Saturday, March 28, 2015

King v. Burwell: A Surprisingly Huge Supreme Court Case

So, apparently the opposition to Obamacare has finally landed on something that might stick.

You know what that means. Their plan to keep millions of people from having any health insurance might actually work.

These are parts of what seemed like a technicality, but which opponents, unable to defeat Obamacare in any conventional sense, are turning to minor little points like this in order to dismantle the whole system, so that they can make sure that people already down can be kicked still a little more.

It's the American Way, at least according to neocons.

Here we go again.

The problem with the American healthcare system is, of course, that it prices far too many people out. Prices are staggeringly high, many times the price of healthcare found in all other industrialized nations. People did not lose their homes or careers because of enormous medical bills following unforeseen medical emergencies in other advanced nations, the way that people did here in the United States.

Want to fix a problem with healthcare? We should all agree that this would be the place to start.

Instead, we have self-serving corporate entities in the area of healthcare literally making a killing, reaping huge profits off of the pain of so many. And instead of a powerful government intervening to fight for the best interests of the people that they represent, we have cynical and self-serving politicians who promote the interests of the crooked healthcare industry that richly compensates them to do so.

It is the exact opposite of the way things are supposed to work. This is corruption in action, and at the very highest levels. Impacting you and me. The little guys, in other words, get shafted, all so that the rich can get even richer, and the poor get poorer. Also, to make sure that there are more people who will enter the ranks of the impoverished.

In other words, it is everything that's wrong with the United States right now.

I am not saying that Obamacare is the answer. Far from it.

In fact, as far as I am concerned, Obamacare does not go far enough towards resolving the longstanding crisis that we call our healthcare system, which has failed the American people for far too long.

Obamacare, for all of it's flaws, was beginning to address some of those inequities. It was a step in the right direction, although to say that it is imperfect is an understatement. While it does address some of the most outrageous and offensive excesses of the old system, the premiums seen in Obamacare are ridiculously high.

As I just stated, what we really need to do in this country is address those lingering problems, to actually make progress towards fixing some of the many problems that the nation is faced with.

Instead, rather predictably, I might add, the focus is on trying to turn back the clock, on not being able or willing to let go of things that are not worth hanging onto in the first place.

In the words of that American neocon demigod, Ronald Reagan, "Here we go again."

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

But I am getting ahead of myself here. This case has not yet taken place, and the outcome is still not certain. We shall see if it is just another hurdle that Obamacare has to overcome, or if it serves to essentially stall the process of greater fairness in the country that badly needs it, yet again.

It seems unbelievable that we are still talking about this in 2015, many years after the passage of Obamacare, and after plenty of exposure to the downright criminal and corrupt aspects of what passed for the national healthcare system beforehand. As such, it serves as yet another reminder, as if we needed one, that this country is going in the wrong direction.



King v. Burwell: A Quick Take on a Crucial Case FEB. 25, 2015

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