Perspectives

I’m of two minds on many issues. Perhaps more. I wish I could see just the “right” side of a problem and say, “Here’s the solution. It’s pretty cut and dried. Just do it.” But as much as I want to be that person, it is not so simple, so black and white, as we might fantasize.

Here’s an example: A local Orlando hospital recently announced “No more smokers on the payroll. We don’t want the costs associated with the adverse health affects of long-term exposure to smoking cigarettes.” I get that argument. I do. For years I’ve said we could fix Medicare costs by simply announcing, “In 2013, if you require medical care and nicotine is found in your blood, you will receive less services and/or you will pay more for care.” That’s two years out, which gives people adequate time to quit smoking if they want to tap into any government health care plans. This seems reasonable to me. Does it to you?

Same goes if you’re a chubster, too. Packing on too much weight? Well, why should your fellow citizen pay for your sloppy health habits? Just because you cannot say “no” to the feedbag and you show up requiring medical care for your diabetes (Chop another toe today, Mr. Jepson?), should your neighbors pay? Again, show up in 2013 requiring government subsidized health care “X” percentage over healthy bodyweight and “you will receive less services and/or you will pay more for care.” Again, I’m OK with charging folks more for their free market-determined bad health decisions. Are you?

I’ve one more example. Say your wife or girlfriend has amniocentesis and there is high probability that the child will be born with “X.” Pick any expensive malady. Down syndrome. Fetal alcohol syndrome. Spina bifida. Any number of costly-to-treat (after birth) congenital defects. You make a personal decision to take that pregnancy to term (knowing that “your” fetus is damaged), who legitimately should foot the bill for the subsequent surgeries and long-term care required for that malady? Some premature babies easily cost half a million dollars to stabilize so Mommy Dearest can take baby home. Again, should the rest of us be saddled with the expenses associated with your personal decision? It seems pretty cut and dried to me. Is my frontier “Spartan” logic in error?

We’re not quite there yet but the state of Arizona is showing us our future. Republican Tea Party Gov. Jan Brewer this month slashed money for the state’s transplant program. “Death by budget cuts” is how one headline read. I’ve seen two Arizona citizens on TV matter-of-factly stating that if they do not receive a heart or a lung, they will die. Death panels, anyone? Should we care? Do you care?

I was recently sitting around with my brother discussing the “problems” of the world, and after one particularly loquacious diatribe on America’s political and economic system, I summed-up my perspective with, “We’re all of a piece.”

My brother said, “Yea, and some of us have a little moldy piece at the edge.”

Folks, it’s what we collectively do for the people on the edge (of society, of life) that determines whether or not we are a great nation, let alone a good one. Yep.

Merry Christmas.