Posted on October 2, 2013

I really can’t figure out what is so hard about this.

For Republicans to shut down the government — to cause real pain to hundreds of thousands of families whose members work for various government agencies, and who will now be furloughed, as if they don’t matter, because, ya know, they aren’t hedge fund managers or other truly vital employees — is the most venal thing I’ve seen elected officials do in my entire life.

And all because why? Because they don’t support a bill that was passed via the normal democratic processes that we use in this country, whether one likes them or not, and all of which could have been explained to these fools by Schoolhouse Rock, if not whatever Poli Sci class they skipped in college before deciding to be a politician. Apparently someone forgot to tell them that when a bill becomes a law, and then the courts uphold that law, and then voters go and re-elect the guy who pushed for the law, then you are done, son. That’s it. You don’t get to hold the country hostage so as to indulge your pre-teen temper tantrum. You have to actually run candidates and win (and not just for some backwoods, or exurban, white flight, Jeezoid congressional district where everyone thinks the same way and believes, against all evidence that Olive Garden is Italian food), but in an entire state, or — get this — a nation! And if you can’t do that, you don’t get to fuck with the rest of us so as to satisfy your church family. That’s not how this thing works.

And what’s pathetic is, most of the people who are railing against Obamacare can’t even tell you what it is, or how it will impact them, and hardly any of them are going to be in any way harmed by it. Quite the contrary. Most will be benefitted substantially. Especially those with pre-existing medical conditions, whom insurance companies, concerned not with health but money only, were free previously to exclude from insurance altogether. Anyone who thinks people with pre-existing conditions should not be able to get insurance (and note, this includes virtually all conservatives in America) are evil. The walking, talking definition of that word. And especially since insuring them (preferably with a real single-payer system, but for now, with the ACA) will only cost a few of us more money as a result.

Oh and yes, note, I said “us.”

Because, interestingly, I am one of the statistically few who probably will see my health insurance premiums rise thanks to Obamacare. Because my family and I are on a private-pay insurance plan (which is true for only about 5 percent of the American public, most of whom get insurance either through employers or through Medicare/Medicaid). And because our income is well above the cutoff for receiving any kind of subsidy from the government for our plan, the odds are, our premiums will rise.

And ya know what?

Good.

Because the fact is, as much as I think health care should be a right, guaranteed and paid for from general revenues — and so, yes, I believe in the utter destruction of the private health insurance industry — the fact is, so long as we maintain a private system in this country, to discriminate against persons with pre-existing conditions, and thereby artificially deflate the cost of my insurance just because you can screw other people and not have to assume the risk of insuring them, is fucking evil. Period. And I am not OK with having my health care costs made cheaper only because someone else isn’t being allowed to have care at all and therefore gets to die, or suffer horrible illness all in the name of the precious market. So if I have to pay more so that others can receive the care they need, so be it. I’d rather do it through tax revenues, yes; because that way, the profit motive would be removed entirely and worthless actuaries would have to get real jobs, involving actual skills. But for now. I’ll take it. And I’ll pay it.

And anyone who isn’t willing to do so, is very simply a horrible human being. No exceptions. Not one.