HEALTH CARE REFORM

Some of the opposition to health care reform is truly mystifying. I can understand the political part where many Republicans just want Obama to fail (even at the expense of our country). These politicians and the insurance companies are successfully stirring up strong and vocal followers to repeat outlandish claims and disrupt town meetings. Many of these are just doing their bidding, without real conviction.

It is claimed that some of these unthinking dissenters are motivated by racism, against a black president. I would hope, and guess, that this part of the group would be small.

But there are also sincere citizens who oppose health care reform, and ignore the facts. There is no abortion funding, no euthansia, no single payer mandate. Most of these citizens have health insurance. Don't they realize that the goal here is to give them more rights and protection and to lower health care costs and thus halt or slow the increases in their premiums?

Some loudly oppose the public option, which insurers hate. But it's not government takeover and the existing public plan, Medicare, is efficient and effective and well liked by its participants.

Many voice legitmate concern about the cost of the reform. But the plan is to keep the reform from increasing the deficit, to lower the overall cost of health care in the long run. 47 million uninsured and at health risk. Providing health care coverage for all brings us into line with all other indutrialzed nations and is obviously the right thing to do. What happened to the earlier polls that showed that most Americans were willing to sacrifice in order to provide coverage for their fellow citizens?

So it's hard for me to understand how so many Americans are voicing unwarranted opposition. Is this a reflection of a deficient educational system?

At my age, I guess that I should just be content to worry about the death panels revealed by Our Lady of Wasilla.