Health Care

I've become increasingly cynical about the American political system in the last couple years, especially vis-a-vis the Israeli occupation of Palestine and the US' role in it, but the health care debate has only crystallized the reasons I became so disenchanted. I am very much a supporter of the "public option" as they call it i.e. universal health care. But to watch the deaths and denial of treatment, the center of the issue, boil down to a ridiculous parliamentary procedure essentially dictated by the monetary interests of health insurance companies is sickening. It's the American people and their well-being versus the health care industry, who has control over the US legislature through campaign donations and lobbyists. Who do you think is going to win, honestly? And we all get to watch them haggle like idiots in their subcommittees and have it all boil down to one vote from Joe Lieberman, who as of now, is siding with the health insurance industry; of course he's been bought out. And this all takes place in plain view, while some of the truly ignorant people throw fits at town halls, apparently too stupid to realize they've been scared by corporations into fervently rallying for their own deaths. Needless to say, no members of congress will ever know what it's like to watch a loved one die because there were denied coverage due to a "preexisting condition" or lack of money or coverage. But they will leave people, their "constituents," to languish and die. It's all so absurd, how detached the core issues become from the process. I remember feeling the same way in 2003 during the invasion of Iraq- the US legislature had this formal vote giving the authorization to attack, causing the deaths of thousands of innocent people. The detachment isn't there in my mind- the connection is direct, as it should be for most people. When we think of their act of casting a vote in the Senate we should automatically connect their vote "Aye" with a dead Iraqi child laying in rubble caused by a US or insurgent bomb. When we hear them vote "no" we should all think of a child dying in front of their parents' eyes because they couldn't gain access to health care. The consequences of their procedure are very real. We need to combat this perception of detachment. In my view, the blood is on their hands as much as anyone else's.