Health Care, my $.02

I'm not a lawyer. I'm not a candidate. I'm not a Constitutional scholar. I'm not a legislator. I'm not a commentator.

I'm a dad. I'm a husband. I'm an asthmatic. I'm a voter. I'm an American and I'm confused.

Aside from sitting down and taking a good chunk of my life and reading the 1990 page bill itself, which I don't think would do me much good even if I did, I'm not sure I will ever be able to wrap my head around the complication and intricacy of the Health Care system nor the new "Obamacare" law. What I do know is this; I'm a health care consumer and I know many other people who are as well. I'm lucky enough to have a job, not only a job that pays relatively well, but a job and an employer who provides me health care. My wife is also lucky to have a job and her employer, the state, also provides her, and my daughter, health care. We're "lucky". Does our insurance cover everything, no, do we have to pay out more for instances beyond our control, as our current bills from stays in the ER and urgent care can attest, yes. Would I trade our current system for one run by the government alone? Don't know, and to be honest with you don't care. The reason is, when my little girl couldn't breathe and I didn't know why, and I didn't know where the money was going to come from, and I needed her to get better I didn't care where the money came from, how much it was going to cost or if I had enough insurance, I just needed my little girl to breathe.
It's a good thing that I'm an American too, because the majority of us have that as a value as well, we as a society wanted her to breathe too. We have that ideal as such a paramount value that in this country if you go to the ER, it is now the law for them to do everything they can to stabilize you and make you healthier.

Think about that, its the law in the country that if you go to the ER or another medical establishment, regardless of whether or not you can pay, they have to help you.

In that sense we're all in this together, it's not something we choose to buy, it's who we are.

That's why I think this whole argument that people are "consumers" of health care is not valid at all, people are not consumers of health care, people are people, we're all fighting the same thing, we're all fighting death. To that end, we all know we will inevitably lose that fight and so we do what we can, while we can to forestall that truth.

We also know that with the system we have created, the system of commerce, of money, of the exchange for goods or services, we must pay for everything, "there is no such thing as a free lunch." Are some lucky enough to have clean bills of health, yes, are some people better adapted to fight of death, yes, but that doesn't make the rest of us any less willing to pick up the fight and help our fellow citizens.

Is the system we have perfect? No. Is "Obamacare" perfect? No. Can I get behind another stab at allowing everyone the same access and help in preventing death? Yes. So despite the fight going on within the Supreme Court building this week, I hope that we, as Americans, continue to believe that we must do everything we can to help one another.