Another brief thought on health care - Cui Bono

I still don't think it's really going to work; I don't see how you can cover more people with higher quality for less money, the way Obama says you can, and I wish there was a higher focus on actual public health and education, and also as some friends have pointed out to me, tort reform. But here's what's sticking in my craw, to put it bluntly - at least someone's trying. This is the first time in a long time that anyone in government has tried to do something that wasn't burdened by some repugnant corporate interest, and it's tragic how difficult that is for this Congress to accept. When health care companies pay hundreds of millions of dollars to members of Congress, they don't do so in service to anything as noble as a free market. They do it to tip the scales against the consumer, and that should be obvious by now. That's why we have no real anti-trust mentality, why consumers are barred from purchasing cheaper drugs from outside the country, why there's still no meaningful regulation barring rescission. Those are things that would make it more difficult for businesses to charge more for their services than it costs to provide them. So it's only logical for those businesses to pay the government to make things easier for them. A dollar of lobbying can be worth ten in subsidies, deregulation, barriers to competition, etc. But please, let's not pretend this is what Adam Smith had in mind - it's the opposite.

I know Obama's bill is set to cost over $1T over the next ten years, and I wish it wasn't, but God only knows what all this other crap is costing us, and it's not a mystery how it happens. Government's sole purpose is not supposed to be protecting corporate interests from the people, but that's what's going on here. So even though the bill's seriously imperfect, I'm lining up against those trying to kill it.

When and if the health care bill fails, feel free to declare victory against the forces of socialism or whatever. Just ask yourself at the end of the day, who gained, and whether they got their money's worth.