Health care

The hot topic lately seems to be the health care reform bill that was passed by congress and is in the supreme courts now. The debate over health care has been an exhausting long drawn out ordeal that seems to be hard to find a middle ground on.

The debates over government control and the fear that Americans constitutional liberties are being threatened is not one that I can buy into. I admit I was less than excited when I learned that we would be required to buy insurance, but the new laws for the insurance companies that prevent them denying coverage to children with preexisting conditions quickly got me back on track along with expanding Medicaid and increasing Medicaid taxes by 3.8 percent for household incomes over $250,000, as well as placing taxes on unearned income like dividends, interest and capitol gains. These few things helped me feel that we would not be the only ones having to grow up and take responsibility.

Like many Americans my husband and I are struggling to get by and make ends meet. We live in constant concern that if one of us comes down with a serious illness we will not be able to get treatment. Therefore the requirement to get insured is not absurd to me because I know that it’s the only way we would be likely to break down and find a way to get insured.

The reasons I cannot buy into the infringement of constitutional liberties arguments are because I have watched two people close to me get cancer and not be able to afford treatment for the illness. The harsh realities of watching a loved one die because you have no money for treatment was something I had no idea even happened until it did to my family. The argument of unconstitutional requirements changes after watching a loved one die for lack of treatment. The idea of liberty changes when someone you love is unable to get an operation they need. Being sick and alone does not seem so much like liberty to me anymore; one ends up feeling very oppressed after going through a life changing ordeal like that. 

I think the health care reform is a new wave of civilization for American just as Medicaid was in the 1960’s. Some are crying infringement on constitutional liberties but I will be calling it progress.

Birth Control/ Woman Control

In the blog post entitled “Puritanism: The Haunting Fear that Someone, Somewhere, May be Happy” Ms. Althouse touches on a topic very near and dear to my heart. The issue of birth control not being covered by insurance was not even something I thought was possible till my sister started working for a Catholic hospital and she had to pay for her own birth control at the age of nineteen. She is now the proud mother of a baby boy and still trying to get through school being a single mother.

I believe Ms. Althouses intended audience crosses political lines and is aimed at people that can decipher hoopla over real political issues. In her article she gives those of us that wouldn’t be caught dead listening to Rush Limbaugh a little glimpse of what and how he forms his political arguments and the process in which he convinces his listeners the opposing point of view is ridiculous.

Althouse is an experienced blogger of eight years and is a Professor of law at University of Wisconsin. This woman is no dummy.

In the post Ms. Althouse shows a good sense of humor over the theatrics Limbaugh is prone to and she does not let him get away with calling the birth control debate a “welfare program”. Calling Limbaugh out in her blog post is one reason I enjoyed this article but the best point made in the article was Ms. Althouse’s statement “It is fundamental to women’s freedom that we have the ability to decide for ourselves when our bodies will go through pregnancy and bear children.” This is the crux of the matter, the ability of women to control their own reproduction, whether they are eighteen and can’t afford birth control or middle aged and successful. Birth control should not be excluded from their insurance because it is contrary to some ones belief system.

Ms. Althouse states that the emotional theme of the Republican Party has been religious freedom and I would like to ask what about the rest of our freedom to not have their religious views pushed on us. I guess we should be grateful that cancer treatment is not against theirr religious views.

I love that Althouse exposes the ridiculousness of treating women like they should not be sexual beings and implying that women wanting their birth control covered by their insurance does not make them a sex maniac.