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Being ordered to do most anything is un-American. We know that freedom is doing what we decide to do; that’s virtually a self-evident description of the personal liberty for which we stand as a nation. But the U.S. Supreme Court went ahead and ordered everyone to buy health insurance, or else pay a penalty. Their decision is almost unthinkable, until we stop and think about the ungovernable mess that is health care today. The average family spends around $14,000 a year for health insurance – a large portion of most anyone's take home pay. Many such health insurance policies still contain a relatively high deductible and exclude coverage for certain medical needs, so it’s increasingly common for people to pay $15-25 grand each year for health insurance, to be covered if disaster strikes. Our health care and insurance systems contain too many negatives. That too is self-evident -- too much paperwork, too many gaps in coverage, too much regulation and too much outright profiteering. There are a reported 30 million people in this country with no health insurance. Long gone are the days when people even expect the health care industry to be self-reliant. Health care has become a mish-mash of co-dependencies. Often decision makers blame others and say there is nothing they can do while collecting big paychecks. It is no wonder the government stepped in. Our government’s solution was blunt, not brilliant – ordering us to buy insurance or pay a fine. That gets everyone paying into “the system.” And, they threw in a bunch of other stuff, creating a huge bureaucracy, a bureaucracy that must tame a business that exists only to help with health emergencies, but has swollen to nearly 20 percent of our economy. It's a system that can’t control itself. I hated the individual mandate in healthcare reform when it was enacted. Mandates from our government are particularly odious, because our forefathers ordained a government on our behalf that would protect liberty, not control people. But for many years, I’ve hated the direction health care is going just as much. Criticizing President Obama's health care reform is okay as far as it goes. But it's old hat. Most of us are well of the burdens of government. We are wary and wise to double negatives and partisan posturings. Show us better reforms.
By George Lauby, Editor
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