Letters from E. Christian

 Dear Friend,

 Most of us would assume that a “wetland” would be wet….at least some of the time.  Particularly if the government was to get involved and spend valuable tax-payer money protecting and maintaining said “wetland”, it should be…wet.  Well I live a mere two hundred yards from a protected “wetland” that amounts to a small ditch that only has water (for a day or two) after a hard rain.  There is certainly no life to be found there; no aquatic animals or rare insects to enjoy.  It spends most of its time being a dry hole in the ground surrounded by dry reeds (which also grow across the street in a drainage ditch…which is usually full of water) and a fence built by the city to keep people out of the hole…’cause it’s a wetland. 

 As I marvel at the utter lack of wetness in this “wetland”, my mind wanders to my father’s koi pond.  Several years ago my father converted our old in-ground kiddie pool into a koi pond.  Only three feet deep and fifteen feet across (which makes it bigger than the “wetland”), it is home to three koi and numerous goldfish that have grown to enormous proportions, many large and exotic plants, dragonflies, butterflies, humming birds, and one large red-eared pond slider (a type of turtle for those of you not familiar with Texas wildlife) that had to crawl 60 to 70 yards from a nearby creek to sneak into his yard.  Blue herons have often stopped by for a drink (and a meal, much to my father’s chagrin) as do roadrunners and hummingbirds.  My father’s koi pond is a perfect place to sit and enjoy a good cigar at sunset and relax in nature’s beauty…unlike the dry wetland you can’t access.

 So I’m two paragraphs into this and haven’t mentioned Obama-care or how my father’s koi pond relates; don’t worry we’ll wrap this up pretty quick because you have other things to do.  I contrast the publicly run “wetland” and the privately run koi pond as an example of what we face with the socializing of healthcare in this country.  Since there are four competing bills with constantly changing proposals, the question before us is not which bill is good or bad or what options we should fight against or support, but rather who is better suited to providing healthcare to us, the American public (not to Senators, Congressmen, and other high-ranking government officers, they are exempt from these bills as they are often exempt from of the laws they pass).  So I ask you, given the government’s track record, do you really believe that Obama-care will really do what has been promised? 

 Question one: can a government really reduce the cost of medical procedures and drugs when it pays $500.00 for a hammer and $800.00 for a toilet seat?  Is it even remotely possible that Obama can negotiate lower costs on drugs that cost a BILLION dollars to bring to market when they can’t even negotiate with Home Depot? 

 Question two: can the same people who run FEMA, the IRS, the DMV, and fill-in-the-blank government entity really run an efficient, prompt medical service?  We can’t get driver’s licenses to people without a “five mile” line and hours of waiting, but we can get people medical care quickly?

 Question three: if the newest, most effective drugs are often illegal or unavailable in countries with socialized medicine, if people in Britain are performing dental procedures at home because the government ran out of money, if people have to wait six months to a year for needed procedures and tests in Canada, what makes you think that the United States will be any different?  We often speak of American exceptionalism and believe that it will carry over into everything we do, even socialized medicine.  But we do so forgetting that American exceptionalism is based on America being the exception; when we do the same things as other nations, we do it the same way and have the same problems.

Lastly, President Obama has recently raised the spectre of socialized medical care being “our moral duty” and is presenting it to pastors as the “Christian” thing to do.  As a Christian, (after all I named my blog Everyday Christian) I do have a question for the President: Jesus cared for people and wanted the best for them; would our Savior support a policy that all evidence and common sense dictated that the outcome would ultimately lead to worse care?  Morality demands that we care more about the actual outcome of our actions than our intentions.  The road to Hell is paved by good intentions, and socialized healthcare is nothing more than good intentions.

 Does this mean that I don’t believe the system is broken?  Of course not. I know there are problems and they need to be fixed, but socializing our current system will not fix our problems─ it will only exacerbate them.  We need tort reform, government restrictions need to be repealed on the purchasing of insurance from other states, government regulations need to be rolled back, and a whole host of other changes need to be made that will allow the free market to bring down costs and fix the problems through innovation.  As I sit here amongst the dragonflies and jumping goldfish enjoying the Texas sunset, I am reminded that the United States Postal Service (a government entity) did not create overnight delivery and has to send its priority packages through FedEx (a private entity).  As I close this letter, I remind you not to take my word for it, look at the options for yourself, ask yourself the big questions, and to speak your mind.

 Reflectfully Yours,

E. Christian

Comments (0) Aug 25 2009