Reform "Now or Never" ... Really?

I’ll give you that there are people hurting without healthcare.

Reform has been ignored by every administration prior to President Obama.

In response to the President's urging outlined below, I ask, “Why does the President insist that this ‘reform’ be made this year? Why does he believe that failure this year will result in ‘never’ reforming healthcare in America?”

If healthcare reform is a good thing, and the President’s plan or idea is the best one, why will people realize that in 2009, but not in 2010 or future years? Is it a problem with the public schools? Are we teaching our children less effective critical reasoning skills every year? Will they not be able to understand the complexities of the issue? Is the electorate’s collective intelligence really decaying that rapidly?

Come on! Reasonable people will agree that, ceteris paribus, a good idea today will still be a good idea tomorrow.

I believe that, when someone gives a “now or never” ultimatum, it is because they are trying to hide something that others may find more objectionable than the status quo. Think back on every decision that someone has tried to rush you into making and see if that does not hold true.

This article was at Politico.com in late May 2009.

Since it’s primarily quoting the President’s conference call comments, there’s not much room for bias; and I don’t sense an overly active slant either way on the part of the writer.

"Obama: it's now or never"
By AMIE PARNES
05/28/09 2:13 PM
On a conference call with Organizing for America volunteers
Thursday, Obama urged thousands of callers to “work in your communities” to help
pass health care reform this year.

“If we don’t get it done this year, we’re not going to get it done,” Obama cautioned.

Obama urged volunteers to build on their experiences from the campaign and
“remobilize” to pass health care reform, calling it “one of our biggest priorities.”

“This is our big chance to prove that the movement that started during the campaign isn’t over,” he said. “We know what’s at stake. We know we need reforms. Businesses and families are just getting hammered… Millions of Americans have lost their health care.”

The president argued to supporters that Americans “want action.”

“Inaction on health care leads to unsustainable lives…everywhere,” he said. “If we want to cut our deficits…the most important thing we can do to close our budget gap is to rein in health care costs.”

This was interesting on a personal level.

The title raised an emotional – almost visceral – reaction in me.

I once had a girlfriend who wanted to marry me when we were 17 years old. I thought it was a good idea at the time, but (by the grace of God) the realities of life struck me and I asked her to wait for just a few months while I got established and settled in a career (read “finished Army Basic Training).

This thought was based on my uncle Dick’s advice that, “If you’re in love and it’s right now, you’ll be in love and it’ll be right in 6 months, so give it some time.” That was wisdom from a man who’d been there and (hadn’t) done that.

When I posited the idea, her emotional response was VERY similar to President Obama’s appeal below. It was “now or never”.

In the end, I avoided a REALLY bad mistake because I chose the more reflective path and insisted on waiting.

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to marry her! After all, when you are young and naïve, you know exactly what you want in life.

Within weeks we realized that we were not right for each other (read "got mad and broke up") and went our separate ways.If healthcare reform is really the best thing, and approaching it in the President’s proposed manner is really the best way, wouldn’t time bear that out, rather than threaten its chances of success?

There is far too much rushing and pushing and scaring in politics today.

We see it from our knee-jerk reaction to Afghanistan’s harboring Bin Laden, to our calculated and misguided invasion of Iraq, to the bailout of the banking industry, to the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, to closing Guantanamo Bay, to confirming Sonia Sotomayor as a Supreme Court Justice, to “reforming” healthcare.

Do we really understand the causes of the problems we see with healthcare?

Costs are high. Other than that, availability is excellent as compared to that in other countries and as compared to the population of the US.

The hospital I worked at in Cleveland had the same sign in the ER as every other hospital in America. It let everyone know that NO PERSON WOULD BE DENIED TREATMENT BECAUSE OF AN INABILITY TO PAY.

Quality is excellent by any standard.

So, we need to understand why healthcare is so expensive to the consumer. Above I cited one reason. You and I, who have the ability to pay for care, are subsidizing those who do not.

Another reason is anecdotal, but I believe it is common and would bear out under empirical scrutiny. About 5 years ago, I asked Tina’s OB/Gyn what her malpractice insurance premiums were on an annual basis. She paused briefly and matter-of-factly answered, “About $500,000.” I was stunned. She was telling me that before she paid a penny for medical office rent, utilities, continuing education, medical supplies, office staff, licensing fees, student loans, groceries, mortgage, car, insurances, her OWN healthcare, she had to earn HALF A MILLION DOLLARS. That is a LOT of pap smears!

If she is just one physician, imagine what the insurance costs are to “big pharma” or to hospitals themselves, or to medical device manufacturers, or to anyone else involved in your and my medical care!I don’t know much, but that could be a major factor in the cost of medicine in America.

John Edwards would probably have us look at greedy insurance companies, fat-cat hospital administrators, or doctors who drive BMWs. Small potatoes, if we did the math, I’ll bet. But then, John Edwards and his ilk make fortunes off of the “high cost of healthcare” in America.

If REFORM is a good thing today, then it will still be a good thing when we've had the chance to talk through it and come up with a well-reasoned solution to the problem.