Skip to main content

Plan to Live Forever, Anyway?

The Supreme Court is debating whether it is legal to require people to have health insurance.  That is a Republican idea that the Democrats finally agreed with, so now the Republicans are arguing that it must be a bad idea because the Democrats support it.

I have been wondering whether it is constitutional to require people to pay taxes for . . . a defense department, for instance, if you are willing to take your chances at not having one, or if you don't want to serve in the military, anyway.

How about paying school taxes?  Should people who do not have children have to pay to educate other people's children?  I know parents who have good reason to argue that educating their own children is a bad idea.  And have you not resented, your whole life, that some idiot required you to memorize the State Capitals?  Whose idea was that?

What if you do not want to walk around Lake Nokomis?  What if you do not intend to slip into, or slip on, your Speedo, and astound your friends and neighbors after the ice melts, and before it comes, again?  Should people who do not want public parks have to pay for them?  Where in the constitution does it say that everyone has to have a brown pot belly?

I can understand that only the people who want to pay for police protection should get police protection, and that only the people whose houses actually catch on fire should have to pay for fire protection.  All that would take is an early warning system that gives us enough time to buy insurance before the fire starts, or that emits an ear-piercing wail the moment anyone wearing a hoodie drives into the neighborhood.  Maybe there could be a button that we push when we need help, and that would instantly deduct the price of the premiums we did not pay from our savings account.  Why should the people whose houses never catch on fire pay good, honest, hard-earned money to compensate people who are dumb enough to let their houses burn down?  Sheesh!  Talk about dumb!

Everybody does not need health insurance, and if people do, they should pay for it voluntarily.  As I see it, if you cannot afford to pay for preventative care, you should not expect me to do it for you.  Anybody with any brains and enough money can afford private health insurance.  Right?  Right!  Anyway, everybody already has access to health care:  it is called the emergency room.  Just go there!  It is free!  Nobody pays for it.  It just happens.  And there is no reason why, if emergency room care works for health care, the same principle cannot be applied to fire insurance, and police protection, and education, and park systems, and wars, and rumors of wars, and the last minute acquisition of Great Faith, which will be necessary when Jesus Comes Again on the Clouds to separate the sheep who can afford insurance from the goats who didn't believe Jesus was coming, anyway.

There are those, of course, who believe that everyone should have adequate health care, whether they can afford it, or not, and that all of us will be better off if that happens, but I am here to tell you that if we do that people will take advantage of it, and do you want that?  Of course not!

I knew you would agree with me!

(I don't agree with me, but I knew you would.)

(No, I was hoping nobody would,
although there is some doubt about
the Supreme Court. They did elect
George W. to the Presidency, you know,
even though The Guy Who Invented the Internet
got more votes.  Well, when a Blowhard
and an Ignoramus are the options. . . .)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Friends-- My step-father of 35 years died this morning. His name was Conrad Royksund. He was 86 years old. He was born into poverty on a farm near Puyallup, WA. He was the first member of his family to attend college and earned a PhD from the University of Chicago. He paid his way through all of that by fishing in Alaska. He spent his professional career as a college professor. I met him when I was just 3 years old and don't actually have any memories of my life befor e he was in it. He was intimidatingly smart, funny as hell, and worked his ass off. He taught me to meet people with kindness and decency until I was certain they could not be trusted. He taught me to meet ideas with carving knives until I was certain they could. I will remember him as one of the bravest, most curious, and funniest people I have ever met. He left this world with a satisfied mind. We are so grateful. Dan Hubbard
1 comment
Read more

Caliche Busters and Government Work

When I was young and both stronger and smarter than I am now, I put my might and brain to work doing nothing useful, unless it might be thought that hand/foot/eye coordination might come in handy.  Those were skills to be learned and practiced.   I found an iron bar our grandfather had shaped in his blacksmith shop.  He took old car, truck, or wagon axles, and made tools from them for digging post holes.  He sharpened one end to a tip, and the other to a blade.  Washington State, like many places, had a hard layer of soil, probably created by water and limestone, or some such materials, that made digging holes a miserable chore.  The bar chipped through the natural concrete so that a shovel could take it up.   I found Grandpa's iron bar, and since I was young and dumb and strong--or so I thought--decided to punch a hole down to hardpan and ultimate truth.  I knew how to do that.  Raise the bar vertically with both hands, and then slam in straight down.  On the second try, aimi
Post a Comment
Read more

The Sea is Rising

Let us just step back:  two hundred and fifty years ago, or so, the ships of England and Spain had drifted onto a whole new continent, as they saw it, from far north to a savagely cold south; pole to pole, as if there were such things. Millions of people already lived here, some of them still hunters and gatherers; some of them very wealthy, indeed!  Gold and silver stolen from the southern Americas funded Spanish and English dreams. There was land, lots of land, under starry skies above, rich land, and oil and coal and iron ore.  The whole western world learned how to build industries not on simple muscle power, but on steam and oil.  We farmed, too, of course.  All we needed was cheap labor--slave labor from Africa, mostly, so the ships came with slave labor.  Chinese labor built railroad beds where there had been rock cliffs. Europeans, long used to killing each other for good, religious reasons, brought their religious savagery with them.  Even when all they wanted to do w
Post a Comment
Read more