A Republican View Of Health Care

Yesterday I received a thick envelope from the Republican National Committee. Inside I found the “2009 Future of American Health Care Survey”. (This must be survey “P45” because that was the “name” on the return address envelope.)
I was going to take the survey and send it back to them—but there was just no good way to answer most of the questions. Pretty much all of them were cast in the mode of the classic, “Have you stopped beating your wife yet?—Yes or No”. You can’t answer those.
At least you cannot answer them with anything like your actual opinion. Let me give you a few examples of what I mean—straight from the survey.
First question was the only straight-forward one on the survey: Is America’s health care in crisis?—Yes or No. It was simple to say “Yes” and mean what one said. Of course it is; it’s going broke, and nearly 50 million Americans have no health care at all.
Question two was still within the realm of rational response: “What is your biggest concern regarding health care in America as it is today.” I could check “cost”, “quality”, “availability” or “other”. I would have checked “availability” AND cost.
Three, “Does it concern you that the liberal media has gone to unprecedented levels to give Obama’s views…and no one elses?” Yes, No, Undecided. Where’s the box where I get to check “I don’t think this is happening.” I’m certainly hearing other views!
Four, It has been suggested that voter registration could be used to determine political affiliation, “prompting fears that GOP voters might be discriminated against for medical treatment in a Democratically imposed health care rationing system.” Does this concern you? Yes, No, Undecided. Oh My God.
At this point I wrote, “You should be ashamed of yourselves.” (I am SO discriminated against in my Social Security and Medicare benefits! Both were Democratically imposed. And how much more rationed can health care get than it is under a Republican and conservative Democratically imposed system whereby 47 million Americans are left out of the health care system entirely? THAT’S real rationing!! Why stop at just the scare word “rationing” when you could throw in phrases like “Communist imposed” or “Nazi death squad imposed”…?)
Five: “Do you believe it is justified to ration health care regardless of whether an individual has contributed to the cost of treatment?” I can’t do a “Yes/No” on that because I don’t even understand the question.
Are the Republicans saying it would be all right to ration care if the person were on Medicaid and not paying anything toward it? Are they talking about illegal immigrants? What in the world ARE they talking about in this question?
Six: “Do you believe that your health care decisions should be made by your doctor and you and not government bureaucrats in Washington?” I was unaware that my personal physician—who is paid by Medicare—had to check with Washington first. Or that this happened with Medicaid. My my, who would have thought it?
Seven asks, Can we afford it? If we use a single payer system, eliminate private insurance except for the rich, we can probably afford it better than our present system—but there was no place for this answer.
Eight: “If you have private health insurance”—a huge IF for millions—“please rate your satisfaction level. Okay, I would probably be much more satisfied with a boat or a private plane if I owned one. And, incidentally, a lot of “insured” people have coverage that is so minimal they cannot afford to go to a physician anyway. I doubt if many of them receive surveys from the Republican National Committee—and how will the people who think Medicare is privately run answer?
Nine: “Rationing” under “Socialized Medicine” means people die waiting for an appointment. Would this be “inevitable in the U.S. under the Democratic plan?” You think that doesn’t happen here now? HMO’s weigh the cost/risk/benefit value of a treatment all the time. Am I the only Republican who has ever read news stories about all the “No’s” under the present system?
Ten: Do we approve a Republican plan to subsidize small business so they can afford to make health care available to employees? Nowhere do I get to ask the counter-question—how good will those plans be? Will the subsidy pay for a decent medical plan?
Eleven: Over a third the population get health care through their employers. Should this private sector coverage be preserved? No, we can’t afford it. (There was nowhere to write that answer, either.) The present system is too limited in scope, it is too inefficient (next time you visit your physician, look in his business office and see how many clerks he has just sorting out the dozens and dozens of health plans he has to send bills to each month.)
There is no effective way to regulate costs by forcing the drug companies, etc., to deal with a single payer. This will also cut the physician’s back room costs.
Eleven worried about whether the Democrats would try to “ram health care through Congress” before the August recess. Since I didn’t get the survey until August 20 and Congress has been in recess for weeks, that didn’t seem to be an issue.
Twelve: Should the government “use age and life expectancy as criteria for determining access to medical care?” Today, if you are put on a list for a donated heart or kidney, don’t you think they factor both into their decision? You’re deceived if you don’t! It sounds cruel, but until there are enough spare hearts and parts to go around, that will continue happening—no matter whose plan we live under.
Some of these are very scary issues. Legitimately so—for an aging population in an era of declining revenues and massive debt service. But putting the questions in the scariest and most pejorative form—going so far as to lie in some cases—does not contribute to any sort of rational debate.
When the RNC collates the answers to these carefully slanted questions, they will be able to go before the country and claim that “Americans don’t want real health care reform”. That won’t necessarily be true—but the questions have been framed so that it looks true.
The Republicans will, they hope, get the result they’re hoping for—continued drift toward disaster. As Louis XV put in the Eighteenth Century, “After me, the deluge”. And he was able to hold off the evil day all his life. It was his son he “sent” to the guillotine by refusing to act NOW.
I don’t like the fact that I am holding proof in my hands that my own political party seems to have adopted the same indifferent attitude. What will happen to our sons? Where and how will they get their medical care?