at that point.

“That’s why I’m voting for Hillary,” were her parting words.

Thank you for your comment. First off the total cost proposed for S-CHIP by congress (including a sizeable GOP contingent) is chump change compared to the war spending - and while I haven’t done the numbers I’d guess that just scrutinizing our Iraq/Afghanistan war expenses to make sure that they are competitively bid (many big contracts aren’t) and don’t involve war profiteering (which has already been found in some sizeable contracts) or other waste might pay (or more than pay) for S-CHIP expansion on its own. Couple that cost with the alternative of emergency room care for uninsured kids that will increase medical bill bankruptcies by parents and I’m sure we’ll save money.

I also need to correct a common misperception that you raise - all (or almost all) of the people we’re talking about are either working or otherwise have income sufficient to put them out of the range of Medicaid qualification - which is where they’d be if they had no income. In some cases there are two full-time working parents (perhaps even with additional part-time work) who simply have modest paying jobs that do not include health care benefits. Many middle class people, people working and making $60,000 a year, if they have a pre-existing condition cannot afford health insurance that can run into the tens of thousands a year. From the link to the New York Times I just linked to:

“Today, more than one-third of the uninsured — 17 million of the nearly 47 million — have family incomes of $40,000 or more, according to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, a nonpartisan organization. More than two-thirds of the uninsured are in households with at least one full-time worker.”

Robert, you write:

“I suggest , if a person is truly in need, ( injury in war, on the Job, loss of job, or a natural disaster ) they apply for relief and Uncle Sam should help.”

I agree. I’d also expand it, via S-CHIP, to kids truly in need who have working parents. As you put it “Uncle Sam should help” with their health care too.

It’s not “if your un-American” as put here, but the question of WHO IS GOING TO PAY FOR THIS? We have a war to fight, the country is in a slump with housing sales for example, and we can’t keep spending out of style. We have to turn to a surplus as Pres. Clinton did back in 1999-2000.

I suggest , if a person is truly in need, ( injury in war, on the Job, loss of job, or a natural disaster ) they apply for relief and Uncle Sam should help.

That in itself need repair as there are those out there who are not willing to work like the rest of us. They choose to rip off the system. We have to follow and enforce the Welfare Reform Bill put into place in 1994! ” THE BUCK STOPS HERE!” AS PRESIDENT TRUMAN ONCE SAID.

-Robert Jones
Blue Dog Democrat member