Saturday, September 18, 2010

Socialist, but...

So I'm sitting in this breakout session at a hemophilia conference this afternoon.   My grandson has it.  I get to learn all about it and how to deal with it at these things.

Anyway, it was a general male networking session (they had a female networking session in the next room.  It sounded like they were having a lot more fun).

The guy running the discussion has hemophilia himself.  And he's struggled with keeping insurance and getting treatment paid for, because ... well this is one expensive disease to treat, and severe hemophiliacs often run into lifetime insurance caps (typically $1 million).   And I'll be honest with ya... it's really a tough one for me because I love my grandson as much as I've ever loved anybody, and if certain things happen to him it's gonna be expensive to fix him.  Things that wouldn't be much of a big deal to you or me.

Anyway, this guy's talking to a room full of hemophiliacs and people related to hemophiliacs about insurance, and he drops a few matter-of-fact things about Obamacare that have to do with removing such caps, and one of the guys in the room brought up Missouri Prop C....

To my surprise the person leading the discussion said he voted for Prop C, adding that he didn't want this to turn into a political discussion -- but he stated his reason for doing it fairly concisely and accurately reflected what the general thrust of the proposition was about.

A guy in the back of the room in my row piped up and said that he must be misinformed, and that he couldn't understand why these people (anti-Obamacare people) didn't get it that "it" should be all about the time wasted by people trying to get health care and keep coverage and what a loss of productivity it is, and that it's supposed to be "one for all and all for one" and what's best for the "collective good"....

He then followed this by saying "Glenn Beck would probably label me a Socialist, BUT ..." and went back into language about productivity and the collective good, and when "the lightbulb" would go off about the productivity bit (again).

He brought up Glenn Beck by name several times in his rant.

I wanted to pipe up, but this was not the place for this discussion, and I knew it.

But what I wanted to ask him was "and would Glenn Beck be correct?"   I mean, he's talking about central planning of "productivity" and of what's best for the "collective good", but he doesn't want to be "labeled" a Socialist.

I mean, here's the deal.  Either Glenn Beck is wrong and this man is not a Socialist.  Or Glenn Beck is right and he is one.   If it's the former, please explain how central planning of productivity for the collective good isn't socialism.   If it's the latter, then what does Glenn Beck have to do with any of this at all except to be used as a Negatively Branded Foil to discredit the argument that the government shouldn't be able to force you to buy a product?

Why is it that progressives can be counted upon to deny being Socialistic in one breath and defend Socialism in the next?

If you're a Socialist, embrace it, and let's go from there.   Arguing with a person who is in a state of denial is typically a waste of time.

I also wanted to tell him that lightbulbs are going off all over the Progressive Western World (Europe, Canada) that there seems to be something fundamental about it that DOESN'T work -- in that it punishes those who make money and jobs and increases demand astronomically due to the lack of out-of-pocket expense.   When demand goes up, either price goes up, or you ration.  Or both.   So you end up with an expensive, unresponsive health care system where money can't even buy you good care unless you go to a country that, *gasp*   doesn't have a socialized health care system.

Bureaucrats decide when and what health care you will receive rather than you, you and your friends, you and your community, a benevolent doctor, etc.   And costs to society most definitely do NOT go down unless healthcare is withheld.

Once again, meaning ... death panels.

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