You Have No Right To Be Healthy

The simple fact is that, in the United States, unlike, say Ireland, citizens of this country are not entitled to have health care i.e. they are not entitled to be healthy.  It seems sort of strange that a country that professes to espouse other rights such life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, is blind to a right for a healthy life.  It seems that you have a right to life – just not a healthy life – if you live in this country that professes to be the leader of the free world.  You might have the right to travel wherever you like on the country’s highways, and you can get a free education in the country’s public schools, but ask for medical help without being able to pay for it, and our hospitals may just leave you to die.  If you haven’t watched Michael Moore’s documentary on our failed health system, Sicko, take a look at it, you’ll see what I mean.

Now the Wall Street Journal has joined the fight against President Obama’s attempt to create some sort of national health insurance plan.  The scare tactics have been launched once again – the ones that have been so successful in the past in preventing universal health coverage for all U.S. citizens.  But why?  Why has this New York Voice of the Wealthy come forth to speak out against health coverage for all?  Try as I might, I can come up with only two reasons for the frantic effort to prevent such a plan.  The first reason is greed.  The second reason is also greed.

Let me explain.  It’s easy to see that in order to have health care for Americans who are in the lowest income bracket that someone is going to have to pay, and it won’t be the people in the lowest income bracket. We already know they don’t have the money to pay – that, after all, is the problem! So what is the solution? Tax the rich! An eminently wise solution.  As the famed bank robber, Willie Sutton, reportedly said when asked why he robbed banks, “That’s where the money is”.  It’s the same with taxes, you tax the rich because they have all the money and, besides, the rest of us are all taxed out.  It makes perfect sense, unless you are the multi-millionaire or multi-billionaire greedy, rich, good Christian, people of this country who would much rather spend their money in Monaco, or the Maldives, or maybe Palm Beach.  OK. I guess, I can see the sense in that.  The ultra wealthy have made their money and they want to keep it.  To Hell with everyone else… Perfect sense.  Very American too, isn’t it?

But wait, there’s just one other little thing about health care – it’s big business.  Actually is massive business.  There is a lot of money you can make from people who have diseases, you know.  If you have the secret elixir that will save their life, some people will pay a fortune for it – even if it only cost you five cents to make it!  If you have the secret knowledge of delicate surgical techniques and someone needs your skill to save the life of their child – think of how much money you could make by doing a little operation!  Yes, the business of providing health care is a moneymaker and a big one.  And then of course there are the insurance companies, close relatives of the Las Vegas casino operators, they’ll take your bet that you will get sick – if you are healthy, that is.  If you are likely to get sick they’re not interested.  And if they take your bet and later on you do get sick, they quickly lose interest in you.  After all, insurance is not about helping you pay for your medical costs, its a business where the insurer is betting that, on the average you will pay them more than they will pay you. How else can they make money?  Be reasonable.  They, of course, have no interest in the government somehow covering your medical costs and you therefore just walking away from their craps table.  In fact, that scares them to death.  How are they going to make money if you don’t place your sickness bet with them?

The problem is that the rich, greedy folks who don’t want to share their money, the rich medical industry who want to stay that way, and the rich insurers who know a good bet when they see it, are terrified of any sort of national health plan.  That’s because it will cost them money.  They don’t care a bit if it helps you.  That’s why they are so eager to try to convince you that you will suffer under any sort of government health plan. Now, all the old scare tactics, that have worked so well in the past, are being deployed once again, and the lobbyists in D.C. are trying their best to pressure our representatives and succeeding as usual.  I wonder how many of our elected representatives have secret Swiss bank accounts?

The simple fact is this: you do have a right to health.  It is a fundamental human right, but the greedy rich don’t want you to have your right to health. That isn’t surprising.  They didn’t want you to have your right to education in the past either.  Nor did they want you to have the right to own land.  Nor did they want you to have the right to vote.  The greedy rich only want one thing – your money.  And these powerful people, many of whom are descendants of powerful people, who are also descendants of powerful people, are working very hard to keep this right from you.  It is time to stop listening to the lies of the greedy rich, it is time for the American people to realize we all have a right to health, just as our European and Asian cousins realized a long time ago.

The issue is not about the freedom to choose your health care provider.  It is about your right to be healthy.