Vic Socotra

20 November 2009

Bless Them All

(Capitol Christmas Tree- Courtesy US Senate)

We have never seen an onslaught like this so early in the festive season. I can’t say I have heard a Christmas carol yet, but everything else is happening a month early.

A gigantic glass Christmas tree was hanging in the soaring atrium of the National Harbor development over in Maryland last week- still warm outside. The tree is 65-foot tall and constructed of synthetic “candy” glass and will light up the 20-story glass-enclosed space with sparkling LED icicles.

Everyone is dragging out the holiday stuff weeks early. I started to get the willies when the shelves at the Class Six store at Ft. Myer wer ominously thin on product as they “remodeled” in preparation for the season.

I mean, they could do business out of a CONEX container and we wouldn’t care.

When a government liquor outlet is going the extra mile to market products that many of us can’t do without, it shows the desperation in the air to turn the corner and return to something that seems normal.

I don’t expect that is going to happen. We are going to have to adjust to a series of new normalcies as we eventually arrive at a new equilibrium between ourselves and the rest of the world. And in relation to the planet, though of course we have not talked seriously about that. Not yet.

Oh well. I’d prefer to have taken the tough part of life and got it out of the way at the front end, but we don’t get to chose our timing. Or maybe it is better said that our timing chooses us. As the Reverend Wright used to say before he was bound and gagged, “there are chickens coming home to roost.”

I’m done with the health care thing for the moment. I will suspend comment until the donkeys get done kicking the elephants up on the Hill, and we discover what the fools up there have done to us this time.

Again, don’t get me wrong. I may have felt that nothing was better than something earlier in the week, before I found out that my Doctor was being forced out of business. A pal out on the Left Coast pointed out the human cost of doing nothing, and her story is not uncommon:

“Jobs are hard to find, my 21-year-old needs a double mastectomy which no one will pay for because she doesn't yet have cancer, although every indication is that she will have it within 5 years. The 23 year old is in the Navy and working on getting coverage to take care of what genetics will bring her. The 26-year-old has stayed in a crappy marriage to finance her reconstructive surgery...my eldest daughter has never been covered because her husband's job never provided. They are not unusual people, just people trying to get along. I am so sick and tired of the fucking government and the lobbyists who run it
and damned near every member of Congress who goes along with the programs. Nothing gets done.”

I could not feel worse for her. Clearly, something has to be done. I just don’t know what it is.

Another pal chimed in from the Right Coast. He said: “This is a good time to think about your investment portfolio. I would strongly urge you to consider beefing up on insurance companies. They never lose money -- they may have a temporary set-back; but they have reserves and know they can simply raise charges to cover immediate and future losses...Everyone else will get screwed -- except the Senators, Congress and other politicians that don't have to use the Socialist Medical Care. Of my UK and Canadian friends that came to the US in order to escape this calamity are talking about their next move. Not sure where that is; Dubai?”

From Key West came this commentary, from an astute professional analyst: “Having speed-read the entire House bill a while back, I allowed my mind to return to its normal RPM before commenting. It was filled with amazing quid pro quo deals with groups that fund Democratic election coffers and budgetary gimmicks that hide the true annual cost of the program. There were more than a dozen each by my count with the total bullshit dollar count during the 1st 10 years amounting to a conservative $200B in false savings…deals with parts of the medical care industry, etc. etc. The magic wand is spoofing us to the tune a trillion over just the first ten years. I’ll review the Senate bill later but expect it to be festooned with similar gimcracks and BS.”

I’ll just get this out of the way so I can start dragging out the Christmas decorations. Here is what is going to happen:

We will have a Bill.

It is going to have all the nonsense in it that we have heard, more in some areas and a little less in others.

None of it will change the trend that is squeezing the private doctors, forcing them to either consolidate in larger institutions or getting out of the business altogether.

That will lead to increased demand on limited services, which will cause the predictable problems in delivery of services, which will in turn lead to a de facto rationing of services. It will all be quite fair, and if you have any doubt, just look at the announcements this week about relaxed standards for screening of mammograms and (this morning) pap smears for women.

Fixing the inevitable problems I availability will force tax increases- just as they did in Britain and Canada. They are going to be significant, because the Boomers are all going to pass away in the next three decades, or sooner. We will swamp the oncology wards and the geriatric clinics.

It is inevitable, but we have a delightful commitment to denying plain facts, which of course is how we arrived here at this moment in time.

The government, bless it, will try to apply all sorts of standards of fairness to the whole process, and the results will be exactly the same as every other government program in the history of humankind.

I don’t have any problems with that. I have said from the beginning that I am a product of the same crappy government health care system we are liable to get- no continuity of care, long delays for referrals, but eminently fair. Just don’t be surprised at what it is going to be like.

Some will clearly benefit from reform, particularly those with genetic problems, pre-existing conditions or crappy job situations. But the rest of us are going to lose. Bless us all, aside from the insurance companies, those bastards.

Of course, from the Buckle of the Bible Belt came the only thing that made complete sense.

I had asked for a symbolic blessing on the head of Senate majority Leader Reid, as he delivered his health Christmas tree, festooned with glitter and lights.

My pal said: “If y'all is gonna use Southern phraseology, y'all must get it right. "Bless his heart" is the phrase most often reserved to Southern Ladies, that excuses all that is said afterwards with regard to that person. You are warned that Baptists, Southern Baptists, may descend on your doorstep if y'all don't get it right.”

I’ll throw open the door for them, bless all their pointy heads.

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