Parody PSA: Protect Insurance Companies
Sometimes you need a little humor and sarcasm during this health care debacle.
Via the Nation
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The strangest thing about me watching this video is that some people in the US seem to actually think that protecting businesses and shareholders is genuinely more important than universal health care.
Being from the UK where the NHS is a much-loved institution it's hard to get this desire to protect companies more than people.
The thing is, people don't see it as protecting the companies. They think they are looking out for their best interest by not wanting long wait periods, worse medical care, etc. You know, all the reasons that every other industrialized nation in the world has worse health care than we do. *rolls eyes*
They're convinced that people from Canada and the UK and France hate their health care. They have to keep telling themselves that in order to get to sleep at night. That and lies such as "they want to pull the plug on granny," "them illegals is gonna git health care," and "women with breast cancer will die."
Yep. I think there's also a very weird "I've got mine!" attitude where people think that there's no reason they should pay for others' health care, even though a) they already do to a degree, in the form of Medicaid, Medicare, and giant insurance premiums that cover the uninsured and b) people in countries with socialized health care pay less than we do. The smear campaigns against Obama's health care bill make me sick. At this point I just wish the whole thing was over.
My fiancee's neighbor put it this way:
"If I am doing the best to take care of myself, I exercise, I don't smoke, (even though I do,) why the Hell should I pay for the health care of someone who does heroin and doesn't care about their own health. I mean, when I was in California, it was only blacks and Mexicans that were goin in the emergency room, and if we have universal health care, blacks and Mexicans will take advantage of it."
What was it that Rev. Wright said about people against Health Care Reform?
That argument seems so strange to me because it's as though they somehow know without a shadow of the doubt that they will ever need health coverage. I may not ever need major surgery or run into an issue where I couldn't afford healthcare, but I would rather pay into a system that would protect me just in case. And then it doesn't even have to be illness- what about people who plan on having children? I hate this idea that I'm healthy and hardworking so I'll never get ill or lose my job, therefore I'm supporting the lazy people. It's not like you're paying for other people. The money is there for yourself when you should need it.
It's also strange because somehow black people and Hispanic people are able to go to the doctor and get treatment for illnesses they don't have... that's the only way that I can think of somebody taking advantage of health care.
Plus, I think everybody deserves at least basic health care, no matter how 'lazy.' It seems very anti-pro-life to be like "If they don't want to work, let them die of cancer if they get it!" And I bring up pro-life because it seems to be the conservatives who are mostly for not reforming health care.
A Conservative friend of mine also feels this way; he doesn't want 50% of his pay to go towards "other people" - isn't it only people making over $250K a year that will be affected? Even so, when I told him I understand that Cons don't want to help people he said Conservatives want "people to help themselves" - meaning what? If we have a public health option people will run to the hospital and clog up emergency rooms with hangnails and bad hair days? I don't know what they are afraid of.
Also I mentioned that everyone pays for fire depts and police and schools. his reply? "Schools aren't free."
What am I missing?
Canadian here. Our system has problems, but when reform comes up guess who's first on the list of countries we don't want to imitate?
Ummmmmm... Iceland? Montenegro?
Alright, I give up...
This is a reply to mikearthur.co.uk and Lilith Luffles (I looove your username btw).
I agree with Lilith Luffles that one of the biggest reasons people are fighting the public option is out of fear that their money will take care of immigrants (i.e. Mexicans). I was just in the UK for several weeks and most everyone I talked to said they loved the NHS. They should. It's completely wonderful. I was so floored to learn how comprehensive it was. The people I spoke with might have well have said, "And we even have unicorns here! They prance around in meadows and sparkle in the sun." Seriously, that's how positive I am on NHS. BUT there also seem to be a few xenophobic nutjobs who don't want NHS to take care of immigrants. Said nutjobs are given a voice by The Daily Mail. So I think the irrational fears are the same. The difference is that our nutjobs have their own news network...
So there's a completely oversimplified and unscientific answer for you...
There's also this amazing sleight-of-hand that goes on in U.S. culture in terms of class, where the elites are able to somehow convince people in the lower-middle income range that they have more in common with millionaires than with the working class poor. Lots of people genuinely believe that protecting big business means protecting themselves, because they're on the verge of making Horatio Alger-style grand leaps in class status (or that on some symbolic level they're already there). The elite class puts out this very convincing and appealing invitation to everyone to think that big business means "us" instead of "them," and it's amazingly effective at killing opposition. My conservative grandfather, who was a traveling paint salesman most of his life, thinks that the current system works in his favor and lumps himself in with insurance company owners politically, all the while cursing his medicare bills.
And no, I'm not always that Marxist, but when the shoe fits...
I'm sorry, what? I saw Jon Hamm and everything went all pretty and good...
A lot of people do value capitalism in US society. In a sense it is synonymous to economic freedom. However the more I think about it lately the more I realize that, uh, NO the big business executives are NOT thinking about "What's best for the country?" they're not even pretending to do so.
Ultimately one has to trust the government more simply because they ARE accountable to the public. Any business is at best only accountable to its executives and investors, maybe its employees and customers.
I'd agree that having government run agencies isn't always the best, and that one should focus on limiting cost even if that means limiting scope, BUT you CANNOT count on corporations to take care of us like too many republicans think we can.
I am a very healthy woman who turned forty this past month. I currently work four part time jobs and am unable to afford health insurance. Don't: smoke, drink, do illegal drugs or are planning to have a high-risk [or any] pregnancy.
I do: have a BMI within normal range, eat low on the food chain, exercise, have a stable relationship and the greatest therapist in the world.
I cannot afford healthcare,