Dear Facebook friends,

Certain of you need to please stop your whining about the passage of H.R. 3590. This is not the worst thing to happen to our country nor either is it going to destroy our country as we know it, or turn it into the Soviet Union/China.

Please remember a few points:

We are the last industrialized country that does not have some sort of universal healthcare system

• This includes both public or single-payer systems such as Canada or the United Kingdom as well as systems that include an “individual mandate” or more simply where citizens of that country are required to buy health insurance. Everyone with healthcare is a good thing.

We are still the last industrialized country that does not have universal healthcare

• This bill only created an option for those who cannot find healthcare through any other means.
• Bhutan has universal healthcare. Bhutan. 
• See also: Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Cuba, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, The Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Seychelles, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, The Republic of China (Taiwan), and the United Kingdom

We have spent more money on a two wars that have netted us nothing than we will be spending in the next 10 years on H.R. 3590

• The Congressional Budget Office estimated in Oct. 2007 that the long-term cost of the Iraq/Afghanistan wars at $2.4 trillion. $1.9 trillion on Iraq alone.
• Former World Bank Chair and Nobel-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz says this is underestimated and gave his own “ultraconservative” estimate of $3 trillion after all costs are factored in. To put it another way: in 2008, $108 million was being spent in Iraq every four hours.

The Preamble to the Constitution establishes the country and constitution partly to “promote the general welfare”

So why is this bill a good thing:

You can no longer be dropped from coverage after getting sick or be discriminated against for a preexisting condition

• That’s nice.

You can stay on your parents’ coverage until you’re 26

• So when you don’t get a job after graduating college with your double major in African Literature and Mongolian Dance, you can be covered

When buying new insurance, your premium will be capped from 3%-9.5% of your total income

My thoughts:

I don’t particularly care for this bill because of its lack of a public option and/or a single-payer system. I believe this is the best way to provide healthcare and I think it fits in perfectly to “[providing] for the general welfare” as is set out by the constitution. I personally am in favor of a social democracy where the economy is highly regulated, and the government provides many services for the people. A single-payer healthcare system is the best service our government can provide for us.

A side note for my Mormon friends, providing for the poor through the storehouse, and the law of consecration are socialist. Whether it’s god or the government controlling resources and dolling them out on a need basis, the definition’s the same.

I think I’ve made my point. You can agree or disagree, it’s your right. But if nothing else, we all get something great out of the whole deal:

Rush Limbaugh is moving to Costa Rica!

Further reading:

Roger Ebert—”Jesus was a Nazi. So’s your preacher.”