Friday, October 9, 2009

Social disease

A friend recently posted a video on Facebook of Ronald Reagan the actor, pre-Presidential stature, warning against the dangers of socialized medicine. To me, it was a laughable throwback to the grainy, jerky videos of junior high school. It was also a pathetic and appalling attempt to play on our fears of change. In it, Reagan warned that if we set foot on this slippery slope, we would end up in a country where the government told us where and how to work.

I looked up the video on Youtube, and it turns out to be from Michael Moore's movie "Sicko." (You can see it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MCqA4QhfXHA) I don't think my friend realized that!

I wrote my friend "We are already have socialism - it just doesn't work for everyone."

What else do you call it when hospitals are paid by the government to treat the poor? Tobacco farmers are paid subsidies? Dairy farmers, corn farmers, all sorts of agricultural groups receive subsidies. Who else? Educators, for one. We have public radio and public television, both of which receive some federal support I think. There's a subsidy for everybody: one for fossil fuels, one for solar, for small businesses, for veterans.

New in 2006, according to the Cato Institute, are "Healthy marriage promotion" ($150,000,000), "Safety belt performance grants" $124,500,000), and a paltry $60,000 for "Steps to healthier girls." (The source is cited as The Catalog of Federal Domestic Assistance, www.cfda.gov.)

And, horror of horrors, we have a graduated income tax. In a perfect world, that would mean that rich people paid more. What it means in our world, of course, is that people without tax advisors pay more.

So I think all the hysteria about our becoming a socialist country is a little naive. We have government intervention in many aspects of our lives, and I really don't think most of us would want to give it up. Really. Who wants to pay $6 for a loaf of bread, or $10 for a gallon of milk? (Okay, besides people living in Alaska.)

The curious thing to me is that so many of the people hollering loudest have long had advantages from these federal interventions. That includes federally subsidized health care. If it's so onerous and diabolical, why aren't the Republican senators refusing it? After all, that's who their insurance is handled by! You'd think they would at least give it up on principle.

I think a lot of this is just misunderstanding. People are afraid the government will monitor their care; I think we don't have that many government workers. Goodness! We can't effectively track expired visas - how on Earth would we track somebody's birth control usage, or smoking history?

Next post: health care, a personal story.